Oolga closed the door to her room and lit a bronze bowl full of plant oil ablaze. The dark interior lit up with an orange glow, and she closed the curtains to the dark outside.

Small flames flickered over the Mayhem Orc’s body and a playful smile teased her face. She lifted a hand and brushed one sleeve off her shoulder. A rough hand came from behind her and brushed off the other sleeve. Her silky green shirt slid down her body and rested on the floor.

Oolga bent over and undid the string tying her pants up. They slid down her hips to join her shirt. A pair of burly arms wrapped around her from behind. She turned her head and met her mate’s face for a kiss. His saliva tasted sweet, and she bit playfully at one of his tusks.

Their mouths separated, and Rigdam rested his forehead against hers. His breathing was so content that he could have been sleeping. Oolga looked deeply at his face and smiled, then patted his cheek. He opened his eyes and she smirked, nodding at her nestbed.

Rigdam gave her another brief kiss and pulled back his arms. He went and laid down on the bed. Reflected in his eyes, Oolga could see certain parts of her that had excitedly burst into flames. They were harmless, thankfully.

Oolga stepped toward the man who was waiting to receive her and leaned over him. She put a hand on his chest and he held it. They kissed once more and she lowered her hips down.

After she had given birth to Vyra, Oolga had lost the desire to have children. Even now, that was still true. She just wanted to be close to this idiot who fell in love with his first partner—a swine who assaulted him one-sidedly—and couldn’t let go. This moron who was doomed to love her no matter how awful she was. This stupid, stupid man... who made her so very happy.

Rigdam, too, wanted nothing to do with the woman who abandoned him, even after forcing him down so many times. He didn’t want his first relationship to be so toxic. But his goddess had designed him to love eternally and unconditionally. No matter how much he tried to deny his feelings, once they were there, they wouldn’t go away.

And he happened to give in to those feelings and confess around the same time Oolga had lost the love of her only daughter. Perhaps she had just used Rigdam to comfort herself during that unhappy time. They disagreed on everything even down to their most core beliefs, but there was one trait they both shared: they desperately wanted love. Rigdam was a person who could really and truly love someone unconditionally, and Oolga quickly fell for that him.

Their relationship had had one of the worst starts it could have, but it had somehow arrived at one of the best conclusions.

Just, for one reason or another, they sort of hadn’t told anybody that they had gotten back together.

Oolga thrusted her hips down again and again. Red lights flickered in distorted patterns against the walls. Rigdam felt a squeal rising in his throat, and pulled Oolga down for a kiss to mute the sound. The flames on her lips and face made him tingle with a strange sensation.

She thrusted again. Her pace was increasing, and each stroke was stronger than the last. Rigdam clawed at her back and she thrusted.

A firework went off, blossoming with bright colors. Oolga lowered her chest onto her mate’s and they both caught their breaths. She rolled off of him. He put his arm around her shoulder and pulled her close to his side. They stared quietly at the ceiling, and Oolga smiled.

Knock! Knock! Knock!

The relaxation they had just achieved immediately vanished. Oolga stood up in a frenzy and shoved Rigdam into her closet, throwing his clothes at his chest and closing the door.

“Just a moment!” she called, quickly throwing on her discarded clothes. She peeked out the door and moved her gaze up, seeing her daughter’s apologetic face.

“Hello, momma. I was feeling a little lonesome, so I wanted to visit you tonight, but it ended up getting quite late while I looked over the evening reports. Am I being a bother?”

Oolga’s expression softened, and she muttered a silent apology to Rigdam. “Of course not, baby. Come in.”

***

Vyra smiled and stepped inside, taking a seat on the bed beside her mother.

“I’ve been thinking about mountains lately,” Vyra smiled sadly.

Oolga tilted her head, “Mountains?”

“Right. There’s never just one mountain. Both in my world and in this world, there are many mountains, and a lot of the time they’re connected.” She laced her fingers and set her chin down on them, “But it’s metaphorical too; it means there are a lot of different ways to be at the top.” She lowered her eyes, “Well, it doesn’t really matter, I guess.”

Oolga patted her daughter’s shoulder and stood up. She took out kettle to her room’s adjoining bathroom and filled it with water. She quickly brought it to a boil with the spell, poured the water into a tea pot, and threw some mint leaves in to let them steep. Soon, the both of them had a refreshing drink in their hands, and the mood lightened up considerably.

“Things in the city are going well, aren’t they?” the Mayhem Orc said. “Cheer up a little.”

Vyra held her cup close to her heart and smiled, “They’re going very well. According to the evening reports, the apprentice researchers have nearly finished engraving all the components for the city barrier, and the mining project is going exactly as expected. All production is up, and we have proper weapons being smithed at last. In another week or two, we should be ready to start constructing those magic roads I want.”

Oolga lifted her eyes up. “Oh, those things. Fiara’s going to work herself to death over those.”

“She’ll be fine,” Vyra waved. “People said the same thing about those skill patterns, but she made them work in the end.”

“Aren’t you the one who figured out the secret to those?”

Vyra smiled tensely, “Implementation is what’s important. Implementation. At best, I helped her out with the theory side of things.”

“Well, regardless,” Oolga smiled, “the city is prospering and your family loves you. Just what do you have to still feel upset about?”

Vyra pulled her mother in for a hug with one arm. Oolga blinked and then cuddled into her daughter’s embrace. “You’re right as always, momma. Thank you, I feel much better.”

After enjoying the comfort for a while longer, Vyra retracted her arm and stood up, setting her empty cup on a bedside table. “I’d better get going.”

“Make sure you get enough sleep,” her mother chided her. “Don’t stay up all night working on that project of yours.”

Vyra smiled, nodded, and stepped out. Rigdam finally stumbled out of the closet, and Oolga served him a cup of tea.

“What project?” he asked. “I haven’t heard anything about it.”

“It’s nothing, really,” the red Orc averted her eyes. “She heard from that Dwarf, Balig, that hand-made items are much more precious than magically made ones, and she decided to cut some gemstones.”

***

Vyra strolled through the empty palace halls and down some stairs to her basement workshop. Here, she had recreated her stone-cutting tools from her last life. Aside from the fact that her cutting lap now spun manually when she pumped her foot on a pedal, it was just like the tools she had at work.

Lined up on the table were three finished gemstones. They were cut in the classic diamond style for which she had the measurements memorized. The stones were comparable to S grade, light yellow diamonds, and each one was about the size of a quarter. Vyra wanted at least two more of them to set into a crown which she would wear someday, but she needed to collect another stone to cut first.

She walked over to a table where a large body was lying and healed it so that the smashed head grew back. Once again, she smashed the face which was identical to her own and pried out the third eye which served as her magic core. Apparently, if she ever died, her magic core would stop resembling an eye and become this pale yellow crystal instead. Also, the magic cores she’d already cut were still able to store Magic Power, so they weren’t just for decoration.

No tumbling was necessary for the smooth and clean magic core, so she went right to faceting it. She worked steadily for about an hour, and then decided it was high time she went to bed.

is such a useless skill, she complained for the neither the first nor the last time.