“What exactly are you trying to do?” Charles demanded in exasperation.

His grandmother had wrangled an octopus monster from the river and was busy poking at one of it its shriveled eyes with her finger.

“Have you fought one of these things before?” Cassy asked her kids.

“Alli, Kira, and I have. It was a much bigger one though. It was in St. Louis, I think. It was destroying everything along the riverfront there when we arrived.”

“Hmm,” She joined her mother in poking the distraught monster.

Charles threw up his hands in exasperation and pulled Myri back before she could move closer. “No, you are not going to join them. Just because they are both crazy doesn’t mean you need to catch the disease as well.”

“How did you fight it?” Steve asked his son and future daughter-in-law.

“I used my magic, and Kira, her hammer.” She demonstrated by letting her silver bracelet form into a large warhammer. “And Alli can use shadows to travel and attack. Well, she could at the time. Now she is even more powerful.”

Alli grinned at them, showing off her large teeth. Since she was letting Myri ride her, she had decided to just stay in her current Great Elemental Shadow Spirit form. Frankly, she still looked like the silver husky he had rescued months ago, just larger and with wisps of shadow clinging to her hair like liquid smoke now.

He thought it was cool looking.

“That monster wouldn’t stand a chance against us now,” She said, projecting her thoughts to the group.

Kira snorted and scratched behind her fluffy ears. “This little one here is probably a higher level than that one was anyway. It was just larger because it was the mother or something.”

It was true. A lot of the earlier, naturally occurring monsters had been much larger than the more recent ones they had been seeing. Not to say the current ones were small by any means. It was simply they hadn’t gotten quite the initial supercharged dose of mana their parents had.

However, that was better for the beasts since it meant they grew up properly knowing their bodies and abilities. It was still early days, but the few they had seen were stronger than their parents. They had a better idea of what they could and couldn’t do, instead of brute forcing everything.

Clara took hold of its tentacles and waved them about in the air a few times. “Do you see this thing? It’s so much fun!” She slapped the monster with its own tentacle a couple of times before stepping back, abruptly losing interest.

“Well, I can see why you would have struggled in the beginning going up against things like this. And that green booger muncher over there.” She waved to a goblin that had been watching them from a stand of trees.

It waved back before continuing to dig in its nostril for the illusive snack.

“Actually, the goblins are somewhat of an oddity. Since the gods released control of the monsters, they’ve been trying to establish communities of their own. I wouldn’t say that they’re peaceful, but they at least aren’t as bloodthirsty as some of the other monsters have been. The orcs, trolls, cockatrices, and vulture bats have all been far worse. And those are just off the top of my head.” Charles ticked them off his fingers as he spoke.

“Are there other nice or intelligent monsters?” Steve wondered.

“There are a few, Stormy, the harpy springs to mind, though her intelligence is somewhat in question.”

Kira pushed him. “Don’t be mean, she’s nice, just a little bird-brained.”

Charlotte groaned. “Ugh, I can’t believe you went there. That was bad.”

Scott and James were standing to the side talking with Conor, getting to know him a little better.

“Anyway, are you done being mean to poor defenseless monsters? If so, we should probably head back before we miss the entire party.” Charles asked as she poked at the sucker on the tentacle.

“Indeed, seeing them has given me a few ideas to bring up during my conversation with Gaia,” Clara said with a smile.

“Mom, we went through this earlier. We are not trying to kill off everyone on this planet. They already have enough troubles with the other gods and the chaos they will cause.” Cassy glared hard at her mother.

“Besides,” Charles began as he herded everyone together so they could head back. “These aren’t the only monsters. There are plenty more that I haven’t even run into. Including ones from myths, and local folklores.”

“So, what you’re saying is that these aren’t the cream of the crop?”

“I’m saying that there is a lot of variety here and that they are all continually growing stronger. Just like the people who live here… if they know what is good for them.”

Behind them, a small group of twenty goblins and a single large hobgoblin burst from the trees and descended on the mini-kraken beast. They were taking the easy kill and food when they saw the chance. The group had decided to not loot the monster and instead leave it behind for them.

Back at town, they rejoined the celebration and ate until their bellies were full and slightly bulging. It was a rare occasion for the people to cut loose, and they were taking full advantage of it. All of them had learned how precious life was over the last few months.

Gone were the days of sitting behind a desk feeling lost as your soul was drained by the constant drudgery. Modern society may have had all the comforts, but it had been harder in a lot of ways for many people. Life in a system-created town wasn’t bad by any means either.

They still had several of those comforts they had come to love. Running water, toilets, even some electricity. Best of all, life had lost the complexity that had made it so unbearable for a lot of them. As long as you ignored the constant threat of death and destruction it was great.

Frankly, it was silly to ask for more, no matter how much they wanted to. They had all heard the stories of what the man who had saved them had done. Charles terrified most of them.

At the end of the night, Krystal and Kory gathered everyone together so Charles could bring them back up. This time, the three otherworlders and the bears also accompanied them up to the space station.

It had been a different sort of Christmas for everyone, but no less enjoyable for it.

“What now?” Zack asked as everyone went their separate ways back on the station.

“Well, tomorrow I’ll be sending you home. So, tonight just relax and get some sleep.” Charles said, pointing them toward an empty dorm apartment.

Conor kept gazing after them for a few more seconds before turning to his daughter and son-in-law. “Do you remember when I mentioned that a younger pair of Gods found you before Dantanian, and made a pseudo copy of Earth?”

“Vaguely. It was something about splinters and fragmented worlds with portals connecting everything,” Steve replied.

“Close enough. Those three are from that world.”

Clara studied the three as they vanished into the apartment for the night. “Interesting. There must be something linking Earth to their world still. That would explain why they ended up here when their system malfunctioned. Earth is the original site behind which their worlds were created.”

“Will it keep me from sending them home tomorrow?” Charles asked.

“No, nothing of the sort. I just thought it was an interesting coincidence, is all.” His grandfather clarified.

“Right then, you two off to bed,” Cassy ordered her parents. “It’s been a long time since you inhabited mortal-ish bodies. They need sleep, among other things, which I’m pretty sure you didn’t do last night. You were up all night exploring this place.”

“Yes, well, for all its faults, what Dantanian managed to get the gods of this world to do is rather interesting. Now that the little Grand World Spirit below is in control, I can’t wait to see what she manages to accomplish.”

“That will have to wait until I send the kids back home at the absolute earliest. Until they are gone, she can’t do anything.”

Clara and Conor shared a look and then turned to their daughter. “We want to be there when she begins these upgrades. Since you all are set on us never being alone with her, we wanted to let you know now.”

Cassy narrowed her eyes. “That’s strangely upfront of you. Why?”

“It’s because they don’t think you’ll be able to go, or at least stay the full-time, mom,” Charlotte answered, leaning against her husband. Scott was wearing a dark cloak that matched the one James always wore. It had been his Christmas present from the man he regarded as a father figure. “That’s when Dantanian is most likely going to cause some issues.”

“It makes sense. Gaia’s focus will be elsewhere, which will limit any involvement from her. It will be the perfect time to make a move, and that’s not even taking into account any effects her messing with the system might have. People could lose access to their abilities in the worst-case scenarios.” Silvi spoke up, holding a dozing Myri against her side.

Cassy glared at her parents. “Could you, for once, just try not to mess with something and simply help? I know you want to find something interesting, but trust me, watching our family grow and thrive is more interesting than you can imagine. You just need to give it a chance.”

Mother and daughter held a long look before Clara gave a small nod. “Fine, you win this time. It’s not like we could really do anything anyway. This isn’t one of our worlds. We can’t control or make any big changes. We’ll simply advise her on how to best optimize the changes she is already making, nothing more.”

She had been hoping they might help them in the coming fight, but knew this could be even better. It would mean Gaia would finish her changes even faster.

“What about the compulsion they put on him?” Charles wondered. “Shouldn’t that buy us some more time?”

Conor shook his head. “The mind is a complex thing. Actively controlling it while he was in front of us was relatively easy. Move him away to his own dimension and our control naturally wanes. He’ll start to fight back against the compulsion. We put as much power as we dared into it, but it was never meant to be used on other High Gods. And when you consider his somewhat unique mental condition, well, it will be interesting to see how it changed.”

Kira rubbed at her eyes in frustration. “Great, so this Dantanian guy, who we’ve been calling Bob this entire time, is crazy enough to even change a compulsion from the Gods now. This is going to be awesome!”

Charles picked up Myri as they separated after making some more plans. He was glad his mom and dad were back, but Dantanian was proving to be more trouble than they had originally thought he would be. Kira was right. This was not going to be fun.