Yunyun hummed happily as she sat at our new kitchen table, eating breakfast. I sat a plate on the table just in time for Wiz to stumble in, wearing nothing but a nearly sheer purple night gown. Yunyun, at least, wore a light black silk robe that wasn't quite as sheer.
Yawning, Wiz tiredly collapsed into her seat and began to eat with a happy sound. "Thank you, Michael~!" she said, around a mouthful of eggs and sausage.
Forcing myself not to stare at her sexy body, I made my way back to the (magical) stove and finished plating my own breakfast. Grabbing a cup for myself, I joined the other two at the table in my morning exercise clothes—shorts and a tee-shirt. It had been a little over two weeks since I'd arrived in this world, and only a few days shy of that since I'd built the home we were sharing. I had scouted out Axel for examples to work with, then taken the best and improved upon it…
Our property was surrounded by a tall stone wall on three sides, reinforced with metal, and enchanted for durability, weather resistance, and to clean itself—on top of the security enchantments. Anyone trying to go over the space above the wall for fifty feet up, trying to dig under, or who walked through the front gate when it was in security mode would be teleported to the center of Axel. Likewise, anyone trying to teleport straight in who wasn't on the approved list would similarly be bounced to the center of Axel. The fourth side, facing the river, was a simple stone wall only a foot high that stopped at the beach, which would likewise teleport anyone stepping over it away.
I had cut a wide road from the edge of the property that curved through the forest, so someone couldn't see the property from the gate, then laid that road with bricks similarly enchanted for weather resistance and self-cleaning. Then, I'd asked the clerk if it would be okay to finish cutting a path from our property to connect to one of the roads. When she agreed, so long as we maintained the road, I had done so—simply so we could get carts and horses in if we didn't teleport in, or so others could visit on foot. All along the sides of the stone path, and in the woods, I had built what looked and tended to act like street lights—waist high statues that, at night, cast the path in a warm glow (though the ones in the woods didn't activate unless someone approached). They were also the basis for my active defense system, however. Every one of them was capable of firing off a magical laser at anyone who actually made it past the front gate uninvited—and they weren't set for stun. If you weren't supposed to be there, you were going to have a bad day.
I had cleared off a large stretch of land leading up to the river save for a few of the nicer looking trees for decoration, leveled the ground, made sure to account for drainage for it wouldn't flood, and put in grass—basically just large sections of topsoil and grass I'd ripped up and stored from the fields around town and transported here. Then, I built a home, using Crafter to enchant the thing to the nines. I had cheated a bit on the design, honestly—as I said, I had surveyed the local buildings and borrowed design elements from them. So the exterior shared a lot of design elements with a certain mansion that may or may not belong to another isekai at some point in the future, just… bigger. I'd worked with future planning in mind, so had made a building about four times that size in a large square, with a courtyard and garden in the middle. So far, only the front section where we were living was furnished and the rest of the place was locked up and empty, but if we needed it, it would be there.
Enchantments for self-cleaning, durability, and self-repair really are bullshit and cut down on a lot of work. I could come in with muddy boots, stomp all through the house, and in an hour at most (because the timer for those spells activating was every hour), the marble floors and carpet over them would be clean and good as new. Our household chores had pretty much been reduced to stocking food, cooking, washing dishes with a magical dishwasher, and doing laundry with a magical washer/dryer. The girls loved the appliances. Oven and stove, refrigerator for easy access food, a cube for long term food storage as opposed to a freezer, individual air conditioning/heating for every room and hall, dishwasher and dryer, clothes washing machine and dryer, even a tool to iron and fold clothes.
Look, I like my modern conveniences and I dislike chores. They're a waste of time when you have some other means to do them automatically—or automagically. That was an hour or more a day I could instead spend doing other things.
Everyone got their own bedroom and full sized private bathroom, though there were guest bathrooms and I'd just blatantly stolen the design for the huge fuckoff bath in Kazuma's future mansion for later fun. Cubes provided furniture and other things to our personalized tastes in each room, and with no cost limit on materials… we may have gotten a bit indulgent when it came to making a few things. Though to be fair, if you've got the material and can just make it for free, why skimp when it comes to the things you surround yourself with? Or the bed you sleep on. Crafter-designed mattress, sheets, pillows, and blankets for the best, most sound sleep of your life. And the best sex, because I'd made sure it kept human wants and needs in mind when designing them.
Wiz and Yunyun both got a ring and a cube for personal storage, so that's where we were keeping all of our clothes and other things. Between cleaning magic whenever I wanted it and being able to have a cube dress and undress me, I was starting to feel kind of lazy.
Overall, the place was nice, and starting to feel like a home, but was still kind of empty even in the places we were living in. But that was slowly changing as we made it ours. And it was ours, not just mine. I could already see touches from Yunyun and Wiz in places. I'd put in a system where they could request items from their cubes and, if it wasn't a design already stored, it would forward the request to me to have Crafter make something, then add the design. So new curtains here and there, different towels in the big shared bathroom, even the different plates and silverware we were using this morning had been picked by the two of them.
"So, I figure we'll go run by the guild and pick up a job, hit the field, and test a few new items before taking care of whatever the quest is. Wiz, we'll bring whatever winners we have back and I'll make you a stock. Sound good?"
"Sounds good!" Yunyun smiled, eager to go play with new toys.
Wiz nodded. "That's good, Michael."
"Alright. Let's review your figures for this past week, while I've got you here. How are you looking on stock?"
"Oh, I sold everything already!"
I nodded. "Alright. You have to tell me when you do that, so I can make more. It's okay to have a shortage for a few days so people don't think we have infinite supply, and to drive the price up. I've got a list of Cleric type spells, so I'll be enchanting a few of those. A few for Heal, definitely. What else do you think would be good?"
"Reflect," Yunyun answered instantly. "Being able to just reflect magic at will would be nice."
"Alright. What else?"
"Hmm… Break Spell and Purification," Wiz supplied. "Heal, Break Spell, and Purification would allow parties with a wizard but not a cleric to heal themselves in battle, break curses, and cure poison."
"Exorcism and Turn Undead."
"Eep!"
I reached over and laid a hand on Wiz's. "We aren't going to use it on you," I promised.
"Mm! Right! You'll be fine," Yunyun nodded, taking Wiz's other hand.
"Heal, Reflect, Break Spell, and Purification. Another for Teleport. That should be plenty. Do probably… five each for the cleric spells, another teleport and raise the price twenty-five percent. That sound good?"
The others nodded and I had my cube spit out the requested equipment, before Wiz's own cube stored it. We talked a bit more before finishing breakfast, got cleaned up and ready for the day, and went to work.
"Weeee~!" I laughed as Yunyun flew through the air, slowly descending from her leap—exactly one quarter as fast as she should. "Michael, this is amazing!"
"Right?" I caught her in my arms, then jumped with her as Yunyun latched onto me and we rose through the air, before slowly falling back to the ground. "Definitely a keeper, right?"
"Yes!" she cheered as we landed. Letting go of me, she took off running, before leaping through the air and falling slowly towards a giant toad that was approaching. Then, her fall abruptly sped up as she lowered the mana going into her new toy. Summing a Saber of Light, she slashed through the toad and it exploded beneath her, before she bounced back to me.
"So, Shoes of Moon Walking are a success," I murmured, already adding the enchantment to a list of them for a set of boots. "Ready to try the next one?"
"Ahahaha! Yes, please!" Yunyun giggled, landing beside me and quickly taking off her shoes. A new set appeared on the ground beside her from my cube and she stepped into them. "What do they do?"
"Speed enhancement. I'm not sure how well they'll work or how safe they'll be, however. So, be careful."
"Mm! Right!" With turn she turned away and took a deep breath. "Let's gooo!"
Yunyun took off running away. She quickly accelerated, her strides growing longer and longer, looking more like she was leaping between strides than running. My computation orb clocked her moving at sixty miles per hour before she lost her footing and slipped, tumbling end over end before landing face down in the grass. I cast teleport with line of sight to her side and knelt down, carefully checking her over, before gently rolling Yunyun onto her back.
"Hey, are you okay? Are you hurt anywhere?"
Yunyun's grin spread over her face, even as she blushed deep red and panted. "I'm fine. Just my pride is hurt, and I'm used to getting hit there all the time." Then, she winced and reached up, cupping both of her breasts. "And my boobs. Ow!"
I couldn't help the next words out of my mouth. Grinning down at her, I asked, "Want me to rub them for you?"
"EH?!" she squeaked, red eyes going suddenly wide.
Reaching down, her gaze followed my hand as I rested it on top of hers… and squeezed, while using my orb to cast Heal. "There you go."
"Eep."
"Feel better?"
Yunyun blinked, the embarrassment fading as she squeezed herself again. "Yeah. You cast healing?" I nodded, and she smiled up at me. "Thank you."
I took the hand I was squeezing and pulled her to her feet. Then, I took a moment to brush the grass off of her, much to her embarrassment. "Sure you're okay?"
"Mm," the girl nodded, a soft smile on her lips.
"Alright. Feel up to continuing?" Her smile grew a bit wide and she nodded enthusiastically. "So, I'm thinking for this one, something kind of flowy of trailing, you know? Like a cape, cloak, scarf, or a sash. What do you think?"
"What's it supposed to do?"
"Enable gliding."
Yunyun hummed. "But how am I supposed to test it?"
"Oh, that's easy." I made a new pair of shoes for her, equipped with both the low gravity and speed increase enchantments and handed them over. "Go ahead."
Yunyun swapped shoes and my cube absorbed the materials for the other pair. "I think… a scarf would be nice."
"Alright." Studying her for a moment, I nodded and sent the pattern to the cube. It spat out a dark red scarf and I passed it over. "It's got a few extras on it just so you can wear it full time."
"It's the same color as my eyes…" I nodded and she squeezed it to her breast for a moment, before wrapping it around her neck. "Alright!"
Yunyun got a running start, took a giant leap, and laughed as she began to glide around me in circles. Watching her enjoy herself, I smiled.
Finally, she touched down and launched herself at me, wrapping her arms around me in a hug, before darting up and planting a quick kiss on my lips. Blinking as she realized what she had done, she made a quiet squeak, before burying her face in my chest with a deep blush that went all the way to the tops of her breasts. But she didn't run away, or teleport away, as she had done a time or two when getting particularly embarrassed about something.
I returned the hug, my hand trailing up and down her bare upper back. "So, you like?"
"Mm," she nodded against my chest.
"I'm glad. Ready to try another?"
Yunyun tilted her head up, looking up at me with those pretty red eyes. "…Can we stay like this for a bit? Please?"
Well, I couldn't deny a request asked like that. "Sure. It can wait."
We held each other in companionable silence, enjoying each other's presence. Yunyun was a good deal shorter than me, the top of her head coming up only to just under my chin, and her curvy form fit well in my arms.
"…I've never done this before," she admitted.
"Well, it's been a while for me, too. No need to rush, alright?"
"Mm."
"And Yunyun?" I asked, and she made an inquisitive sound. I pressed my finger to her chin and tilted her face up. Leaning down a bit, I kissed her lips and smiled as she looked shocked. "So there's no misunderstandings."
"N-no, no misunderstandings," she nodded, before standing on her tiptoes and chasing after me, pressing her lips to mine again. "Mmf~."
My hand trailed down, running down her short skirt to cup her round, firm ass. She squeaked and clutched at my shirt, before opening her mouth. Our tongues met in the middle—
And the world exploded.
In the distance, anyway. We both sighed as the mood was broken violently, looking away to the source of the sound, and a small mushroom cloud in the distance. Yunyun looked the angriest I had ever seen her, at that. "Megumin…!"
I gave her ass a squeeze before letting go. "Want to go check it out?"
"No~! I want to go back to what we were doing!" Yunyun whined, pouting, before breathing out a sigh and letting go of my shirt. "But we probably should. If that's Megumin, she can't move. If she's with a party who will just walk away, she's in danger. I can't just leave her like that."
"Alright, let's go," I agreed, and created my own new set of gear quickly—new boots with the anti-gravity and speed enchantment, and a new coat with the glide enchantment. Using the cube to quickly swap them out, we took off at a run for the site of the blast.
Only a minute or so later, we set down on a nearby open field to find a giant toad with a set of legs sticking out of its mouth and, in the distance, a group of adventurers walking away. Yunyun sighed. "Light of Saber!"
One toad explosion later, we pulled the legs out of the remains of the toad's mouth. The captured girl gasped for breath as she was pulled out into the light. "You came back for me—!"
We rolled her over and she blinked, single red eye (the other hidden by a black and red eye patch) taking in myself in confusion, before sliding over to Yunyun. Her entire demeanor changed, going from relieved to depressed. "Oh. It's you."
Yunyun sighed. "Hello, my rival."
Megumin closed her eye and sighed. Yunyun and I shared a look, before she smiled. "Alright. I won't say anything, this time. We'll carry you back."
"You… you really mean it?"
"Of course," Yunyun nodded.
Reaching down, I picked her up in a princess carry, while Yunyun grabbed her staff. Megumin blushed and looked away, pulling the wide brim of her hat down to hide her face. "Who's this guy?"
"The guy who's doing to drop you if you don't show some gratitude," I warned.
Megumin pulled the brim of her hat back up, looking up at me wide-eyed and scared. "You, you wouldn't!"
"Oh, I definitely would. We only came because Yunyun was worried for you. Now, apologize for being a jerk or I'm going to leave you for the toads."
"Michael—"
"No. She's being rude when you went out of your way to help her. If you let her walk all over you, she will. Anyone would, Yunyun. You have to stand up for yourself." Looking down at the small girl in my arms, I fixed her with a stern look. "Now. Apologize."
Megumin sagged. "Sorry."
"For?"
"Nn!" She flinched. "Sorry for being a jerk. Both of you."
"That's better. Alright, let's get home."
With that, I teleported the three of us back to the manor, before heading for the big bath. "Yunyun, I'll hand her off to you. Think you could clean her up?"
"Sure," the girl nodded.
"Thanks. I'll go make lunch for four and make Wiz take a break."
I dropped Megumin off at the bath with Yunyun and set out to do just that, after casting a spell to clean the toad slime off.
I was just getting back from taking Wiz lunch when Megumin and Yunyun came out of the bath, one of Yunyun's robes hanging off of Megumin like a sack for a moment as she distractedly tried to tie it down. When she did get it set properly, I raised an eyebrow at the way it clung to her form. Megumin was not flat. Small, athletic, and sporty? Absolutely. But with those (proportionately) wide hips and thicc thighs, and the little mounds of her breasts, she looked like a lot of fun, if I'm being honest.
"Wiz didn't come back?"
I shook my head and finished up plating food for the rest of us. "No, she was actually busy. More than ten people in the shop looking to buy our stuff. So I made her lunch and took it to her, and watched the shop for a few minutes while she ate. Dropped off the new stuff so she could put it out, while I was there. People think I'm just a new hire running errands for her—which is fine by me. Did a little market research while I was at it. Made a sign and a suggestion box and put it out front, then put one in the guild hall, asking what people wanted to see in magic items. We'll need to check those later and see if we get any hits."
We all sat down at the table and dug in to the sandwiches I'd made. A surprisingly erotic sound slipped past Megumin's lips as she began to dig in with gusto. Yunyun and I shared another look and I asked, "Say, when's the last time you ate?"
Megumin paused, her mouth so full her cheeks bulged like a chipmunk. After taking a few moments to swallow and wash it down with tea, she said, "Only a week. I thought for sure this party would let me stay with them! But then…" She looked down at the table and sank into herself. "They just left me there. Those jerks."
Reaching out, I laid a hand on top of hers. The girl squeaked when I gave it a squeeze. "Sounds like you've had it rough."
"N-no! This, this is nothing!"
"They abandoned you."
She shook her head. "So I'll find another party that won't!"
Sighing, I explained, "Megumin, could you move when they left you?"
The girl sent me a curious look and shook her head. "No."
"So you were completely defenseless?" She nodded. "And, in fact, were in the process of being eaten by a monster when we arrived?" Another nod.
I turned to Yunyun. "Did those guys even look back?"
"No," she denied.
Turning back to Megumin, I continued. "You were abandoned and left for dead when you were at your most vulnerable. You haven't eaten in a week. When's the last time you had a bath?"
"Today."
"Before today?"
She winced. "Last week."
"Did laundry?"
"Same."
I went in for the kill. "Slept in a bed?"
Megumin refused to answer, taking on a mulish look. Yunyun sighed and shook her head. "Last week. I saved her from another toad and left her some eris to get food and take care of herself."
Standing up, I met Yunyun's eyes and nodded towards the door leading out of the small kitchen/dining room. "Have as much as you want. We'll be right back. And eat slow, or you'll hurt yourself," I warned.
We stepped outside, pulling the door mostly to—leaving it cracked do we could see Megumin sitting there stuffing her face. Turning to Yunyun, I asked, "She's your friend?"
"I, that is, we… we're rivals." Reaching out, I laid a hand on her shoulder and waited. After a moment, she nodded. "Megumin is my only friend."
"Okay. Do you want to help her?"
Yunyun didn't even hesitate. "I do."
"Okay. How do you feel about having an assistant? We can hire her on as your assistant and pay her. And since she's working for us, why don't you get her a room? She can stay here with us."
The girl nodded. "That would be good. Michael," she leaned in close, smiling shyly before standing on her tiptoes and pecking my lips. Pulling away with a blush, she whispered, "Thank you for this."
"You're welcome."
We came back in and found Megumin had nearly finished her meal. "Still hungry?"
"Mm," she mumbled, nodding.
I used telekinesis to cut my sandwich in half and put the other half on her plate, since I wasn't very hungry, and I doubted she could eat that much more. They were pretty damn big sandwiches, anyway. "So yeah, here's the deal. Yunyun and I are working together with Wiz now. I make items, she tests them," I pointed to Yunyun, "and Wiz sells them. We could use another tester, if you're interested. The job pays pretty well. Yunyun?"
"We take a kill quest or two when we go out to test things, so we also get the income from those… but really, the business is starting to take off. I'm making more from sales now than from the jobs."
Megumin looked between us incredulously, then suspiciously. "What, you make magic items too?"
"'Too?'"
She nodded. "My dad makes them. They're crap. It's why my family is—"
Megumin cut herself off, but I could hear the frustration there. Yunyun shook her head quickly. "No, no! Nothing like Hyoizaburoo! Michael's creations work and don't have any drawbacks! Here," she took off one of her rings and handed it to Megumin—the one with what I'd come to think of as 'convenience spells' on it. Telekinesis, cleaning magic, conjure water, and a spell for creating heat/fire.
Megumin looked at the ring in curiosity before putting it on. She blinked, then pointed at her glass of water. It wobbled slightly as it rose into the air, before falling as she girl slumped in her seat. I caught Megumin and Yunyun caught the glass. "Easy," I propped her up. "You're still low on mana. Here." Tapping into the computation orb, I rested my hand on her arm and transferred over some mana.
The small girl perked up immediately, before turning wide eyes on me. "You really can…"
"Yeah," I nodded, sitting back down. "So. We'll pay you. We've got rooms here. Yunyun will pick yours and make you a bed. You can live here rent free as long as you're working for us. Just contribute to the food budget and take care of your own chores. You don't have to decide now. Take some time. Let Yunyun show you around. Spend the night and think it over."
"You, you'll really do that? Really?"
"Really," Yunyun nodded, sending Megumin a smile.
"I'll do it!"
"Hold on," I held up a finger. "There are some conditions."
"I knew it sounded too good to be true!"
Chuckling, I explained. "Don't be a jerk. That's my rule. Be nice and you can stay. Got it?"
"Y-yeah. I will."
Reaching out, I rubbed the top of her head, earning a blush in response. "Alright. Let's get you outfitted. Yunyun, I think it's about time I did the same for you as well."
One of my cubes flew out of my pouch and Yunyun clapped, an eager smile on her face. "Let's just… take care of that little mana problem," I murmured, deciding what to do first.
Starting the build queue, I selected two new computation orbs, identical to my own—save for a few changes. Namely, that I could remote deactivate them, and Megumin's wouldn't let her just spam Explosion all day, or sink a ridiculous amount of mana into a single Explosion, unless I gave it the okay—and that most of the outside-system spells with visible effects would be locked out unless they were in danger.
Okay, that's done. Bottom layer up, then. While I'm at it, might as well do some for me and Wiz, too.
I started with underwear and worked my way up to every piece of clothing we normally wore, taken from scans done with my cube. Every piece of fiber was woven from the most durable, flexible, and stretchy fibers available, with mithril and orichalcum woven into the mix, and sheathed in the softest material available to me. I made sure they would be warm when it was cold, breathe when it was hot, water resistant, and water wicking even without magic, just from their base materials. Then I went for something more exotic, adding a very thin layer of dragon hide inside each, just under the surface layer of cloth, for added protection.
Next, I started working on enchantments. I started with the basic stuff that everything we used would get from now on—self-cleaning (including drying), water repelling, self-repairing, and temperature control. Then, I started in on defensive enchantments. Enchantments to turn even a thin layer of cloth into something that could easily turn away blades and bullets. Enchantments that extended protection over the whole body, including uncovered skin. Enchantments to turn away energy from enemy spells, adding a layer of magical protection. After that, I added stat enhancement enchantments across the board, increasing all of our stats by a minimum of ten percent at all times, but allowing us to put mana into them and increase that boost at any time.
Then, I started in on the fun stuff. Boots and shoes got the stuff I had been testing with Yunyun today plus some extras: adjustable gravity, increased speed, silencing to quiet our footsteps, water walking, and surface sticking to allow for walking on walls, ceilings, and other places. Yunyun's new scarf, I left alone. Megumin's cloak, a cloak for Wiz, and my jacket I enchanted with glide. Gloves—which Megumin and I both wore—Yunyun's tie, and Wiz's cross I enchanted with a magical shield to deploy in an emergency. Everyone got a belt buckle enchanted with an emergency teleport that would go off if it detected that they were wounded, unconscious, or out of mana and teleport them back to the manor. Enchantments to dispel curses and debuffs like Sleep, nullify poison, and more were thrown in.
Well, it's a good thing we don't have to power these ourselves, because fuck a duck they're going to just soak up mana. However, despite that, I considered it worth it for the protection they afforded.
Finally, I put a new cube and ring in the queue and sent the build order to my cube and Yunyun's. My cube split open and created the new cube and ring first and I sent the rest of Megumin's build order to her own cube. Then, I handed her the mithril ring.
"This is yours. It will only work for you. If you take it off and get more than five feet from it, or leave it off for more than five minutes, it'll teleport back onto you. Yunyun will show you how to use the cubes later. Don't tell anyone how they work. If they ask, it's a fancy magical storage device and light source—that's all. Do not abuse them. Don't try to make a bunch of shit then sell in the market—someone will get suspicious if we do that too often."
Megumin nodded and took the ring I offered with shaking hands, before slipping it onto her left ring finger. "I won't," she promised. "Thank you."
Her cube split open and Megumin fumbled a moment as something dropped out of it. Holding up a computation orb with a confused look, she looked up at me and Yunyun, who held her own. "Put them on. Under your clothes. They stay on, like the cube ring. Get used to sleeping with it on. They're going to provide you with extra mana and spells. Yunyun, that obsoletes the ring with telekinesis, so you may as well store it, unless you just want to wear it. Your cubes will let you know when your new outfits are done. Megumin, we get up at first light, so get to bed early, okay? I'll leave you two to talk and explore. I've got some stuff I want to work on in the lab."
With that, I downed the last of my water and left them to it.
Behind me, Yunyun called, "Thank you, Michael!"
"You're welcome."