Chapter 90: 90 – Where the Wind Reaches

White snow blew across the window outside John's office, barely illuminated by the night Tokyo cityscape.

It was late in the evening, long after Hana's stream and reaction to Alfi's debut.

John would have liked to watch it, but like Beta had mentioned earlier, he had a lot of work to settle.

Anyway, the girls had all gone off to have a slumber party to get to know each other in Betty's room downstairs. John wasn't sure exactly what that entailed, but it was probably the typical bonding shenanigans.

Although he had to admit that he was slightly curious... but his instincts were warning him that he was better off being left in the dark, so he resisted the urge to peek.

John straightened a stack of papers on his desk that he still had had to go through, mostly tax information and forms that had to be sent in the old-fashioned way instead of online, and then turned his attention to his computer.

A 3D model was displayed on the monitor. A young anime woman with bright blue hair, horns poking out of her head, wings sticking out of her back, and a scaly tail.

Asako's avatar, which she insisted to be modeled after the Azure Dragon.

John felt like it was far too much on the nose, personally, especially with the backstory that Asako chose. But there was the saying that the best lies had a grain of truth in them. And that the truth was often time more ridiculous than a lie.

"...Well. Not like anyone would test it." John muttered and then ran the model through a few more simulations, tweaking the physics on the wings and tails.

As he did, he idly wondered if anyone would appreciate that he was basing it on how those body parts actually worked in reality.

Probably not, but he would, and that was all that mattered.

John stifled a yawn and saved the modifications to the model. After that, he memorized the raw data just in case something happened to the computer.

Which was fairly likely, considering how well things seemed to be going recently. And how calm things had been.

A faint buzz. John's phone, vibrating against his desk.

"Hm?" John glanced at it and saw that it was a message from Kai. "What does that guy want at this time?"

It was almost midnight. Shouldn't that guy be asleep or something?

Frowning, John picked up his phone to check the message.

[Just touched down in LAX. Will be gone for a month or so.]

John blinked, wondering what the heck 'LAX' was... and then he remembered that it was the Los Angeles International Airport. "Huh. Didn't expect him to leave right away."

When John told Kai to enjoy a vacation with Tsuki, he hadn't been expecting Kai to leave the same day.

"Guess that guilt trip worked better than I thought."

He'd have to remember that when Kai got back if he needed his friend to do things.

John tapped on the message to respond and started typing. "Good luck... have fun... Let me know... if you need things... And send."

Not long after, Kai replied.

[Thanks, Friend. Will call if needed.]

"Huh." John leaned back to read the message and said, "That guy's a lot different over text than in person." He shrugged and then set his phone back on the desk. After that, he conjured a cup of coffee and opened up a sticky note app on his computer to make a list of what he had to do.

"Let's see..." John took a sip of his coffee and started typing.

First off was making Alfi's streaming schedule and organizing her first proper stream tomorrow.

Right now, Hana's streaming schedule was in the afternoon most days, with sliding slots on the weekends.

Asako mentioned that she wanted to stream in the mornings, so that meant that the best times for Alfi would probably be the evening.

Of course, since there were only the three of them, the schedules could shift around to accommodate. And later on, overlapping could be fine once they had an established audience. But for right now, and to future proof things, it seemed like the schedule for the members of Project MirAIs would be: Asako in the morning, Rin in the afternoon, and Alphy in the evening.

He'd have to hash out the details with the girls after Asako's debut stream to confirm what they planned to stream and when, but that was a problem for future John.

"Alright. Then next... Alphy wanted to do a gaming stream tomorrow, so I'll need to remember to set that up." John jotted that down and made a note to move some streaming equipment into the recording studio that she had taken over as her room.

"Rin..." John opened up Hana's schedule on his computer. "Another karaoke stream tomorrow afternoon. And after that, a gaming stream of... Neighboring Malice?" John blinked, wondering if he was reading that right. And it seemed that he was.

"...Isn't that the knock-off of the popular zombie virus game with the Umbrella company?"

A quick bit of research revealed that it was.

"Geez. You can't really judge a person's tastes by their appearance and personality, huh?"

John remembered Rin not being that scared playing the last horror game, but to think that she was going to dive right back in... Granted, the Neighboring Malice game she was going to play was the old one for the PFX, but still.

John shook his head and then took a sip from his coffee. After that, he glanced at the stack of papers on his desk.

He... really should go through sorting them. It wouldn't take long. After all, he could always use his powers to speed up the process.

But still, it was paper work. And paper work was boring.

He stared at the stack of papers. And he could have sworn the stack of papers stared back.

Or at least, that was what John wanted to say so that he could have an excuse to burn the pile to ashes.

But they didn't. It was just ordinary paperwork that he had to fill out and file with the local municipal office to make sure that things were in order before the new year.

John sighed and then dug around his desk for the TV remote. "Let's see what's on the news first."

Right. It was important to gauge what the current events were so that he could make proper plans for the future.

John definitely wasn't just procrastinating filling out those forms. Absolutely not.

The mounted TV on his wall turned on. A few clicks of the remote later changed the channel to the local news.

Of course, since it was late, the programming was more about random trivia and minor stories instead of breaking news. But it was still important. Definitely-

"Eh?" John blinked.

A woman was running the program. That wasn't odd. But the fact that she was definitely not Japanese was.

Sandy blonde hair. A slightly masculine face, but still clearly feminine. And a deadpan expression along with a slightly sarcastic tone of voice. "I'm Poppy Gloria, and this is your news."

"Wait. Wait, wait, wait." John leaned forward and turned up the volume. "Poppy Gloria? Like, that fake personality the famous UTuber put on to run his news section?"

The news anchor shuffled a stack of paper and said, "In today's news... An amazing new UTuber debuted!" She waved her hand and showed a screenshot of Alfi's last moments in her debut stream. It was a picture of her smiling with tears running down her cheeks, standing in front of the ruined buildings. "For all of you otakus out there, the future is here. A real, 2D waifu, created by the genius behind Project MirAIs called John Smith. We've got feet on the ground hunting the man down, but he's looking to be as mysterious as the mythical John Titor said to be running the operation himself. Or maybe he's really a time traveler? The tech is advanced enough that he could be."

John felt sweat run down his brow. He didn't expect news outlets to be running stories about Project MirAIs yet. Especially not on national television considering everything else going on at the moment.

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The saving grace was that the current timeslot was just filler and that there weren't many people watching.

Even so... "Looks like I made the right choice scheduling that interview on Monday." John muttered and then took a sip of his coffee.

"I don't know about you all, but I'll be looking forward to seeing what else comes out of Project MirAIs. Now, in other news."

The screenshot of Alfi faded, replaced with a blood-stained intersection. The middle of it was blurred out, but a mangled body and a semi-truck could still be made out in the mosaic.

"An unfortunate foreigner was recently struck and mortally wounded by a truck in Shibuya." Poppy Gloria shuffled a stack of papers, her eyes scanning across them. "As they lay dying, the foreigner was said to have stated, and I quote, 'Guys. I'm a main character now. I gotta have a major role in the story.'" She sighed and said, "And here we see the dangers of reading too much isekai. Remember, not everyone is a main character. And trucks don't isekai you." She set her papers down and said, "Next up..."

John turned off the TV and sighed. "Guess not everyone's lucky enough to get properly isekai'd like me, huh?"

He idly wondered if that foreigner had been asking for it. But then he decided that it didn't matter and turned his attention back to the papers.

Silence. Time passed.

And then John sighed and picked them up. "I really need to hire an assistant." He leaned back in his chair and sipped his coffee, scanning the papers.

Seeing legalese and dense fine print, John sighed. "My backlog's definitely going to keep growing at this rate."

After going through the papers, John still had to set up the countdown and make the new background on the website. Then he had to make clips of Hana and Alfi's stream before uploading them to the official Project MirAIs UTube channel. Then he had to make and edit the videos teasing the reveal of Asako's character, manage the social media accounts...

It was a never-ending deluge of more things to do. But even so...

"It's fine." John nodded and took a sip of his coffee.

Right. It was fine. While he had a lot to do, all of it was for the sake of people he cared about. Not only that, but this wasn't just about him anymore.

Maybe if it had still just been him and Rin like in the beginning, things would be different. But now his beloved daughters were involved, and he had a proper employee in Asako as well.

Which reminded him. He really needed to get to know the Seiryuu Heiress better and sort out her affairs.

But anyway, like Beta had said, it was time for him to be a responsible adult. Even if he couldn't play games, watch anime, or read manga and light novels, as long as his daughters and their friends were happy, *he* was happy.

Though, speaking of his daughters...

"Meg should be coming soon too, right?"

Omega. His youngest daughter who inherited the worst personality traits from him and from Yue. A volatile princess-type that would be dropping down in the middle of all this...

John felt a shiver run down his spine. "M-Maybe she's grown out of that phase...?"

It *had* been a few hundred years since he last saw her. After all, he had been busy working on his transcendence and didn't have time to spend with her-

"Ah."

Right. He didn't have time to spend with her and then he promptly left not just her, but her mother behind while running off to Earth.

Which meant that her affection towards him wouldn't just be zero, but it would have dropped to the negatives. And considering John's youngest daughter preferred fists to words...

"I... should probably start setting up formations around the city."

And prepare a battle arena.

That battlejunkie of a daughter he had wouldn't calm down until she got tired out. And the aftereffects from their fight would blow up all of Japan... so yes. Definitely necessary to set up an arena. And lay protective formations.

Then there was Yue. His lovely wife. Idly playing with his wedding ring and feeling a stab of guilt, John muttered, "You're fine, right?"

-----AI|IA-----

The Celestial Jade Palace, the Imperial Princess's private chambers.

Yue stood in front of a full-length mirror and carefully spun around, examining her naked body.

At that time, Omega appeared in the room. Seeing her mother, she blinked and said, "What are you doing, Mother?"

"Hm..." Yue turned sideways and then said, "Perhaps I underestimated your father's cooking skills."

"Eh?" Omega blinked. "How so?"

Yue conjured a silky emerald robe before putting it on. "While slight, I appear to have gained some weight."

Omega placed a hand on her chin and frowned. "Do you think that is the cause of your recent sickness, Mother?"

"No." Yue shook her head. "Your father was always exceptionally careful in preparing food." She sighed and said, "It seems that his attainment in the Dao of Cooking is just great enough that it can affect even Eternal Emperors." She frowned. "Though now I wish that I had fresh food instead of the preserved dishes he left behind. I miss Master's cooking."

Omega nodded and smacked her fist into her open palm. "Don't worry, Mother. I'll make sure that worthless father of mine cooks a lot to make up for it."

Yue smiled and walked over to pat Omega's head. "Thank you, Omega. You truly are a filial daughter... though you shouldn't be so harsh on Master. Despite everything, he is still your father."

Omega huffed and said, "So what? If he wanted me to treat him like a father, he should have taken me with him along with my older sisters." She lowered her gaze and kicked the floor. "It's not like I'm weak or anything... Right, Mother? I'm stronger than both Alphy and Betty combined. So... why did Father leave me behind with you?"

Yue sighed. "Omega..."

Omega shook her head. "He promised. He promised! Father said that he would take me with him to travel through the stars after he became a transcendent. And I waited! But then he... just left! Both you and me!" She looked up, tears in her eyes, mixed with anger. "It's not fair!"

Yue pulled Omega into a hug. "There, there."

She sniffled and said, "It isn't fair. Father... That man's a worthless father."

"Like I said, Omega. You shouldn't be too hard on your father. Master had been under quite a bit of stress up until his transcendence. And in truth... I suppose it might be my fault that he left so suddenly."

Omega leaned back and said, "Eh? Mother's fault? How?"

Yue gazed off into the distance, suddenly remembering all that she had done and convinced John to do in the past few millennia before turning a deep red. She coughed and stepped back from Omega. "That's... I'll tell you when you're older."

Omega huffed. "That's what Father said! I'm already ten thousand years old! Why do I have to wait until I'm older for you to tell me?"

Yue averted her gaze and said, "Y-You just do."

Omega frowned, clearly upset. But then she sighed and said, "If Mother says so." She shook her head and then walked out. "I'm going to go train. Don't strain yourself, Mother."

Space ripped apart, the equivalent of Omega slamming a door shut in anger.

Yue sighed and then stared wistfully at the starry sky above. "Perhaps we both weren't ready to become parents yet, Master. At the least... perhaps I should not have rushed it." She sighed again and then walked over to her bed, pulling out an jade scroll and a brush.

Since she had time, she might as well continue working on her story.

"Where did I leave off...? Ah yes. The Snow Princess met with the Golden Dragon within the starry expanse and cursed his name for stealing her treasures. But in truth, she was delighted to see him again..."

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