The evening of December 15th. After the expo was finished, John bid everyone farewell, closed out the night for the event, thanked Kai and Tsuki for keeping an eye on ggie, and then headed ho with his youngest daughter to fulfill a promise he made.
And so, a particular room down in the basent of Myth Inc. HQ had regained its forr status as a gaming center.
There, shown on a giant monitor mounted against the wall, a fierce fight unfolded.
Two fighters, facing each other on a single platform stage suspended in the air.
One was a young man in a green tunic with faint smoke drifting around him. He carried a sword and shield and stood at the ready. Lonk.
The other was also a sworduser, but instead of green clothes, she had light green hair. Not only that, but her sword was yellow and aged, split apart at certain areas as if it was cracked. Berith.
Silence, and then Berith dashed forward. As she closed the distance, the sword vanished, suddenly replaced with a spear slashing the air in front of her. A crimson wave of energy traced its arc as the spear moved to cut Lonk down.
But he didn't try to avoid it. Instead, he swung his sword out to et the lance.
A white spark flashed and then the two were sent back.
Berith imdiately jumped back and swapped over to a bow, shooting a beam of light at Lonk.
Again, he didn't move. And as a result, the beam of light hit him, but it glanced off his shield instead of doing any damage.
"ARGH!" ggie growled and said, "How are you still alive, Dad?!" She narrowed her eyes and then dashed forward with Berith again, reaching out with a grab.
John laughed and imdiately side stepped with Lonk before responding with a forward tilt attack, making Lonk swing his sword down at Berith.
The green-haired swordswoman was sent flying back, the percent bar beneath the character's icon jumping up 15% from zero. A trio of dots next to that icon showed the three stocks that ggie had left before she lost.
In contrast, the percent beneath Lonk's icon was at 530%. There was also only one dot next to that icon... aning this was John's last life before he lost the match.
ggie's eye twitched as she saw Berith fly back.
John chuckled and said, "I'm used to living by the skin of my teeth, ggie."
"But *HOW*? You're not even using half of that character's move set! No, you didn't even use up B to recover!"
"Because using Lonk as anything but a swordsman is cheating."
"You're the freaking cheat, Dad! Stop turtling!"
"Make . This isn't Street- I an, Road Fighter or Iron Fist. ...Well, maybe if you used those DLC characters though. Still weird that they eventually added those guys though. And that guy from Kingdom Stars. And the ultimate Ani swordsman Sephi-"
"Shut up and fight !" ggie growled and then dashed forward with Berith again. A quick attack, slashing out with the sword.
John made Lonk respond with a slash of his own. But it was too slow. Before Lonk's sword even started its arc, he was already hit by Berith and sent flying off the stage.
ggie grinned. "I've got you now!"
Berith jumped after Lonk, swinging her sword up. If it was a normal sword, it would have missed. But the blade suddenly broke apart, turning into a whip.
But a couple fras before that hit, Lonk suddenly jumped, causing the attack to miss. And then in the next second, he drew his sword and fell through the air like a cot, stabbing Berith.
A loud collision. The animation for a teor effect activated, sending sparks through the air. At the sa ti, it sent Berith plumting into the depths below the stage.
Lonk jumped one more ti, landing back on the ledge of the stage as if nothing happened- No, sothing did happen. His percent ter ticked up 10%. But compared to how high it was already, that amount didn't matter. A single good hit should be enough to knock him out.
Yes, a single hit.
That ggie had been trying and failing to get since she took off two stocks in the first two minutes.
John looked over at his daughter and smiled. "What's the matter?"
ggie glanced at the tir in the top right of the screen. After that, she let out a deep sigh and then glared at her dad. "I should have punched you harder."
John laughed.
*TI!*
The announcer called the end of the match.
After that, the results screen popped up, showing Berith in the front with a victory pose while Lonk stood in the back, politely clapping his hands.
[Winner - OGA]
ggie slumped over letting out a deep sigh. "I hate you. You know that?"
John set down his controller and handed ggie a can of Dk Pep- No. It was a special edition of Dk Pep that had a gray can and different na. Instead of plain cola, it was a tropical mix with coconut and other exotic flavors.
The special edition na?
Dr. Salt.
Anyway, John handed ggie a can of Dr. Salt from the mini-fridge by his feet.
ggie grabbed the can and sighed. But then she saw the label.
John grinned.
ggie's eye twitched. But she didn't say anything and just quietly opened the soda can, sipping on the drink.
Seeing that, John laughed and said, "Well, at least I'm not as bad as the Green Hexagon person when you were playing online earlier."
ggie shook her head and said, "That's different. At least that person played like a normal person. What kind of crazy guy uses Lonk as a full-lee character."
"The guy who grew up on using Lonk in lee?"
ggie blinked. "What ga is that?"
John paused. "...Right. Doesn't exist here." He sighed.
"O-Oh." ggie lowered her head. "...Sorry, Dad."
John ruffled ggie's hair and said, "It's fine. I already made peace with that. Besides... I would totally beat you if we had that ga. You're lucky Li- Lonk doesn't use a hook shot in this version of the ga."
ggie sipped on her soda and said, "I thought you said using Lonk as anything but a swordsman is cheating?"
John pulled out a can for himself and then cracked it open. Taking a sip, he looked at ggie and said, "So did you have fun, ggie?"
"No. I hate fighting people like you in Smash."
John coughed. "Ah... fair. But I ant hanging out with and at the expo."
"Oh." ggie looked at John and then averted her gaze, muttering, "It was alright."
Dismissive words. But from how her face was flushed with embarrassnt and her voice was soft, it was clearly a cover up for how she really felt.
John poked ggie's forehead and said, "Being dishonest with your feelings is bad. Don't make tell Alphy on you."
ggie flinched and said, "Please don't."
"Hm?" John paused. "Wait, did sothing happen between you and Alphy?"
"No, just..." ggie shifted in her seat, her face still red with embarrassnt. "...Onee-chan is too nice now. And expressive. It's weird. When she's happy, she makes everyone else happy. But when she's sad, it's like the world's collapsing."
"...So you're saying that I should get her to talk with you when you did sothing bad. Got it."
"Daaaad!"
John laughed and then pulled ggie in for a one-ard hug.
She clicked her tongue and squird out of it, looking upset. But from the faint twitch of a smile at the corner of her mouth, she was pretending again.
John noticed and said, "You really are a tsun-"
"I will punch you."
John laughed and then stood up to stretch. As he did, he looked around the room at the haul of goodies ggie brought back with her.
Bags of various knick knacks and collectibles from random exhibitions. A fancy holographic Steem card for Betty's new ga... which John was really curious to try out considering the obvious source material.
Well, obvious to him, Yue, and probably his sisters. Maybe Alphy, considering how much she rembered from that ti.
Anyway, there was that. The visor and gloves that Titor handed out for Mirror Corporation's demo... Which reminded John that he needed to rant to the guy about communication before up and doing crazy collab stuff and punting the hot potato to him.
Seriously, what a douche.
Ah, wait. Titor was basically him.
...Point still valid.
So Creature Hunter gear, a bag of things from exhibitions that ggie missed the first day from being sick but that Tsuki gave her...
And seeing all of that made John rember sothing. "Huh."
ggie looked over and frowned. "What?" She followed John's gaze and then looked smug. "Upset you didn't get as much cool stuff as ?"
"If I'm being honest... Kind of."
There were a few exhibits that John was really interested in but that he couldn't check out because he was with ggie. Like the new premier of this world's version of GTA.
ggie was definitely mature enough to check it out... but he had a feeling Yue wouldn't forgive him for that. And Xuannu would probably smack him over the head. Then Zhaojun would give him a cold stare, Daji would be super disappointed...
Yeah, bad idea.
But that wasn't what he was thinking about.
John shook his head and said, "But it wasn't that. I'm just thinking about how we don't actually have a real house yet."
He had an apartnt that he occassionally used with Yue to get private ti away from the kids. Myth Inc. HQ had a bunch of spare rooms that could be used as apartnts, and the title on it let him use each floor for whatever developnt he wanted.
But it still wasn't a house.
"A house?" ggie frowned and then slowly nodded. "That's right." She looked around and said, "This building isn't really a house, is it?"
"Hm. I'll need to have a chat with Kai later. That guy lives in the suburbs, so he should know so good places out there-"
ggie gasped and then ran over to John, excitent in her eyes. "Can we live next to Tsuki?! She's starting school in the spring, so that ans I can go with her if we live nearby, right? Right?"
John laughed and patted ggie's head. "Well, if my tsundere daughter is that eager about it, I guess we will."
ggie froze and then stepped back, shifting in place. "I-It's not like I *really* want to or anything. It's just... Tsuki will be lonely if she doesn't have any friends with her and since she looks different, people might not want to be friends with her."
John paused. "...That's a good point."
He kept forgetting about it since he was used to all sorts of weird people in the Three Realms... and since he hadn't actually been outside too much recently by himself, but Japan was still mostly ethnocentric. Soone like Tsuki who was clearly a 'halfie' by their standards would have a hard ti fitting in.
Well, until high school probably when boys would be tripping over themselves trying to date her. But that was an issue for Kai.
...Who might go overboard in being a helicopter dad since that guy didn't have any common sense about these sorts of things.
And coming from JOHN of all people, that said a lot.
"...Yeah. I'll work on that. Can't let my cute baby daughter's best friend be sad, can I?"
ggie huffed. "I'm not a baby, Dad!"
"You'll always be my baby girl, ggie. Even when you're big like Betty and Alphy. ...But please take a few more years for that. I don't think I'm ready to deal with a daughter going through puberty."
"Puberty?"
"...Don't worry about it. Yet. Ah, but don't panic if you suddenly start bleeding from weird places. Or if your body starts changing a bit."
"D-Dad?! What do you an?!"
"Anyway." John turned off the monitor and said, "Why don't we catch up with your mom and your aunties before getting so rest?"
"Dad? Dad. Explain! What are you talking about! Dad? DAD!"
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