WE HAVE DISCORDS! JOIN THEM NOW! mu1622
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Ciel's POV
I sat at darling's desk holding Aoki in my lap, while I knew I wasn't supposed to go that far, I also knew exactly when the little one would wake up. So it didn't particularly matter.
Though I attributed the level of success Aoki had been to their will, as I had picked them specifically for that. So it could be possible for them to disturb the crafted skill.
However, I would consider waking up in my lap a perfect reward for such a feat.
Unfortunately this time would be promptly cut short, something I was also aware of from my constant monitoring of most of the largest magical presences in the world. One of Rimuru's chosen siblings was coming here, and to be specific, the second oldest.
The White Ice Dragon had a tendency to have things always go her way, but interestingly she'd recently lost a bet of some kind to her younger sister. I found it somewhat amusing, and I was wondering how exactly the embodiment of envy would cope with it.
After all, she represents stability itself, or more accurately the ceasing of change. So having one of her longest standing traits, being the best of the three of her siblings, being further questioned would be terrible.
That did mean I needed to deal with her. So I attempted to put on an expression Rimuru would have, and attempted to fake the same kind of spiritual activity Rimuru is generally expressing.
She opened the door, and stared at me for just a moment. Her eyes glowed golden for a fraction of a fraction of a second.
"Hello, Big Sister." I put on a facsimile of Rimuru's voice.
She immediately sighed. "I don't know what the two of you are doing, but what are you doing in such control, Ciel?"
I frowned softly. "I guess I still can't fake it that far."
"Dragon Eye is all-seeing, you should understand that." Velzard walked into the room and sat carefully onto the couch, maintaining her dignity through force.
"I do know that, but it won't stop me from attempting to hide from it." I lifted Aoki carefully from my lap and set them on the desk, knowing this was who Velzard was there for. "Aoki is still asleep, as they recently had a spell applied to them which drained much of their magic power. It shouldn't be long, though."
"I can see that." Velzard sat carefully up. "That human boy is leaving today, right? I noticed that the Little One doesn't seem to like him very much. Do you want me to go out of my way to avoid him?"
"I don't think that will be a problem, thank you for the concern." I shook my head along with my statement, to make it a clear negative. It is simple childhood jealousy, something you'd be well acquainted with, Velzard.
"Alright, but I have a feeling the boy will interrupt the day at some point. He isn't as scared of me or Velgrynd as he should be, but it's to be expected when Rimuru puts on such an innocent front." Velzard chuckled under her breath and leaned back on the couch again. "Are you sure it will be so soon?"
"Certain." I didn't like being questioned myself, especially not by someone who hated it so much themself.
"Hm, guess that's a nerve I'll avoid. I really do need to get to know you better sometime." I'd shared with her part of the process involved in creating Aoki, so I calculated it was most likely to do with her wanting to know more.
I saw a small movement in the magicules of the little slime in front of me, and it was right on the time I'd predicted, as is almost always the case. Aoki began to roll across the desk, until stealing one of the pens into their personal space.
I rolled my eyes at the antic, because I knew it was an attempt to get back at Rimuru for the punishment we'd given them.
After that, Aoki seemed to notice Velzard, as they visibly focused on her magical presence. They seemed at least somewhat frightened, but they'd be safe anywhere in this city, even with another True Dragon.
"Take another form, that one is cute, but I wouldn't want anyone to mistake you for a normal slime today." Velzard gestured forward, offering to pick up Aoki.
{{Father... Is it safe? This is Mother's dangerous sister... The one that made the cold.}} Aoki still seemed to remember their life before being named, which I found interesting in itself. I had passingly hoped they would not, but with their will being as strong as it is... It was unfortunately likely.
I looked at them and gave a soft nod, since they still needed practice with human mannerisms.
"Alright..." Aoki changed into human form, and carefully hopped off the desk. They still seemed reluctant to approach Velzard.
"Go ahead, she is your Aunt. I can understand being afraid from your earlier meetings, but she could be credited at least partially with your birth. So please don't be rude." I had to explain things in full, otherwise our little one would perhaps never be able to get over this.
"I-.. See." Aoki carefully approached Velzard, before taking her hand. "Will... I go with you today?..."
Velzard picked up Aoki without giving the slime no choice in the matter. "Yes. I have a lot to do with you today, and I've reserved it all ahead of time."
"Please be safe, Aoki. Additionally, as Rimuru set the same rule with Velgrynd, you may not leave the city with them, Velzard." I glared softly, to make sure the dragon knew I was serious.
She responded by rolling her eyes subtly. "I get it."
"Father, when I get back can I sit in your lap?" It was a cute question, but I had to decline.
"No, you may not. You are still being punished." I steeled myself slightly, I had made a note of it perhaps being difficult to say no to Aoki if I became totally attached to them in a similar way to my darling.
Soon, Velzard had left the room with our child. It left me to keep practicing my impression of Rimuru with his subordinates.
Velzard's POV
I picked up the little one and set them on my shoulders, as I knew it was easiest to carry a child in this way from my observation of humans in the past
I spent much time trying to rationalize why my big brother would favor them so much, especially when I was around to dote on instead.
Big brother knew best most of the time, but I've had to question him much more deeply ever since I first met Rimuru. While it can't be said that Rimuru hates humans by any stretch, he certainly doesn't favor them. Not anymore at least, I heard there was a time he did.
Instead, Rimuru treats humans with a friendly indifference, mainly using cooperation with them for his own benefit, even if he sees something more in a limited few of them.
It made me curious how this new child of his would treat them, but I had much more to focus on with them. As I found myself dwelling on the past again, simply of habit.
Aoki seemed to be staring down at me cautiously despite my attempt at creating an air of comfort, and while it would be a lie to say I wasn't irritated by that; I knew I still couldn't react in a way which showed that.
Instead, I decided to just push the child on why. "Why do you seem so frightened?" I pushed open the door to the palace as I finally stepped out onto the street.
"You won't make it cold again... Will you?" I think I realized what they meant immediately, as on the night I had found out about them, I had gotten quite upset. My aura had created a snow storm over Tempest. That must have been quite taxing for them at that time.
"I won't, if that would make you uncomfortable." I looked at Aoki for a few moments with Dragon Eye to sate my curiosity, and to confirm what I was sure was the case now that they'd been named. "Although, even if I did, you'd have nothing to worry about now. You have an immunity to such things."
Despite my words, my thinking was focusing on another thing. The child had skills I couldn't name, which meant I'd never seen them before. I'd need to know more about how they worked to read the inscribed name with All of Creation. I couldn't make clear guesses at that moment, though.
I had noticed them days prior, but they were still forming. Now the magic circuits were more clearly developed and stable. If I had seen them before, I could have heard the Voice of The World authorize them.
Aoki finally responded to my earlier statement, I had been lost in my thoughts again.
"Father told me the same thing..." The child seemed to get a bit more comfortable, as they finally let themself lean forward and rested on my head.
"I can make up for the first time though, would you like a small portion of my magicules? You look incredibly hungry." I could clearly see they still weren't back up to capacity, so it seemed like the perfect way to make up for harming them before.
"Are you sure...?" Aoki seemed uneasy at the idea, I had to assume they had not had a major dose of magicules from any but Rimuru.
"Yes. It will be fine. While I may not have as much capacity as Rimuru, it still over-shadows yours many times over." Honesty is a virtue.
"O-okay..." The slime was shaky now, but clearly excited in a cute way.
I ever so lightly opened the barrier containing my aura, and allowed a small portion of my magicules to form into a crystal in the child's palm. In this way they'd still exist in a pure form, but would not be a danger to any of my baby brother's citizens.
"This is... A lot." The slime held the crystal above my head, clearly examining it closely with Magic Sense. I could tell they were analyzing it as well, however difficult it was for them at that density. Eventually though, they allowed their palm to return to its true form so that they could pull the crystal into their body.
I knew they had a personal space of some kind, but they were taking a large degree of caution in absorbing such a large dose at once.
It seemed to confirm my suspicion that the child had an intrinsic intelligence of magic, which exceeded that of any human.
"Little Aoki, would you like to have lunch? We are going to eat lunch in town, but for dinner we are gonna go back to the palace to cook a meal of our own." I knew Rimuru loved food, and I wasn't sure if it'd extend to his child, but I had already made reservations.
"Yes. Fire Auntie took me to dinner, and the food was good. I hadn't eaten food before that." It seemed Velgrynd was useful for something, at least.
"Ah! Perfect. I want you to try something a bit different then, since you haven't eaten anything like this before." I let my excitement slip for a moment before composing myself.
"What kind of thing?" The small slime wouldn't think much of it, but it was quite important.
"Something very simple, actually. Some foods are only edible while still alive, so one thing which is prepared here in Tempest is miniature black spiders. Some monsters also keep them as pets, I believe." It was unusual to keep something as a pet and a creature for slaughter, but I supposed it was not all that different from Luminous' treatment of humanity.
It was the perfect test for Aoki, as I could find out her ability in regards to absorbing skills. I knew she did not possess any form of thread skill, therefore I could allow them to eat one of these spiders and observe if they do gain one.
"Some foods can only be eaten alive?"
I nodded softly before making my way to the restaurant I had in mind.
Aoki's POV
I stayed on my aunt's shoulders all the way to whatever restaurant she was talking about. I didn't know you could eat living things, as Rimuru told me not to. However, if you are supposed to with these ones, that means it was fine. Especially with my Aunt saying it was ok.
The building was very simple, a cube with a black exterior and some glass windows. It was a bit uninteresting, but when going inside I was immediately greeted by what I considered an oddity.
There were glass rectangle boxes containing the spiders, little ones. The size of a large slime, I think. They weren't as big as the ones I would expect to find in a place like the labyrinth, even with my limited time there.
The spiders did have more interesting patterns though, they weren't just black. Instead they were lots of colors, and lots of little intricate patterns with almost all the colors I'd seen so far.
I could see why people liked putting them in the glass cases to look at, they looked nice.
These ones were for eating too, which meant there were probably more interesting colors in the ones people didn't eat.
"You can pick the one you want, and they will prepare it for you." Velzard picked me up and then set me down to wander around for a bit, it seemed.
No one else was in the restaurant, except for a small group of hobgoblins, as Analyze and Assess called them.
So I just walked along the glass and looked at all the spiders, carefully analyzing each while using Magic Sense to learn as much about them as I could.
I was able to figure out tiny pieces of information, like their age and their magicule capacity. So I cataloged it away for future reference.
After that, I decided to pick one out. I wanted to get a lot of magicules, but I also didn't want to make the display look worse. It wouldn't look nice without all the bright colors, so I picked a dull black one that seemed to have a larger magicule capacity than the rest.
I stood near it at the edge of the glass.
I stared too, but tried to make it not notice me. However it still seemed to be able to do it.
The spider would clearly and obviously look at me, and then try to skitter to another part of the glass case, often hiding in little rock holes.
It took a bit of effort to make sure I could stay next to it, without looking like I was standing next to another one.
That made me think of an idea though, if it knew to run away from me, how?
I looked like a human, and I was small for a human. I think Rimuru called my body a child's body. So that meant that they were running away because of something other than seeing my body.
My aura was almost always visible, at least partially. Most of it was still inside my Aoki Space, but that didn't mean it wasn't still bigger than the spider's. It was clearly visible with Magic Sense.
If this spider has a similar skill, I would look frightening.
Deciding to test out another idea, I pulled all my aura into my Aoki Space.
After that it seemed like the spider stopped really being scared at all. It seemed like it almost forgot I had been the thing emitting the aura a moment ago, as it just basked near the edge of the glass, right in front of me.
"So this is the one you want then?" Velzard was standing next to me again, but I hadn't noticed her so it was a little frightening.
I didn't jump. You are a liar.
"Yes." I pointed at the one I was standing nearby.
"Alright then, I see what you are doing, so I'll pick one of the duller ones as well." After that, Aunt Velzard turned away and gestured toward one of the goblins, seeming to call them over with a glance.
When they approached us, they immediately bowed and then asked their question very quietly. "Please simply point to the ones you'd like."
"Didn't you already see them doing that?" Velzard tilted her head slightly, and I could sense it as she very lightly released her aura.
"Ah! Yes, sorry ma'am..." The goblin wasn't hurt, but the aura clearly caused them a bit of pain.
After that, Velzard pointed to another spider, and then picked me back up and placed me on her shoulders.
She carried me to a table, and sat me in a seat across from her. "It shouldn't be long. I did want to ask how you'd plan to eat though?"
"What do you mean?" I had no clear idea of what she meant, as other than absorbing the magicules, I had no real plans as far as how to eat the spider. It seemed like a simple thing, so I thought I'd like to eat it the normal way.
"Well, it is a monster with skills you've never had before." Auntie said something interesting, though. I knew I could take skills, but I hadn't actually done it yet. After all, I'd only absorbed things without skills, or other slimes. So none of the skills were useful to me.
"Skills." I looked back over at the glass case and became somewhat excited deep down, I had wanted to use this ability for a long while. [Inheritor], the name of a subskill of [Integrator]. It allowed me to inherit the skills of any monster I'd defeated and absorbed.
I knew Mother could do the same thing, so I didn't think much of it. I really wanted to use it though, and this would be my first opportunity. "Are you sure?" I looked back at my Aunt, not being completely sure of one thing; if Mother would be ok with it.
"They're yours if you want them, I don't think Rimuru would mind." It was so exciting.
Velzard's POV
My suspicions were correct, Aoki can absorb skills, just like Rimuru. The slime's response affirmed that for me, but now I get to witness it in action. It will be interesting.
The few times I'd witnessed similar from Rimuru, my cheeky baby brother fully blocked any sort of analysis of the ability, meaning that I still had no information on how it exactly worked. But, now with Aoki, I had a chance to learn about it.
Yes, I doubt that Rimuru's child would have a skill on par with his, but the nature should be similar nonetheless. It would be better than nothing.
I decided to bring up a lighter topic that would be personal to Aoki, to cover my tracks a tiny bit. I knew the child wouldn't suspect anything, but I didn't want the servers to either. "So then, have you still yet to choose a gender for yourself? My siblings and myself chose somewhat quickly, but I assume you feel much less strongly about the topic."
"Why do I need to choose? It seems irrelevant." The little one frowned deeply.
I could understand the feeling, but it was still more nuanced. "I agree, but it is something to consider. It can affect how others treat you and interact with you. Not so much when it comes to higher beings, but to all the monsters and humans that live in this country, it does. Their opinions matter little to me, but I don't know your stance on them."
They looked down. "I don't understand..."
I had more to add, though. "And I should add that others may try to assign one for you if you fail to choose. In your place, I'd refuse to let that power be taken away from me."
They lifted their head again with an even deeper frown. "Then I should choose, but I don't know the differences. Can you tell me?"
I had a small idea to help. "Well, I can at least tell you why I chose to be a woman. Would that help?"
The little slime nodded. "Yes."
"Back when I first came into existence, I quickly noticed that women seemed to have more influence over my older brother; he struggled to deal with them more than men. He often told me what to do and I found that distasteful, so I made myself harder for him to deal with. After choosing to be a girl, he did that a lot less, and after so long; I saw no reason to change." I smiled lightly.
"Older brother? I thought you were the oldest True Dragon."
My stupid little brothers... neither of them mentioned Veldanava to this child yet? It was infuriating to me.
"I'm the second oldest, but that is not a topic we are going to talk about." I said, lacing my words with intimidation.
The slime seemed to get the idea and dropped the subject immediately.
After a few moments of complete silence, a pair of goblin servers came holding platters. They set one in front of each of us, but they did ask if the little one needed a way to take the food home.
"That won't be necessary. Aoki is a strong eater." I smiled softly to send them off, since I didn't want to be bothered while watching Aoki.
Aoki was tentatively trying to open the platter, until eventually they just completely pulled off the platter's dome, almost throwing it across the room.
I caught it in the air, though. "Be a little more careful with your strength." It was left suspended in an ice barrier hanging in the air, I didn't feel like dispelling it.
After that, I carefully removed the dome of my own platter and set it aside.
We were both greeted by a spider which was still barely alive, however it was imobile because it had been partially gutted. The reason for this being so the meat did not spoil, as otherwise it would quickly.
It was safe to eat due to the high concentration of magicules inside, at least for most monsters.
The lower half of the abdomen was removed and innards were removed from there.
"Can I eat?"
"Go ahead." I didn't plan on eating until I saw them do it.
I engaged Dragon Eye just enough that I would be able to see the magic circuits of the skills, without being overtly visible in my eyes.
Aoki seemed more excited than I expected, as they immediately tore into the spider, quickly eating and absorbing the pieces into their spatial skill from there. I could also see it happening very clearly, as the magic circuits were incredibly carefully extracted from the body of the creature.
It seemed that the skill involved created a container for the skill beforehand, structuring it to contain the magic circuit to the best of its ability. Afterward, small tendrils of magicules would carefully untie the magic circuit from the matter it was bound to, and finally it would be carefully weaved into the container and sealed inside.
It seemed like shortly after, the skill was placed into another larger container, one that was suddenly created by a completely separate part of the little one's unique skill.
From gaining such an understanding, All of Creation finally allowed me to read the inscriptions of the skills. I could clearly see the Unique skill itself was called [Integrator], as I'd heard from the Voice of the World before.
Under it, I could now see the names of three of the subskills. Notably, [Inheritor], [Combinator], and [Aoki Space].
The last name was sort of cute for a personal space.
After getting the important business out of the way for this activity, I was able to watch my baby brother's child eat adorably. I also ate myself, although I was much more conservative. So we spent almost an hour there before leaving the staff.
I made sure the little one cleaned up after themself, after doing the same myself.
I still wanted to know the names of some of the free-floating skills I'd been unable to identify before. They'd since been incorporated into something larger, which I now knew was using [Combinator], however I could tell they were resistances I'd never seen before.
I did not wish to harm Aoki in any way, so there was almost no way of discovering what they were.
Instead, I settled on simply enjoying the rest of the time out in the city with them. By the time we were going back to the palace, I was carrying quite a few small items we'd bought along the way.
Additionally, Aoki had never actually stopped eating, even though we were going to make dinner soon. I'd had to cut her off around thirty minutes before we'd be returning.
Powerful slimes are truly ravenous creatures.
However, a pest arrived as we had gotten back toward one of the sidestreets leading to the palace.
A small little majin who had plans on challenging my baby brother, I could tell just from the look of him. I'd heard Rimuru had to deal with these insects from time to time, but I'd never encountered one before.
We'd coincidentally walked into the street they were walking down to approach the palace themself. However, when they saw me and little Aoki, they became fixated.
More specifically on Aoki than me.
"You! That child is close to the demon lord, aren't they!?" It was a beastman, but it seemed like they had gone too far with their beast form. They were now far closer to a rhino than a human, and it could even be said they were just a monster now.
A small demon lord seed, not even worthy of meeting Guy's little tea party group.
"That is none of your concern." I glared at the majin, but didn't flare out my aura, as there were bystanders nearby.
"Well, if you won't answer me, I'll just take them to get an audience myself!" It wasn't a situation of that much concern, as I knew Aoki themself could easily squash the bug, however I still need to do much to interfere.
"You can try if you'd like." I still didn't think much of it, but what happened next was of some interest.
Mainly, the insect used a spatial motion skill to move Aoki into its arms. The child was still calm, but it was still expected.
"That was too easy. See, this is why that demon lord doesn't deserve his title. He doesn't deserve to get to speak with any of the True Dragons!" It was amusing he couldn't recognize he was speaking to one, but to say that my darling baby brother didn't deserve to speak with us was infuriating.
"Hey! Mother is a True Dragon!" I had managed to put up a silencing barrier around the three of us before they said it, but I did like the Child's willingness to speak about it, unlike Rimuru.
"There is no way such a weak and pathetic demon lord could really be a true dragon!"
I closed my eyes, feeling my rage build up inside. The whole interior of the barrier froze over with my aura flaring out even a tiny bit.
Aoki was fine, in fact I saw something odd about what happened with them.
However, the little demon lord seed was reduced to flakes of red ice, when it turned into frost on the ground, alongside the air inside the barrier.
Aoki was standing there, visibly shivering, they looked quite horrified. I knew it wasn't from that death, but rather from the cold. So I quickly walked over, and scooped them up before leaving.
In that time, I was able to see what was amiss. The little child had a resistance against my attack. It wasn't their Temperature Immunity either.
Instead, it seemed their body was able to reflect the magicules from my aura. Once I'd realized that, the inscription became clear: [Dragon Attack Resistance].
I would have found it amusing in other circumstances, that our baby brother felt the need to give his child an overt resistance to the attacks of his family. However, seeing what happened, I understood it.
I did take note of how the magic circuit was structured for later though, as I could attempt to replicate it myself.
I offered the slime comfort until we were back into the palace, and alone in the room I was staying in, in the time I was thinking about all this.
"...You said you wouldn't make it cold..." Little Aoki didn't have tears at the edges of their eyes, but their aura was clearly very sorrowful. "Why?... We had so much fun..."
"I apologize..." I didn't exactly know how to respond to a situation like this, as I'd never dealt with children in such a circumstance. "I didn't mean to do so... The thing insulted Rimuru..."
"...I know..." The little slime returned to slime form and laid on my lap for some time like that, in silence. "It actually hurt."
"Yes, as it was my aura, it was a spiritual attack, not simply a physical one. However, you did great resisting it. I am very proud of you." I decided to credit Aoki with resisting it, as they were still compatible with the skill. Which spoke more of them than anything.
"...Thank you."
...
We sat for a few more minutes in that room, before heading back out.
The little slime wasn't exactly cheery again, but they were willing to try cooking food of their own as we had planned.
I decided to take Aoki to Rimuru's personal kitchen affixed next to his office in the palace, and while it wasn't often used, today it was being used unfortunately. By the human child and majin from another world.
I didn't mind it though, as we wouldn't be here long.
However, instead of cooking dinner, I realized we'd be best off cooking desserts.
The reason for that being that Aoki had already effectively had several dinners out on the town, and I did want to cheer the small slime up.
As for being here in investigation, it was simple. Baking was an activity where you would create something of your desires, as a result, it is the perfect activity to test a child's authority over the world. Whether they create a new spell, skill, or matter. Which didn't mean much, I simply wanted to see if Aoki's [Dragonoid Magic] skill was functional, alongside that pseudo-dragon factor.
When we arrived in the kitchen, I discovered that others were already there. The human boy that Rimuru has been keeping as well as a majin subordinate of some sort.
The human had already made a mess of the space, which complicated my plan. I wasn't expecting anyone to be there.
"Oh! Hi, Aoki!" He greeted the slime, "And Miss Velzard too. I'm just making some cookies before I leave tonight, do you wanna help me?"
"No," Aoki responded immediately, sounding a little annoyed with the human. "I will make my own cookies. Better ones."
I didn't know why Aoki felt the need to prove herself superior to the human since that fact was already so blaringly clear.
"Okay... um, I'm making chocolate chip ones, but there's ingredients left, so I'll leave them out for you so you can make your own batch. Opera, can you give Aoki the recipe book?"
The majin servant handed us a thick book opened to a page with ingredients and instructions and Aoki stared at it for a moment and handed it right back.
"I've read the book."
I could tell the majin was slightly surprised, but he didn't say a word and just brought the book back to the human, who awkwardly laughed at the situation.
"I want to be on the counter," Aoki reached up at me, clearly wanting to be picked up.
It was bold of the little slime, but I wasn't offended. So, I picked Aoki up and set them on the counter.
"Flour," Aoki pointed at the bag of flour on the opposite counter and locked eyes with the human boy.
"Are you wanting me to bring it to you?"
Aoki nodded and Iruma scooped up most of the ingredients and brought them to Aoki. Aoki didn't even need to ask for the rest for the boy to obey.
"There you go. Mine are mostly done anyway, I'm just waiting for the oven to heat up."
"Oven..." Aoki muttered, then frowned. "If he's using the oven then I won't be able to bake my cookies."
"Why do you think you need such a device?"
"The recipe requires an oven."
"Someone like you can use much better methods."
Aoki's eyes lit up for a moment before they turned into their slime form.
"Mix the dry ingredients first..."
Aoki bounced around and pulled all the dry ingredients into their Aoki Space, then grabbed a bowl out of a nearby cupboard using a tendril of slime and absorbed that too. Then, within a few seconds, released a bowl filled with the ingredients evenly mixed together. The, Aoki did the same with the wet ingredients.
"Knead the dough with your hands... I need hands for that."
Aoki goes back into human form, but this time with three sets of arms.
For this task, it improved upon the form. However it may be more clunky in combat.
"Whoa..." the human child exclaimed from across the room, his hands already working his own cookie dough. "That's p-pretty cool, Aoki."
He was clearly freaked out by the additional arms, but was trying to hide it.
Aoki started efficiently working away at their baking, smoothly kneading then introducing the chocolate chips. Lastly, Aoki rolled it all into perfect spheres, all the same size and placed them on a tray, evenly spaced.
They glanced at the oven that Iruma was currently using and frowned again.
"You were with Velgrynd yesterday, right? Surely you saw some form of fire magic from her. Just go ahead and copy that." It would be amusing if Aoki could, as that meant Velgrynd wasn't hiding her techniques well enough.
"Ok..." Aoki held her hand over the tray, and I watched as a barrier of blue energy formed around it, before a black flame lit up inside for just a moment.
After that, I was able to see clearly what was occurring. The barrier had temperature immunity applied to it, which meant that it would contain the heat perfectly.
It was disappointing, since I was hoping they would instead attempt to create a fire spell. Unfortunately it seemed they'd inherited some subskills from Rimuru. It explained why their Magicule Manipulation was such a large skill, though.
They must have had a large number of ingrained spells contained within it.
I sighed softly, but I kept it discrete. I didn't wish to upset the child again.
"The cookies are done." Aoki dispelled the barrier and then picked up the pan and set it on the counter's hotplate.
"That was really fast..." The human boy meanwhile was still struggling with the oven, it seemed he was trying to change the temperature often because the cookies didn't look right. Meanwhile the majin attending him tried to help with an exasperated look.
After that, Aoki seemed to get self satisfied. They decided to make a second pastry while waiting, and ended up getting the ingredients for a pie from the pantry for themself. After that, they used some of their skills to bake again. However this time, I did notice some usage of the Particle Manipulation skill.
The skill alone suggested a high degree of authority, considering Aoki themself lacked any Ultimate skills. However, that still wasn't proof of the Dragonoid Magic skill being functional.
I didn't know if I would get any confirmation of anything at this rate, and soon the child would need to see the human boy off. So I may have been unable to get anything of what I wanted.
It also seemed like they were nearly done baking, as the majin attendant had decided to make a compliment for the cookies and pie Aoki made, as opposed to trying to help the human boy cook.
It was simple vanilla ice cream, and he even used some form of ice magic from another world during the process.
It was somewhat adorable to see such a rudimentary form of ice magic.
"Aoki, I think we need a topping for the ice cream... I don't know if I should make it though. Could you do it instead? You are better at cooking." The human boy looked defeated in a somewhat pitiful way, but at least he could recognize he was below Aoki, even if Aoki themself didn't seem to see it that way.
"I can, but what topping? There are several in this book." Aoki closed their eyes, and seemed to be reading over the book again in their mind. Vaguely mumbling out some of the names of toppings under their breath.
"Uh... I think chocolate syrup is the best for vanilla ice cream... Do you want that?"
"It describes how it should taste, and I don't know what those words mean, but I would like to try it. Do we have chocolate?"
The human boy paled a bit. "I don't think so... we used all the chocolate for the cookies." He sighed after that. "Sorry for getting you excited about it."
Aoki frowned deeply. It was unusual to see that sort of expression on a child, but it seemed to be accompanied with contemplation. "I could try using one of my skills."
"To get chocolate?" The human boy tilted his head. "I thought only Rimuru could do something like that."
"Mother might be the only one who can, but I can still try."
The conversation piqued my interest enough for me to start paying close attention to the little slime again, it seemed like they had a plan for this.
I knew Aoki lacked Material Creation, so making something as complex as chocolate would be almost impossible for them. It was a good opportunity.
My baby brother's child focused deeply, seemingly turning completely inward. They were activating the Dragonoid Magic skill, and it seemed like they were attempting to use it to simply create chocolate directly.
Simply wanting it, and pushing magicules into the skills. It was relatively obvious.
Of course, the result was the magic circuit of a new skill being created, and while it resembled Material Creation; it was badly malformed.
Upon being activated it nearly immediately shattered, and the backlash of it was extreme, releasing a small cloud of magicules into the air.
Aoki immediately pulled all of them back into her Aoki Space, but they looked ashamed for a moment. At least, that was the feeling resonating in their aura.
Now that's just curious. Perhaps they don't have the authority to use the skill? They were able to activate it, but the skill created failed. That isn't exactly true though, it did exist for a short time. It was just so badly malformed that the Voice of the World didn't even attempt to repair it into a lesser form... Interesting.
I walked over and picked Aoki back up onto my shoulders. "Don't be too down, I think we had more than enough fun today. You also have plenty of dessert."
I couldn't stop myself from trying to rationalize what just happened internally, though.
I suppose three possibilities are most likely, insufficient authority, as the dragon factor she possesses is far from complete, insufficient will, she does not truly want material creation, or insufficient understanding; she may simply not understand how the skill might work.
I slipped on Aoki's gender, but I was more focused on the details I was trying to piece together, so I simply took them back to Rimuru and Ciel.
It seemed the human boy and majin were following, but I didn't concern myself with it.
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