It took me a while to find Spine. Nanny Shank wasn't kidding. The kid was getting around. He had set the stew crew up to mix in meat from other mobs so it had some flavor. It was set up with a preload in the barrel so it automixed when they were filled. The stew crew told me Spine went to deal with the kids. I found the little one play-fighting with baffers made of low scale bigfoot fur, while wearing armor made from similar Scale spider chitin. They were beating the hell out of each other, but no one was crying or permanently hurt. The kids told me Spine and Pappy Havok went to the east side of the camp. I found the old goblin packing up pipe bombs. Like an upsetting amount of explosives. Spine had helped him build the stock pile. Pappy Havok told me Spine had wandered off to help with buses. The bus driver said Spine helped him switch out the axel.

This kept going for a while.

It made a certain sort of sense. Spine had a relative mountain of attribute points compared to most because of our pact. He also was gunning to prove himself. Unlike a lot of angry teenagers he did a fuck-ton of public good rather than beat the shit out of the kid that kept calling him names. I was proud of the little guy. He was way better than I was at his age. That's also factoring in the only reason I actually kicked the shit out of Tyler was what he said about Mark and Richard.

I eventually tracked him down. I used a cunning strategy of asking people everywhere I went to tell Spine I was looking for him. Eventually he found me.

"Hey Doug," he said. He looked up at me uncertainly

"Hey Spine," I replied. We walked through the crowd toward the front of the convoy. We righted a few of the cars that had flipped over in the battle.

After a while, and we had made it to the end of the convoy, Spine said, "I know what you are going to say: I need to apologize to my dad."

"Not what I was going to tell you," I replied. I crafted a bench out of the ice.

"Wait what?" Spine asked. He hopped up and sat next to me.

"I am not telling you what to do," I explained.

"Oh shit. You're trying to teach me something," Spine groaned.

I let out a laugh, "not really."

"Then what the hell are we doing?" Spine demanded.

"We are taking a moment," I told him.

"To do what?" Spine demanded.

"Are you still upset?" I asked.

Spine was quiet for a long time. "I'm fine." He didn't sound fine. After another long pause he asked, "What should I be doing?"

"I honestly don't know," I admitted. Family shit can be hard.

Spine gazed at me in disbelief, "How do you not know?"

I shrugged, "I don't know how food works. What do you think the right thing to do is?"

Spine thought about it for a long time. Eventually he asked, "I should apologize to my dad. Shouldn't I?"

"What for?" I asked.

Spine scratched his neck, "I yelled at him. He's probably pissed at me."

"He isn't," I told him.

"How do you know?" Spine asked.

"Your dad loves you," I told him.

"You can tell that?" Spine asked, watching me.

I nodded, "When it comes to fathers, I have seen the worst imaginable to the best men alive. Hell, I spent time in those trenches. It is profoundly difficult."

"Where does my dad stack up?" Spine asked.

I considered a moment, "He beats the hell out of Ben Jones, my biological father. He may not measure up to Hank Smith, the man who raised the Titan, but I am biased for Hank."

"What about you?" Spine asked.

"I am all but certain your dad out ranks me. He is trying to raise two kids in a frozen waste land full of monsters." I told him.

"Everybody does that," Spine pointed out.

"Now, yeah, but I never had to deal with anything like that," I explained.

"So I should apologize?" Spine asked.

I was quiet for a long time. There was a lot of things I could say, but I knew enough that they weren't going to register with an angry teenager. I didn't want to lecture Spine. Honestly, I doubted I had any right to.

Growing impatient, Spine prodded me along, "It's a yes or no question."

"It isn't as simple as yes or no. This is your life, and your family. You have to figure out what you should do on your own. The only thing I can tell you is what I would do." I sighed.

"I'll take what I can get," Spine insisted.

I almost laughed. That would have been a mistake. He wouldn't have taken it well. I spoke carefully, "A big part of being a man is figuring out what you have to do. Besides you know what you want to do." He wanted me to tell him to apologize because he wanted an excuse to apologize.

Spine sounded very young when he asked, "Why can't I just talk to my dad, like I can with you?"

"The people closest to us can hurt us so easily, often on accident. It still hurts though." My mind drifted to Jo, Hank, Mark, and Marnie. They were gone. I knew where Richard was, but our next meeting was going to be anything other than happy. Then there was Kate, my -the Titan's- daughter…my daughter? … 280 years. "I will tell you this, If you love them tell them, and do what you gotta do to make it work."

You might be reading a stolen copy. Visit Royal Road for the authentic version.

"Will you be there when I go talk to him?" Spine asked.

I stood, "Sure."

It didn't take us too long to find Philip. Nanny Shiv told us he was with Janky. They had gone to the west side of the convoy to watch the sunset. The sky was barely beginning to color the faintest hint of orange. The crystals of ice around the sun formed a rainbow with two bright spots on either side. Sun dogs were a rare sight for me -the Titan- in the world that was. It was pretty, but it also drew the eye to the northwest and the shadow of the tower was visible.

That's what it was, the shadow of the tower. It loomed high in the sky cast upon the clouds. We were close and its presence was undeniable. I could feel the cold radiating from the shadow.

It was less than a day's travel away.

When I stopped walking Spine did too. He looked up at me, "What are you doing?"

I paused for a moment, "Giving you space to talk to your dad."

"Oh… right… I kinda need to do this myself," He said, shuffling around.

"I'll be here regardless of what happens. Just try and stay calm and listen," I told him.

Spine walked slowly over to them. Janky noticed him, "Spine!" She ran over and hugged him.

Spine hugged her back. He lifted her like she was nothing and held her in his arms. He rested her on his hip as he faced Philip. "Dad. I am sorry for… before. It's just when you said you didn't want me to go to the tower. That you still saw me as just a kid… I took that badly. I am sorry, and I hope to one day earn your trust."

Philip was quiet for a very long time. Janky was the one who broke the silence, "Dad?"

Her voice snapped Philip out of his hesitation, "Spine, most of this is my fault. You grew up so fast. I should have said this earlier. When I said it was too dangerous for you to go to the tower, I wasn't saying you couldn't handle the fight to come. I meant you were the best man to protect our people. Without you, I fear for them. Son, I trust you with the future of our people."

"What?" Spine asked.

Philip rested a hand on his shoulder, "Those with you are either children, the untested, or the elderly. Should the need arise you and Pappy Havok will be in charge to face it. Nanny Shank has been preparing you to lead this whole time."

Spine blinked, 'Oh shit… I'm not ready."

Philip smiled, "No one really is, but you are. You have been doing the job for the last three days."

Part of being there for people is knowing when to fuck off. Watching Philip and Spine figure out fine details of what needed to happen before our forces split up, told me things between them were on the mend. My presence wasn't going to help any further.

New Achievement!

Moderate Cult

Your cult in now over 50,000 people strong. No more off brand trappings of the faith for you. You're a god. If you want Kool Aid, you get Kool Aid. honestly there is a lot things that could be said about this, but fact is this is a profoundly rare achievement, and in any other story you would have gotten at an unbelievable speed.

Reward: You have unlocked God feature: Blessing of Relief, and Smite

Blessing of Relief: Good help is hard to find. So a faithful servant is a precious commodity. With this skill on a success a god may remove any nonpermanent condition from a follower. Doing so costs [Scale of Follower x Scale of condition] MP

Note: For this formula: Common Scale is 1, Uncommon Scale is 2, Rare Scale is 5, Epic Scale is 10, Heroic Scale is 20, Demigod Scale is 50, Divine Scale is 100, etc.

Smite: Not all gods are benevolent. Sometimes you have to show your followers who is in charge. Should a god need to make an example of a follower they can inflict [Magic Attribute] damage to a follower. Doing so costs [Scale of follower^2] MP per second

XP withheld. Please consult with Narrator

…

What in the name bad idea bears just happened?

I moved my big ass back to my tent. Honestly this was my fault I left Grimset and Toad in a room together unsupervised. May as well leave Plato and Diogonese alone together. For those who don't get the reference. That is how you get history, the dumb parts of it.

This was a bad move because I was no Alexander the Great.

When I got back to the tent I found them huddled over a piece of paper "The optimal strategy is to fold everyone that is over the age of seventeen into the cult. That should get us just over seventy-five thousand. That should earn some sort of achievement." Grimset declared. He handed a few more papers to several runners.

"I earned the achievement at fifty-kay," I told them.

They both paused.

"Before I left you were opposed to me founding a religion," I pointed out.

"And then you made me pope. I have already expanded the flock." Grimset said, completely unashamed.

"Why?" I asked.

"For military might," Grimset didn't explain.

I turned to Toad. "What is happening?"

Toad grinned at me, "We had a realization. Those with the pacts gain both attributes and Divine Scale. If we could elevate our entire fighting force… we could annihilate the demons."

"How would that work?" I asked.

"You would simply need to form 15 more pacts, the Colonels of the army. They would then select twelve captains who will have ten lieutenants, who will have eight sergeants, who will supervise five privates."

"Seventy-six thousand, eight hundred people in pacts," I muttered to myself.

Toad blinked at me. He then checked his notes, "Yes."

"How were you able to do that so quickly?" Grimset asked.

"I seem to have a math brain, I think it is how I was made," I answered honestly.

"That is disconcerting," Grimset muttered.

"I'm not thrilled about the implications," I admitted.

"Not to be insensitive, but we are building an army. So,Toad paused, "Are we going to do this?"

"I have concerns," I started slowly, "Do we actually know what we are doing?" I cast my gaze around looking for Angelica. We needed someone… smart. Not clever, not cunning, nor even tricksy. We needed someone wise, and Nanny Shank was sleeping.

"Yes we are leveraging the system to gain power," Grimset explained, "At least until this fight is won. Also there is a vague hope that any levels gained while Divine Scale could translate to gain Divine Perks or Traits, and hopefully all the attributes."

"You turned fairly quick with this," I pointed out.

"I am in control of this church. Speaking of which I still require a holy text. I cannot edit a blank document." He explained. Seeing I still wasn't convinced he added, "I will admit I am hoping to leverage this to make a small collective of Divine Scale goblins to check you if need be.

I had been working on that. I didn't have a huge amount of time, but there was really one real option. I pulled the document out of my inventory and handed it to Grimset.

He looked at the cover and frowned. "The dog-lover's manifesto?" He paged through the manuscript, "This is just seventeen pages of admittedly highly effective means of killing snow lions."

"Yep, you can add to it. We should probably add stuff about Bigfeet and the other mobs." I said.

"So this religion is: Don't eat people, Don't own people, no sex crimes, and don't be a dick while we share methods to kill monsters?" Grimset asked.

"Yeah," I said, surprised we had something coherent.

"That isn't a bad religion," Grimset admitted.

"Don't fuck it up Pope," I told him.

Grimset scoffed, "That is easy for you to say. You just have to be god."

He kinda had a point.

"The others should be outside," Toad pressed.

I stepped outside and then time stopped.

"I leveled," a goblin shouted!

Time Stopped.

Please wait for a special session.

…

Special Session begins in

5…

4…

3…

2…

1…

What new hell is a special session?

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