Dear Diary,

There are days when I wish I was smart. I get that I'm not a moron; I know enough math that I can maybe remember enough to teach the devil's math of putting letters into equations. I can figure stuff out if I can keep my attention on it long enough, or if the puzzle or problem is complicated enough that I don't have to force myself to focus on it. I know I'm not actually stupid, even if I am, by all accounts including my own, a dumbass.

But I'm not smart. I'm not the kind of organized and structured person who can make big plans that involve lots of people doing lots of things. The Liberation of Calverton was about the most complex thing I can envision myself doing, and honestly I mostly just figured out what needed to be done and let people do it. Like, once we had that big killing field from my tentacle smashing a path through the City, I knew we needed Black Dragon's guns to kill any Undead on there. Once I knew we needed those working, and I knew we could see the connections between Undead if we forced them to shove more Miasma into them, I figured we could at least bury the Master under a pile of rock. Also, we had to get the Undead out into the killing field in a disorganized mass, which meant bait and that massive anti-Translocation field. I knew we needed to keep them from crossing the bridges, which was just the easy thing of packing them with troops, and I knew we needed to take the walls to keep any Undead from getting away.

All just simple things, and the ones that needed brain power or self-discipline to sort out the details I fobbed off on somebody else, like Orla or Swanson or Saffron. My current plan is really even simpler, and there's only like one Shape I need that I don't know, and I've got Saffron working on that. I think she might be working with Siobhan on it, both because I think it's technically a Healing Spell and also because with Siobhan now looking sorta pregnant, my Kitten has started focusing on her a little more. Which back in the day me would have blown several gaskets over, but all I can do... No, all I have the impulse to to, never mind the right to do, is smile and watch, because they're adorable together.

Yeah, I'm definitely revisiting the final phase of that Penance night at some point after Siobhan decants. I'm not sure if the initial impulse of that came from my darker half or from me, but I definitely own that part with no guilt or shame. When I love someone, I want to force feed them all the physical pleasure and dopamine release I can, as much as they can stand without losing their taste for it, because physical touch, acts of service, and quality time are all ways I express affection, and that's kind of all three in one for me. Providing an opportunity for two people I love who also love one another to engage in an endless feedback loop of all of that is a perfect storm of affection and love for me.

But again, that's not a huge, complex plan that needs me to coordinate with dozens of people leading thousands more, it's just me and my ladies. I'm kinda wondering whether it's gonna hit different now that they know what to expect. Part of me wants to leave them stewing longer, see if I can't make one or both of them break without unleashing either of them, but that might spoil it.

Of course, that's part of why I'm not smart. I have all kinds of things I could be planning, things I should be thinking about, and I'm laser focused on achieving that perfect mirrored ahegao face with the two of them again. Maybe I could slip a mirror in between them to show each of them how hot and adorable they are. Then again, none of us really need mirrors for that any more. They're really more for seeing angles nobody in the room is paying attention to.

Yeah, I can spot shit like that right away, and yes I am absolutely gonna do that next time, because I think the massive feedback loop of each of them seeing themselves through the other's eyes would shatter any remaining scraps of doubt in their own adorableness, which I see as absolutely a core part of my favorite duty as Wife and Mistress. Unfortunately, I'm not apparently able to spot how some of the kaiju knowing how to Shape Healing means some of them might be able to Shape other things.

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

So yesterday after hopping around everywhere, I stopped by the Homestead for dinner and bath time. I'd rested up last night, with my ladies watching over each other and my Black Dragon, so after soaking for a little with all of them, I put the kids to bed, hopped to each of their ships and tucked them into bed. So long as we had one of us aboard each ship, we could bring any or all of the rest of us to the ship whether we stayed still or kept moving. The Captains of the Worshipping and the Training both kept their ships in motion, the other three weighed anchor. Each had its own problems; ships moving at night without radar or any other way to see the bottom or the shore beyond the mark one eyeball, especially in the ugly freezing rain that had swept in, were sort of constantly in danger. Meanwhile ships that were standing still were, well, sitting still in a combat zone. Never a great place to be.

Fortunately, nothing went wrong overnight.

Unfortunately, that ended the moment the sun rose. Well, shortly after that. The ladies each Co-Located to their respective Temples and Tentacles, but before I could collapse back to one of me aboard the Black Dragon, one on the West Tower, and one running errands, Karen shouted, "Goddess! The Seven!"

I didn't ask, I just leapt all of me aboard Tentacles to the Temple of Love, where muted screaming and crashing stonework greeted my arrival. After a quick glance to be sure the Temple itself wasn't falling apart, I leapt to the doors, collapsing down to one of me in the group to minimize feedback. I almost didn't catch what was happening until something smashed into the roof of the Temple of Kings. A quick glance showed the Temple of Storms, the closest one to the Delaware, had huge path busted through it, like something had gone right through it headed for the Temple of Kings. A kind of heat haze flickered along that path, and a deep roar joined the screams and complicated collapse right before two huge flickering somethings hammered into the roof of the Temple of Kings.

I shoved my Blend up as far as it would go, which is when it hit me. If these things could Heal, there's no reason one couldn't Blend. Not like Loki and I and our assorted clergy had a complete monopoly on it. I pulled in all of my nearby tentacles, keeping them as surreptitious as possible, and held them ready. Whatever the thing was roared again. A moment later the wall of the Temple of Kings collapsed inward, and I shoved every tentacle I'd brought through to the Mortal Realm into the area in front of that. Some of them, the big ones, I brought around like clotheslines, but the little ones I jammed in like spears.

The spear ones that hit something extruded Mana Blades, and that roar repeated itself, but with the distinctive sound of pain added to the mix. Something pulled my tentacles. I grabbed. Squeezed. Extended Mana Guillotines through whatever my tentacles wrapped around. Every time I did that, whatever it was screamed again. A hand fell into the open space between the Temples. Then a limb. I kept grabbing, squeezing, spearing, and slashing, a dome of invisible tentacles surrounding the area about ten feet into the air.

Finally, after I have no idea how many yanks, grabs, and guillotines, the roaring cut off like somebody'd flipped a switch. A massive body, missing both hands, half of one arm, one leg, and its head fell. Right toward my fuckin' Temple. I grabbed it, managed to lift it before it hit. The fucker was heavy as shit; I don't remember if I'd tried to lift one of the humanoid ones before or not, but this one just weighed a fuckton.

I lifted it up, hefted it over to where I remembered a park over by the Schuylkill, and after making sure nobody'd run there, dropped the body. I figured if it didn't have a head, It couldn't Heal itself, but just to be sure I wrapped two tentacles around its torso, then rammed a third right through its ribcage to remove its heart. If it could reconstitute without a brain or heart, I'd figure out a way to get it to my Maw, but given the thing tasted like ocean silt mixed with port mud, I did not want to go that route.

I also didn't want to think too much about how I knew what it tasted like after manhandling it with my tentacles.

Most of all, I didn't want to think about how many bodies lay still and silent in the Temple of Storms.

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