Beyond SSS-Rank After Getting The God System

Carl, nodded, appreciating the warning and then bid them good evening. "Something to detect heat fluctuations..."

"Carl, don't overthink it, take a thermometer." Kyubi laughed as she took from a kitchen draw and slid it into his sleeve with a giggle and kissed him, before it beeped a few seconds later and made Klaire snort with amusement.

"Who would have thought that was all we needed to do to get a read on you." Klaire laughed.

Carl withdrew the thermometer and held it out to her. "That's the battery dying, probably because someone keeps putting it in the draw and not on the utility dock, Klaire."

"Hey! You don't have time to be worrying about things like that, go plan tomorrow."

Carl shook his head and said goodnight to everyone but Tiamutael, Omedra, Squidge and Levi as he led them off to the sparring room to use it as a war room.

"Right, Tiamutael, bring in the line-up."

Tiamutael nodded then brought in Equinox, Aldra and Aegis.

"Carl, are we done being pacifists?" Equinox asked with an inquisitive tone.

"No, I'd still rather avoid it, but I'm not hiding from it. I want us to be ready to do what needs to be done." Carl answered.

"Good, we have allowed far too much chaos to come of our association with the variants. Aegis and I will accompany you." Carl struggled to gauge the mood Equinox found himself in.

"Equinox, no first-strikes unless you're certain..." Carl held eye-contact until absolutely certain Equinox wasn't going to act as preemptively as in Cocytus. "...Saboteur, be ready for Tiamutael to retrieve you, don't reply."

"I think he just gave me an acknowledgement." Tiamutael reported with unusual uncertainty.

Suddenly Sis emerged from him. "Sorry for doing that Carl, I wanted to make sure you remembered you can bless them all."

"Right..." Carl proceeded to give them a greater blessing. "...Thanks Sis, but surely that isn't the only reason you came to see us."

"No, I wanted to teach you how to see systems, well less teach and more give my own blessing..." She wasn't exactly how to make contact so she gave Carl a hug.

[ CARL HAS RECEIVED TWO BLESSINGS ]

[ SIS' BLESSING RECEIVED : SYSTEM SCAN ]

[ ISHTAR'S BLESSING RECEIVED : SIBLING BOND ]

"...Did it work?" Sis asked as she stepped back, looking a little uncomfortable.

"Yeah, did you just get her blessing as well?"

"Yeah, I did. I'm not sure how to feel about it. I really want to know the truth..."

Carl hugged her again. "I will find it, her diary I mean. One of the reasons I claimed Tsukuyomi's realm is so we had free reign to search there, but time is strange there so we need to pace ourselves okay?"

"Absolutely. Since I know you'll forget to check, her blessing gives us the ability to summon each other in emergencies as long as we're on good terms."

"Awesome, I don't care about our origins as much, but I'm grateful I got you Sis. I'm sorry for complaining about you for eight years and being a bratty brother."

"Meh, I was a bit of a menace, I deserved it. Sorry for not being more helpful."

"Hey if you can handle the HR nightmare of running a faction we'll call it even."

The pair chuckled, then Carl had Tiamutael bring over Alysse.

"Well look who it is... You never call, you never write and you plan a trip and I get no invite." Alysse said as she wobbled.

"So... Been drinking?"

"Well yeah, I had to celebrate all my hard work. So drinks first, then handover, then off to bed where I shall stay for two days." She chuckled before producing something and placing it on the table

"I can't believe you actually managed to do it. I only brought you here to ask for a quick rundown of building materials."

"Why the hell would you want that!? A wall can be smashed no matter what they made it out of."

Carl laughed to himself, he'd missed the times they spent in the workshop and this reminded him how much. "Alysse, I want to know if I need to have saboteur take samples for me to log."

"Oh right! Well, I guess we could do with some osmium and rhenium. They're handy for making alloys, Rhenium in particular can be used to make heat tolerant superalloys."

"You are a gem! Rhenium might be just what I need. Saboteur, if you can find any rhenium bring it to me as I arrive."

Tiamutael gave him a thumbs up and then he went to open the case that Alysse had produced. "I'll warn you now, it's still not pleasant. You got ten minutes."

Carl told everyone to watch carefully and do their best to memorise what they see, then opened the case. Inside it was some kind of headwear resting on top of a projector.

Carl put the head piece on and activated the device, squirming as nanites began to make nanoscopic canals through his head connected to his mind, then he chickened out and deactivated it.

"Sorry, no, that's not gonna work. Great work, but it's too invasive still when we have the choice of recollection magic."

"Yeah, I know, that's what got me this far. I'll get there eventually, but I wanted to show you ASAP."

Carl, began drawing the circle on the table after Alysse retrieved it and then Carl gestured for them to touch it. "I wrote a bit of Infinity into it, so you should experience everything in short order."

The others looked at him for a second before replying. "When did you learn to do that exactly?"

"Well, I watched Kyubi make one on Lugaria, I guess becoming immortal helped me understand its structure."

"Great! Can you give me a circle of some of your more personal ex-"

"No." Carl spoke with enough bluntness to sober Alysse up a bit.

"Fine, spoil-sport."

By the time that exchange finished the others came out of the recollection and they all began discussing the layout of the pluto base.

"Carl, I can easily blast through the structure, from meeting room to exterior..." Aldra stated. "...If I condense my platinum flame into a beam the sudden decompression would create a distraction. Since you can breathe in deep space and Equinox, Aegis and I are not oxygen dependant, it would be a good means of extraction in an emergency."

"No, it wouldn't work. They're cowards, they wouldn't meet anywhere they were in danger."

"Agreed, Not to mention Gilgamesh, I have a feeling he would be able to intercept it. Carl, I can last maybe three seconds against him."

The admission was stunning, Equinox was the strongest creation Carl had produced and he couldn't even begin to put up a decent fight against the immediate threat.

"Equinox, I trust you..." Carl said as he had a thought. "...Would you allow me to give you a power boost through layered chimerism?"

"Are you sure? I'm not bound to you, if I ever became your enemy..."

"Then I'll tell you to stop being mean Equinox." Tiamutael said with a determination that only children have the ability to express at the tensest of moments.

"Hmm? You are powerful, my future lord, but still far from that level. Do not burden yourself with such promises." Equinox said with a level of respect that eclipsed even what he showed Carl.

"I agree with him Buddy, teaching him a lesson is his creator's job... Please don't turn evil though, you'll embarrass me." Carl laughed as he designed a chimera based on the Life and death version of balance.

"I promise and am ready whenever you are."

The change was immediate and overwhelming.

[ NEW LAYERED CHIMERA CREATED ]

[ LAW OF BALANCE HAS TAKEN NOTICE ]

[ LAW OF BALANCE HAS INTERFERED ]

[ THE LAYERED CHIMERA HAS INCORPORATED THE NATURE OF AN ASPECT ]

[ THE CREATION HAS ACHIEVED HYBRID LINEAGE ]

[ NEW DESIGNATION NEO-DEUS PREATOR ]

[ PLEASE NAME SPECIES ]

"Something fancy, something grandiose..." Carl pinched his chin. "...Dragon-god of equipoise? How's that sound?"

"Fancy." Tiamutael said with a nod of approval.

"Grandiose." Omedra laughed.

"A waste of time, he's your creation, as long as he remembers that it's pointless." Aldra added, killing the fun immediately.

"Dragon-god of equipoise, it is." Carl said with a disappointed sigh.

Equinox asked them all to follow him to the viewing room, which Carl was glad for, because he had always wondered exactly how strong Equinox was and that suddenly became more intense with the power-up.

[ SYS BUILD = DRAGON-GOD OF EQUIPOSE V 0.0.0 ]

[ NAME = EQUINOX ] [RACE = DRAGON/ASPECT****** ] [LEVEL = MAX ]

[ VIT = 500,000,000 ] [ DEF = 315,000,000 ] [ INT = 1,000,000,000 ] [ STR = 900,000,000 ]

[ DEX = 800,000,000 ] [ CHA = 378,000,000 ] [ MP = INT x 10 ]

[ HP = VIT + DEF ] [ DIV = NEO DEUS' ]

[ SKILLS = LAW OF ORDER, LAW OF CHAOS, LAW OF DEATH, LAW OF LIFE, HUMAN TRANSFORMATION, IMMORTALITY, DIVINE DRAGON WRATH, CHAOS BRINGER, ORDER BRINGER, LIFE BRINGER, DEATH BRINGER ]

[ SKILL RANKS = UNQUANTIFIABLE ]

"Carl, I'd hate to sound arrogant, but I think we're done planning. I can buy seven seconds which is more than enough time for evacuation."

"Seven seconds..." Carl said, before they called it a night and Tiamutael sent them all to their homes.

He then took his children back and joined the nest that everyone else had made on the couch.

"How'd it go? felt like Equinox got a power boost." Klaire whispered as to not disturb the children as they watched the vid.

"Yeah... We got him strong enough to last a whole seven seconds..."

"That's actually very impressive. I'd last maybe thirty if I had the initiative and he didn't use curses, but it's a bad match for me anyway. Lillim would last maybe two minutes."

"What about Nergal?"

"We're not sure, some think Nergal would make it a fight, but I don't think it would end well. Like myself, Nergal is a bad match for him, except that's because he's immune to the unique wavelength of Nergal's family."

"Well, I guess it's a good thing I'm different, but I'd rather enjoy the movie myself than talk about him."

As he finished speaking his eldest daughter collapses into him and filled his ear with the sound of snoring. "I think you should take your daughter to bed first." Klaire laughed, patting him on the back as he did...