Bethany went back to sleep, clearly still suffering some side-effects of what had happened. Tara went out to find Audrey, not to bring her back, but to be a friend. Eli finally sat on his meditation platform and fully connected with the piece of his soul that inhabited it, making them one. He pushed the image that he had for the town and his intent into the town's soul and gave it several examples of magic to work with. He borrowed Bethany’s water magic, he used his own Gravity magic recipe, then sent a combination of his life magic, Bethany's Water magic, and Tara’s Shadow magic. The combination of the three was for the new town defenses and a personal touch that he never told them about since it was non-negotiable.

  The ground under him shook and there was some crackling, the sound of water running and then a sudden twist like they were spinning, not him, the whole town. The stone around him shifted and changed color, his dome hut now had a wooden roof instead of being like a tree. He hadn’t really thought about the layout of his personal part of the town but it seemed the town had its own ideas about it. The doorway to his private area changed to a real wooden door and everything shook again and again. The stones now all had a faint purple shine to them and they were more uniform in size and shape with a single rune in the center. The spinning sensation slowed but now it felt like they were rising in the air.

  Eli peaked over to Bethany, letting his focus split for a second but she was still asleep, but now she was in an insanely well carved, dark purple, stone, four post bed. It had vines draped between the posts and the moss was much thicker and more plush. His area was still the one room with the bathing pond area on the other side, but now there was a fancy curtain and a partial 3 foot tall wall separating the two areas with a walkway on either end. It took over an hour for everything to complete and he hadn’t heard any screams so he was reasonably sure no one had been hurt. He wanted to go check it out, but stopped himself and woke Bethany to join him. She was still a little shaky on her feet but, arm in arm, she joined him as they explored their new and improved home.

  Leaving their bedroom, just outside the door, there were stairs. This shocked them but wouldn’t hurt anything they supposed so they continued down the stairs and upon reaching the bottom, Eli face-palmed so hard it was almost like a thunderclap. The bottom floor was stylized like a great hall, with an elevated seat on one end. It was a large chair, not quite a throne, but more like a focal point for the room and there was a slightly smaller chair to each side. Bethany smirked when she noticed that the side chairs were also different sizes, and she just knew the bigger one was for her. Not wanting to spend any time in that room, they headed outside and both of their jaws dropped in shocked awe.

  The central fountain area was now a small park with the fountain in the middle, there was a walkway going around the fountain and through the park with one end going into their house and the other leaving the park to the other buildings. With bushes, trees, and grass it all looked very peaceful, there were even a couple little benches in the middle facing the fountain. The rest of the hut were now full of buildings and wandered into one, living rooms with a basic cooking area with a fireplace. There was a bathroom in the back, with two bedrooms in a small upstairs area. They weren’t large like his home, but they were cozy and strong enough that Eli doubted that he could break a wall without multiple punches.

  Next, they walked to the wall and where the entrance to the town had been. It was now just a wall like the rest of the perimeter, except a wide and tall double doors section that was recessed. They went to open the door but Eli paused when his hand passed through a magical barrier to get to the door. He explored it with his senses and smiled, it was exactly what he wanted. It contained shadow magic to make it invisible, life magic so it could think and know who or what to stop, and water magic that could absorb the impact of a meteor. The barrier went around the town like a sphere of protection, and it was also what was holding the town together because when he eventually did open the door they saw that they were now in the sky.

  After leaving the doorway, there was a wide path about ten feet long that ended with a stone pillar, it had runes on it and was about a foot wide and eight feet tall. He touched it and immediately knew what it was, he grabbed Bethany tighter and let a bit of his magic into the pillar. In a flash they were on the ground, in another park-like area next to a large pond where the town had been. He looked up and could see the town floating above them maybe half a mile straight up in the air. The town was still connected to the surface by a magical tether that went into the center of the pond then deep underground. They sat on a bench that overlooked the pond, moving around the stone pillar identical to the one up top.

  Bethany had not said a word the entire time, at first Eli just thought that she had still been tired, but now that he paid more attention to her, he could tell she was experiencing joy. Just a plain simple joy that was calm, introspective, and appreciative. She laid her head on his shoulder as they both looked out at the water, neither of them said anything, they just enjoyed being together. But Eli knew this peacefulness would need to stop, he had been idle for long enough, he needed to keep moving forward or the system would find a way to push him. From everything he has experienced so far, when it pushed, it wasn’t pretty.

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  It was maybe an hour later, the sun was starting to come up and Tara walked up to them on the bench and stood in front of them with her arms crossed. She didn’t seem mad so Eli relaxed, but then he went tense again when he saw Audrey walk up right after her.

  “I should know by now that when you say you're going to do something crazy and impossible, you aren’t kidding.” Tara said, with a small chuckle to herself.

  “You thought I was kidding?”

  “Well, in my experience, when a man you're sleeping with tells you he's going to build you a castle in the clouds, he’s just trying to keep your legs open.” Tara said.

  Eli and Audrey both looked at her with raised eyebrows, “Your experience?” Eli asked. “How many times has a guy said that to you?”

  “Ok, fine, I saw it in a movie.” Tara said.

  Eli chuckled and looked at Audrey, “I’m free if you want to talk.”

  Bethany got up and made her way over to the stone, she put a hand on it and when nothing happened she turned to Eli with a frown. “How does this work?”

  “You push just a bit of your magic into it, it reads the signature and then lets you up.”

  “Oh,” was all she said before vanishing.

  Audrey didn’t seem able to find her voice so Eli spoke first. “How about I start, and you can chime in when you want. Also, feel free to correct me if I get something wrong.”

  “Is that allowed?”

  “Is what allowed?”

  “Correcting you, if you're a god then you don't make mistakes.”

  “And that brings me to the first thing I wanted to discuss, I am still human.”

  “You weren’t before this, how are you human now?”

  “Well this is where it gets tricky, I’m not human physically, at least not the same as you are. I am something though, a person, a being, no matter how you look at it, I had humanity.”

  “I can see where you are going with this, but I don’t agree. What you are capable of is not something a human, or person, can do. And I bet you're immortal now, what would you care about us, our lives, our happiness, when you’ll live forever.”

  “I’m going to stop you right there, I need to correct you on a few things. First, yes, my capabilities are extreme, but not anything that someone over level 200 wouldn’t be able to do even without being a half god thing. Secondly, I am not immortal, I can be killed, and I am aging, it’s just very slow.”

  “I don’t think you get it, what kind of a relationship can we have when there is this giant distance between us. A distance so vast I don't even understand the other side.” Audrey said. She was beginning to raise her voice and her eyes were watering a bit. Tara was by the pillar now looking at it awkwardly, she didn’t want to interrupt but she also wanted to see the remodeled town. She touched it and after a moment vanished.

  “We could be friends, I think,” Eli sighed, “I would like to believe that being friends with me is possible.”

  “So I just tell people I’m friends with a god who has a castle in the sky? I’m not doing that, this is just too much like the cult and I'm not sure I can get past it.”

  “That’s fine,” Eli stood up and started walking over to the pillar. “I would like to be your friend, and you are always welcome here, as a guest. But if you don’t want to be here with me and my friends, then I can’t let you keep your servant status.” he paused, now standing next to the pillar. “Is that what you want?”

  She looked unsure, but nodded her head, “Yes, please take it away.”

  Eli didn’t make a gesture or touch her head, he didn’t even say anything. He just looked her in the eye, and touched the pillar vanishing. The moment he was gone she fell to the ground, her body and her soul felt weak and useless. Their connection had been cut and his strength was no longer aiding her. The worst of it was that her will skill, also known as a soul skill, was a copy of his and she couldn’t use it without their connection. She wasn’t in pain, just felt like she was normal again, plain, like before the system came. She had expected this sensation, but not this severe, and she hadn’t expected to lose feeling special.

  Her brilliant mind had always made her feel special, then when the system came she felt ordinary since she wasn’t very good at magic or fighting. Then Eli came along and taught her some tricks about magic and she felt special again, then she joined his group and he relied on her, someone powerful and meaningful to the world, relied on her. Then she didn’t go on the raid, which was fine when they left, but when they returned she realized that she had missed out on the bonding that the group had done together. She felt like an outsider, which hurt, but then she heard about his promotion to god and realized that no one was going to catch up to him. And, unless she could take Bethany or Tara’s place, she was going to be a nobody standing next to a god, a footnote that no one would even notice or remember. She stopped sulking and gathered herself together, the only thing left for her to do was to find a new path, a new way to stand out. With her current skill set, the only thing that she could think of was to be an assassin, she would be the best and strongest one ever.