Wish upon the Stars chapter 933

Derrick was the first to arrive. I’m somehow not surprised, Derrick reminds me uncomfortably of Abel, and my mentor is never late to a party unless it’s fashionable. Unlike Abel though, Derrick was also young and incredibly eager to prove himself. Choosing to become a combat focused Wishmaster candidate spoke to a deep love of battle and glory. His wishes were probably all very heavily Might focused.

Which is what made it both surprising and somehow incredibly unsurprising at the same time when he kicked the door in with a crash bellowing. “Derrick ARRIVES!”

I glowered at him from the table where Callie and I were enjoying a meal. “Can Derrick shut the fuck up? Some of us are trying to eat.”

Callie looked appalled, but Derrick just grinned at me. “Sorry cousin, I didn’t realize you had such a delicate constitution. I’ll try to speak softly so as not to give you indigestion. After all I wouldn- OW ow ow, Molly stop that hurts!”

The tiny purple haired woman who had entered behind him had reached up and grabbed his earlobe viciously, twisting and pulling him down so she could shout right into it. “We are here for an ALLIANCE meeting you colossal child! I asked you to do one thing! Don’t provoke the host, and what is the first thing you do?”

“I like her,” Callie said with a grin. “She gets things done.”

“Don’t get any ideas,” I said mildly. “I’m not some musclebound dunce like Derrick. And you’re strong as hell as a heretic angel. You’d probably rip my ear off”

She pouted at me cutely. “Spoilsport, you know I could never bear to see you hurting.”

Smiling softly at her, I reached across the table to take her hand, intertwining our fingers. “Awww, Cryton they’re so cute!” Chirped the sunny voice of Alys as she stepped inside past the squabbling duo. “Why aren’t you ever that sweet with me.” She tucked herself under the copper titan’s arm, resting her head on his shoulder like a cuddly kitten.

“Because it would shatter my reputation in front of potential adversaries,” he said in a resigned tone. “Like this is doing right now.”

“Man, she’s got you wrapped around her finger, huh buddy?” I asked him with a wide grin.

My wife glowered at me. “Are you saying loving your significant other is some kind of sign of weakness?”

“No dear, sorry dear,” I said immediately, dramatically flicking my eyes down to stare at my food like I was cowed. Though not before winking at my cousin and her apparent boyfriend. Alys giggled at the exchange, and Cryton looked mildly amused if still long suffering.

The next pair to enter was Nadia and her own second. Nadia was a short dark skinned girl with soft features and and quiet demeanor, but she had an IRON spine when pushed. I swear she’d been willing to die with us rather than get pushed around, despite being heavily outnumbered and outmatched. She was willing to negotiate, luckily, but her nerve had made a strong impression.

At her side was a tall pale girl with sparkling silver hair wearing a set of gleaming armor, and, of all things, a crystal tiara. Bryn was Nadia’s second, basically what Callie was to me and Valk was to Nat, the main focus of her wishing and one of her closest advisors and friends.

Charlie was the last to arrive, alongside his retained Walter, the men resembling nothing so much as a pair of brothers, both being tall and having dark hair and eyes. They didn’t join in the teasing banter like Alys and Derrick, being much more reserved. Belsara was, of course, already here, along with Nat, though both of them were part of my own retinue rather than being individual participants. They were sitting with Ellie, Felicity, and Crell, who I suspected was keeping them all from being noticed.

I frowned down at my pot pie. “I’m going to have to eat this later, aren’t I? Or get a new one.” I pushed it across the table. “Here, hon, you can have it. I’ll look like a savage trying to run a meeting with my mouth full.”

My wife just squealed in delight, snagging it and dragging it across the table as she released my hand, I laughed, standing up and pressing a quick kiss to her forehead. “Just chime in through me if you have anything to add. And enjoy.” I glanced up at my four cousins. “Let’s sit at the big table so we can fit everyone, shall we?”

“I get to sit at the head of the table!” Derrick proclaimed loudly, having since freed himself from Molly’s grasp.

Cryton was none to pleased with that. “You’re not even the oldest Wyndham here. Everyone knows etiquette is for the host to sit at one end and the eldest at the other. Eldest would be Nadia.” I wasn’t even going to ask how he knew that, because I had no idea who was the oldest, but it was good info.

Derrick just sneered at him. “You better shut your mouth servant, or I’ll have your guts for garters.”

“You wear garters?” Cryton said with an unconcerned smirk.

My cousin flinched. “Wait, what? No! It’s a turn of phrase! You know that’s not what I meant!” He pointed accusingly at Cryton. “Don’t make me kick your ass!”

“Is that a turn of phrase too?” Cryton said smugly. “Because metaphor is the only way you could ever hope to beat me in a fight.”

“Enough!” I cut in, my voice booming as I reached back for my old “Fist” persona. “The table is round you fucking idiots. Because I KNEW you morons would argue about this. Now come sit down so we can start the meeting. If I wasted a pot pie for no reason I’m going to have Abel and Bethy kick BOTH your asses.”

Alys and Molly both snickered at the misfortune of their respective partners, and my sunny cousin beamed at the camaraderie. I could already tell Molly had just accidentally made a friend for life. Alys was the type to make friends with everyone.

It’s…weirdly familiar honestly. The vibe with my relatives is a lot like with my friends. Not personality wise, really. But the bickering and the shit talking reminds me of how I interact with people like Benny and Abel. It’s really nice. I have Chelsea, and we’ve gotten closer, but I never really had a BIG family. Or I did, but it never felt like it. I didn’t know these people well, but I felt comfortable with them.

Which I considered might be recursion, actually. The us against the world mentality was part of the Wyndham lore. As was the copious amounts of infighting, granted. But positive recursion tended to be harder to resist than negative. The instinct to be a backstabbing dick was something any of my friendlier relatives would push back against, but instinctively liking and wanting to get closer to someone? Why would you want to avoid that? I wondered if the old man had actually considered that before he formed the family as it was? Or maybe I was giving him too much credit, who knew what gods were capable of?

Shaking that off, I plopped down in my seat. Renting the round table had been Crell’s idea, actually, and he’d definitely proved his worth again with that little spark of genius. I wondered if he knew about the Wyndham meeting customs or just assumed a bunch of megalomaniacal reality warpers would be prickly about status.

“So, what do any of you know about the reasons for the recent changes in the succession war?” I asked bluntly, trying to gauge where to start this.

Alys grimaced. “I’ve heard some…not so great stuff. I started asking around, and word on the street is the Void is involved. I mean, something is clearly going on, but I was hoping they were just updating the competition or something. It’s been static for a long time.”

“The Void is sticking their nose into things now?” Nadia asked grimly. “I’d have expected those graveborn upstarts of being behind things if there was an outside force, why would the Void be intervening?”

“The Void hate us,” I told her bluntly. “And the Vanished gods provided a point of access and a distraction. Having dealt with them a bunch of times, I can promise you that they view any opportunity to fuck up realspace as a gift from whatever they have that passes for gods. But yes, Alys is right. The Void is here, and they’re making a play to wipe out the entire current generation of the WCP and every one of our retainers along with us.”

I explained the situation, filling them in on the Void ladder and the danger on the horizon. The relaxed atmosphere vanished in moments. Say what you wanted about my family, but they knew how to get down to business when it was time to be serious. I suppose none of them would have reached this point if they hadn’t.

Nadia was the first to respond after I finished. “That is…most distressing,” she admitted. “I’ll have to confirm your story, of course. But I can see why you approached us. Strength in numbers, and all that. But how do we deal with the obvious flaw in that plan?”

“The succession war,” I sighed. “I know. We all want to win, I assume?” I got nods, unsurprisingly. “But it seems like they’re going to be shifting away from direct combat. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised to see them mobilizing us against the Void invaders directly through tasks in the upcoming rounds. While in the past, working together might have been kind of tricky, I think we could manage it this time.”

The rest of them all seem to look to Nadia as the leader, at least in this context. I’m approaching them, but Nadia is clearly someone to be deferred to. I suppose because she’s the eldest. I assume from them KNOWING she’s the eldest that they have much better sources about the family than I do.

“It might be possible,” she hedged slowly. “I suppose. The Void is certainly a larger problem than a bit of advantage in the competition, though obviously not as large as the succession war itself.”

I find myself…agreeing with that. I’d been doing a lot of thinking about this, and my momentum for growth was a HUGE advantage. But that momentum was going to start slowing down once I hit C-rank. I’d need ten million points for my next rank up, and the current trickle of income I had wouldn’t BEGIN to cover that anytime soon. My best shot at advancing quickly and finally catching up to my Path advancement was winning this. Becoming the Wishmaster was a coveted position for a reason. The sheer quantity of renown incoming from the office would make reaching B-rank a breeze.

Damn. I’d been corrupted by the WCP and turned into one of those maniacs who thought the succession war was the most important thing. How the mighty had fallen.

“I think we should get an idea what the conclave will entail before making any concrete decisions,” I said easily. “Make sure that our upcoming tasks end up being team compatible. If so…well, let’s just call this meeting an early audition. I think we could all work really well together. For now though, we should all get to know each other a bit better and you can check into everything I told you.” I raised a hand, gesturing to the man behind the bar. “Barkeep, pot pies for everyone, on me!”

Everyone seemed receptive, and I ignored my wife’s internal snickering that I’d pivoted the whole meeting to get another pot pie. She was mistaken. I was just being a good host. But man, that pot pie was amazing. I was totally going to have seconds.