GxG 14
First things first, I needed to get this kid off my work table. I don't have anything particularly dangerous on it, but it is not exactly baby-proofed either.
Stepping forwards and scooping them into my arms, I ran a couple scans with my senjutsu. All those experiments with Gregory have made me a damn good healer, and decent at exploring new biologies too, since I was basically building him up from a common housecat.
The first thing that stood out to me was that she was extremely healthy. Damn near overflowing with vitality.
She had these cute little slightly pointed ears and I think her hair is nicer than mine even after 15 years of Body optimizing and enhancing me.
If she was human I'd peg her around 4-5 months old maybe? I don't know how flower spirits age.
Second thing I noticed was all the formations I had put on the Rainbow Lotus before I left were swiftly merging with her, leaving some very faint floral patterns on her arms and legs.
Mentally tracing the formation, I found where the missing portion would have been.
However, instead of finding nothing there, my senjutsu scan pinged off a ball of energy that was in the process of ordering itself.
Kind of felt like what I imagine a Soul would be like.
Oh! That was a soul. I've been trying to get that mote for years now, but I could never lock it down.
The senjutsu primers I was given years ago mentioned senjutsu can interact with the soul, but they didn't say how.
I could not find my own damn soul, but thanks to the formation I could physically trace where her soul was.
Set Mind, Body, and Soul to focus on becoming in sync with each other. That should help speed run the last few years of the Path of Breath.
By the time I graduate I should be able to-
I was startled from my thoughts with a smack on the forehead.
Looking back to the baby, she was not happy I got distracted.
"You're a smart one, aren't you? Already a little attention hog too~" I cooed at her. She just scrunched up her face.
"We really need to pick a name for you, huh?"
"Gah." She babbled at me.
"I knew you would agree. Truly my daughter."
And WOW isn't that a thought.
My daughter. There really isn't any denying it either. She is obviously the Rainbow Lotus I left on the table, and my senjutsu scans show a decent amount of my energy signature in hers.
A side effect of her forming in my workshop where all the natural energy is tainted from years of only me interacting with it.
Nothing near what a proper Sage could do, but my whole base is basically Nathan flavored.
Even if that was not the case, I already considered the Rainbow Lotuses my babies.
It just wasn't supposed to be literal.
"How does Lily sound?" I half-asked, not really expecting a response.
She promptly blew a raspberry at me.
"No dice, huh. Daisy?" That got a very cute scowl.
"How about Hana? It means flower, grace, or hope depending on the origin. It also sounds English, so we won't get any weird looks."
She scrunched up in thought for a moment, before letting out a small "bah." alongside a nod.
"Alright then. You are now Hana Meyer. My name is Nathan Meyer, I'm what passes for your dad. It is very nice to meet you."
Hana leaned back in my arms slightly and stared at me searchingly before seemingly finding what she was looking for. She then threw herself into my chest and started squealing.
"There is going to be no hiding you, is there? It's a bit of a walk home from here so let's get you set up first."
I shifted Hana to one arm while with the other I used senjutsu to quickly grow a small amulet out of the wall. Catching it, I quickly inscribed a few dozen protection, tracking, and healing formations.
The most important one was a Momentum formation I had to puzzle out because I kept breaking things with my flash step.
Gently sliding it around her neck, making sure not to get tangled in her shoulder length hair, we were ready to leave.
"Let's go meet your grandparents. They are going to love you, even if they might kill me."
She let out a very startled "Gah!?" and I just laughed.
"Not actually kill me, silly. Probably. Maybe. Hopefully?"
Some final cleanup as I was leaving and a final petting of Gregory who seemed to have calmed down greatly, I flash stepped towards home.
[LINE BREAK]
I opened the front door of my house, sliding my shoes off as I called out.
"Mom, are you home?"
"Yeah sweety, I'm just doing the dishes right now." she replied normally.
I was walking towards the kitchen now, baby Hana in hand.
"Hey, remember how you and dad gave me that 'always wear protection' talk a few months ago?" This is a lot more stressful than I thought it would be.
"Yes?" she replied, suspicion creeping steadily into her tone.
"Well, turns out you should have given me the 'no mad science' talk instead."
"Huh?" Her suspicion turned to confusion as I stepped into the kitchen.
"Anyways, meet your granddaughter! Her name is Hana Meyer." Maybe if I slip that into the conversation casually enough I won't get in trouble?
"Nathan." she stated, slightly robotically.
"Yes?" I asked as if nothing was wrong.
"Who's child is that?" Ah, denial is one hell of a drug.
"This is my daughter, mother. Your granddaughter."
"How can you have a child? You barely talk to kids your own age. If you had brought home a girlfriend your father and I would have been ecstatic. How do you have a child?" Ok, ouch. True, but saying it hurts.
Here is the part of the conversation I was actually dreading. Hiding magic for so long is gonna hurt everyone involved.
"That's actually what I wanted to talk to you and dad about too. I didn't know how to bring it up before, but this little cutie forced my hand."
"And what could that possibly be?" Ouch, she was starting to spiral. Dad was at work still so I had to do this alone.
"There's really no way to say it, but magic is real." My mom just looked at me like I was stupid. To be fair, that did sound like a shitty excuse for the whole baby situation.
"There is no way magic is real. I don't know where you got this child, but you better retur-"
"Mom. Magic is real." I interrupted while flaring my touki on the hand not holding Hana, bright white flames flickering down my arm.
"Oh." Uh oh, she might be going into shock. This may have been too much all at once for her.
It's time for a tactical Hana deployment.
I stepped towards my mother who had at this point stopped washing the dishes and passed Hana to her.
She accepted the surprise baby instinctually before she realized what was happening. Hana latched onto her and won her over instantly.
"What- I- You- This isn't over. Go call your father, tell him to get home now." She clearly didn't completely accept that Hana was mine yet, but she was currently in 'this baby is adorable' mode, so I was safe for now.
"Yeah, that was the plan." I stepped out of the room to call my dad, seeing my mom giving Hana a once over as I walked out.
[LINE BREAK]
I was currently sitting in the living room, across from my parents. Hana was still in my mother's arms, but she was playing with some of my baby toys that had been stashed away in case my parents wanted a second kid.
After a few seconds of awkward silence, my dad opened.
"So, magic?" It's crazy how much edge a grown man can put into a two word question.
"Yeah, magic..." This was going worse than I thought possible.
"How about you explain from the start, and then your mother and I will decide if Hana will still have a father." Yikes, this room was icier than the time I buggered my Cooling formation.
"So, remember when I was like three years old and got super sick after going to the park?" It's time to be honest and hope I survive. For Hana's sake.
"Yes, I remember that. You had me so worried, it was the first time you had gotten sick." Replied my mother.
"Well, that was actually the result of me instinctually tapping into some very high level nature magic. Not that I knew it at the time." I'll explain the proper terms later, right now I'm easing them into this whole mess.
"And you didn't mention this after?" My mother snapped at me.
"Well it's not like children's shows were about shapes, colors, and the mist that makes you super sick when you eat it. I didn't know what was happening either." I snapped back.
"Hey, focus." Was all my dad said.
"Ok, so I just poked at that mist stuff for a while. Until the Japan trip."
"Japan trip?" My mother asked, but I could see my dad putting some of the puzzle pieces together.
"Yes, Yasaka was the leader of the supernatural in the area we were in. When she said I helped Kunou, she meant from an assassination attempt. A mook had slipped through the normal checks and almost killed her daughter. Most of the hospitality after that was as thanks for not letting her daughter die."
"Ah, I was thinking it was something like that. What did that have to do with nature magic specifically though?" My dad pointed out, getting right to the issue.
"Yasaka's group, the Yokai, specialize in the same kind of nature magic that I was born with an extreme affinity for. The other half of the payment was a range of books on the topic for self study." The affinity comment wasn't exactly true, but I was not going to explain the motes.
"Books?"
"Yeah, they are still upstairs. That fancy bag they gave me has an expanded space." This was going better than I thought? Maybe I would live to see another day.
"So far we are still at 5 years old. You didn't say anything for the next ten years? Is this what you were doing when you 'went to the park'?" Damn dad, such good questions.
Why couldn't he be more like mom who was half distracted with Hana.
"One of the things I learned at Yasaka's was that the supernatural is extremely dangerous. Murder and slavery are an average Wednesday. Thing is, thanks to a bunch of complicated treaties, if you don't know about magic, you barely notice it. If you barely notice magic, you are much less likely to get targeted by the supernatural." I explained. I wasn't even lying, all this info was in some of the more basic primers I was given.
"So by the time you were old enough to know that hiding it was bad, you had people telling you it was dangerous to tell us." Wow, dad is on a streak today with his laser focused observations. Even mom focused in when I said it was dangerous though.
"Yeah, basically. You guys gave me a lot of independence growing up too, so I spent a lot of time in the woods practicing my magic. It wasn't hurting anyone, so it kind of became the status quo and never crossed my mind." I shrank a bit into myself, but things are looking in the clear?
"Sounds reasonable. How does this end up with you having a daughter? I admit she's very cute but you haven't mentioned a mother at all." Wow, dad is... taking this well? Mom perked up now that we were talking about Hana.
"I have a base a few miles into the woods outside of town where I do experiments, like-"
"Experiments?!" my mom cut in, she did not like that word.
"Magic flower experiments. I used nature magic to make flowers. Nothing dangerous, I promise. And also a cat." That pacified her, hopefully.
"Okay, you're in the clear for now young man." Wow, she completely ignored that cat comment. She does not like pets at all.
"So anyways, my magnum opus is a breed of lotus flowers called the Rainbow lotus, and their successor, the Rainbow Lotus: Sun and Moon series." Some pride crept into my voice, I really did love those flowers.
"Gabbah!" Hana added, clearly recognizing her own flower. My mother just cooed over the cute outburst.
"A Rainbow Lotus you say?" My dad asked, eyes squinting.
"Yeah, the 'Sun and Moon' version has two metal petals on each flower, one gold and one silver."
At that my dad squinted harder at me, looked up in thought, and then looked at Hana. After a moment he turned back to me.
"A Dryad?" Now THAT surprised me. Who knew my dad had a bit of a fantasy nerd in there.
"Well, yeah, basically. It's a bit more complicated than that, but Hana is a flower spirit, or a dryad, or something. She's definitely mine though. I grew the flower, and because of how much nature magic I use in the area she would most likely pass a magical paternity test too." I laid all my cards on the table. Hana was mine and I would hate to fight with my parents about this.
My dad was silent for a few moments, which felt like hours.
"I'm convinced"
"Dear!?" "Dad?" Both my mother and I were surprised.
"What? You heard him. That's clearly his kid. A very magical kid, but his either way." He then turned to me. "We will be having many long talks about this later, but let's get the main ones hashed out now. School and money."
"Huh? What do those have to do with anything?" I do not like that look in his eyes.
"Well Mister Teenage Dad, You have a lot to prepare for now. You're only 15, you have to finish school. How are you going to pay for Hana too? Children are expensive you know? Little 5 year old you begging for a tablet, what are you going to do when Hana does the same?" Uh oh.
"Uh, I didn't think that far. Um, mom still stays at home, I guess I was hoping she could help while I'm at school? I could just get my GED if not. Money isn't actually a problem though. You know Marge?" I turned and asked my mom.
"With the 12 and 11 year old and creepy husband? Don't tell her I said that."
"Yeah them. Well, her husband is effectively middle management for a pretty large supernatural organization called the Grigori. With my nature magic I can make some very in demand fruits and vegetables. I could ask him for some contacts to sell to." Thankfully the skills I gained over the years are fully marketable.
"Wait, you're the reason our garden has been so healthy and tasty? I knew it wasn't the new fertilizer I bought!" Uh oh, I might have triggered my mom. Diversion time.
"Cancer! Dad!" Nailed it.
"Cancer?" replied my dad.
"You had some growths in your lungs last year. I healed them." He stilled.
"Oh. Thanks. We will talk more about that later for sure. Do you know what Hana eats? You said she's a flower spirit, do we need to leave her in the sun?" Okay, that's a very valid question too, even if it was a blatant topic change.
"I don't actually know. I'll run some medical scans later but I don't think- WAIT WAIT WAIT HANA STOP!" Halfway through my sentence I watched in horror as Hana reached out and somehow grabbed a wisp of natural energy with her grubby little hands, stuffing it straight into her mouth.
"What's wrong? What happened?" My mom caught onto my panic immediately, passing Hana to me.
"She just did the same nature magic thing we talked about before, but she's even smaller than I was. I don't know how to make a baby cough up magic! Who would we even call-"
Burp.
Hana, having just burped pure natural energy into my face, giggled like she just got away with stealing the moon.
"You're ok baby?" I asked as I ran a senjutsu scan on her.
She was completely fine.
Better than fine even. Like she had just had a... filling... meal.
Wait.
Pure natural energy.
"ohmygod" I whispered as I stared at her.
"What? What happened? Is she hurt?" asked my frantic mother.
I just started laughing uproariously, lifting Hana up in the air.
"Who's the cutest little Sage? That's right, you are!" I can't believe this.
"Son. What happened?" My dad tried to get my attention, but I was too distracted.
"What happened is that my research for the last 5 years was successful, and it came in the cutest surprise package." I kept laughing and Hana was squealing in joy from being in the air.
Until she puked all over me. At which point my dad started laughing loudly.
"Welcome to fatherhood son. Get used to it."