continued - 7/8

Joe caught her distracted change of conversation and thought carefully, "I'm… what do you mean?"

Kilniara said nothing, embarrassment silencing her but Garnedell took up her thoughts, "She is wondering why you have chosen her."

Joe nodded, understanding coming to him, before he continued, "Ah… well… my people do not see power or status are meaningful … as much. Well … that seems to be changing some, but I, at least, see little meaning in status or position. Who a person is is more important than any form of status or power. And you are good people: kind, considerate, hardworking. You seem like you treat others well with respect and consideration. This means much more to me than any other measure."

Joe stopped to allow his words to sink in, the other three growing embarrassed by smiling brightly in pride as the squirmed under his praise. Joe allowed them there moment before he returned to Kilniara's and his relationship.

"Are you sure? You will not be offended if I make decisions for us?"

Kilniara flushed brightly at that and took too long to reply and Zilnek had more than enough time to choke back some laughter before interjecting, "She will not care! You are strong. Stronger than she has any right to claim!"

Kilniara cut off a cry of indignation before leaping at her brother and shoving a hand over his mouth to quiet him, embarrassment coloring her cheeks a brilliant red. Joe watched on with some amusement before cutting them off, the conversation too important not to discuss.

"Zilnek, please let Kilniara talk," Joe interjected before continuing, "Are you sure, Kilniara?"

She nodded quickly, "I am more than willing."

"Well, I don't think you have much to worry about, as my people have taken to separating decision making between both men and women, although men do have the final say. But recently, my people have taken to an equal discussion between the two before decisions are made."

"I know," she nodded, "You do the same for us."

Realization drove Joe's eyebrows up before he nodded, "OK. Yeah, I could see that. Although if we were to … grow closer together, you will take on more … equal position with me."

"Equal?"

"Hmm. We attempt to be equal, for the most part."

Kilniara flushed but said nothing as she listened intently. Joe continued.

"Usually, the couple will choose and make decisions together as a team. If there is a decision that causes a conflict, the two will try to choose the one that's best for both. Maybe one has a better opportunity or job, and it will greatly help the family or make them more wealthy, then the other will choose to quit their job and follow their spouse and seek a new job at the new place; things like that. Sometimes, if it's really bad, then you'll get a fight and have to fight about who will be the final decision maker. In this case, in a patriarchy, the man will have the final say. In a matriarchy, the woman will. Today, in my culture, men still usually have the final say although they usually listen and hear their wives' thoughts and do not often clash, if they work together well and communicate well. But, I would probably be used to make the final decision if one needed to be made." Joe ended with some concern.

Kilniara nodded, then sighed before continuing, "I would be fine with such. You are stronger, and of higher status. It would be natural in my society for a woman to follow such a man."

"But not usually in marriage?"

Kilniara stopped in thought for a moment before she began, "If the marriage was one of equals. But as I said, with status and strength differences, the stronger and higher status will lead."

Garnedell quickly interjected while nodding his head in agreement, "Amongst all, gender is usually low in rank for who leads. Only if the marriage is equal, does matriarchy or patriarchy come in to play. Almost always, strength and status have much greater weight."

Joe pondered that for a bit before he began to nod, "I guess I could see that."

Joe's thoughts drifted away after that as he considered a society developed around obviously defined strength from a system. Strength quantified would be easily another measure of success and power beyond wealth and political power. And since this strength was specifically personal, wealth and political power would likely pale in comparison. Political power can move armies and wealth could buy armies, but personal strength would ultimately become too great for political power or wealth to control. What powerful person would want to submit to a weaker person with political or economic power.

The other three began speaking amongst themselves, leaving Joe to his thoughts understanding how society would develop with such an obvious third avenue to success that was uniquely and permanently tied to an individual, which couldn't be stolen, or even blackmailed. Who would try to blackmail someone with such power? It would take another of equal or greater power. And even if you are equal in power, a simple ambush would likely be easier. And if you are greater, why go through the trouble. Just walk through the front door of the other guy's house and bully him around how you want.

Joe spent some time considering this before pulling himself from his thoughts and quickly called the other three to their purpose, power leveling. He split the teams in two, as usual, and found himself with Zilnek first today. The day went quickly especially with injecting his mana into his strikes. However, it proved more difficult than the last couple days because he no longer had the help of the jobs that would allow him easy access to mana emission. Despite that, the other three seemed to find it remarkably easy to emit mana and kill the goblins quickly and efficiently. Joe failed to emit mana regularly but when he did so, the monsters seemed to freeze, shuddering as if in electrical shock before immediately collapsing. Despite the slightly faster kills with emitting mana through their weapons, they still took until almost an hour after lunch for Joe to hit level thirty. Joe smiled when he did so and decided to call it a day. Joe eagerly flipped through his status windows and took a look at what his current job's stats were as well as the newly available skills. The excitement died pretty quickly, as the stats proved absolutely useless, although he did get some decent gains in his magical resistances and learning. Which… yeah… goddess of wisdom… makes sense, I guess.