Inside Fertility's temple is Sedriresa, waiting for me. Her skirt is waving as she taps her foot around. She does her best to hide how she perks up when I enter.

She takes a deep breath and says, "Your Highness, please come help my Princess. She needs you. Please, I beg of you. She will be a great Mother, I promise. I'll lead her better than her mother. I promise the child will be better with Elora around."

"That is why I'm here," I sigh. "Show me the way."

"Thank you, your Highness," Sedriresa says. She turns immediately and darts down a hallway. We just go a single door down before she enters, holding the door open wide for me.

Elora and her blood are resting on the bed. Even the wall is dripping red with her blood. Has she been fighting monsters in here or something? How does blood get on the walls? Is the baby scraping her way out?

"The baby. Please," Elora groans. "Please."

"I can do both," I say. "But you may get pregnant again to recover from this." Elora actually manages to nod to my answer. I should be able to heal her without that, but who knows? Goddesses seem to be involved with this long labor. Elora shouldn't have any trouble giving birth. "Where is the baby?"

"Still inside, your Highness," Sedriresa says.

"How?" I ask. How is it possible for the kid to still be inside after all this time? She thought it would be over already, and it has barely even started.

"I do not know, your Highness. Please, whatever you need. Just ask. Save their lives, please."

I may have been a little overconfident when walking in now. I've been in a bloody bed before. Isda was certainly now better than Elora when I popped into her room. Elora is going to be much harder to cut open, but that is likely the only way.

I send my mana first. Straight to the baby and find it just fine still in Elora's womb. It starts to travel around the rest of her body, and it seems just to be lacking blood, a minor detail for nobles based on how often they liked to bleed people out.

I shuffle onto the bed and hear it ooze out blood. I push through and get between Elora's legs. She's fully dilated, the most I've ever seen, so the baby is just refusing to come out, I guess.

"I have to pull it out," I say. Elora has finally passed out.

Sedriresa comes to the side of the bed, "Just tell me what I need to do."

"Nothing," I say. "Just don't want you to freak out when I cut her open."

"I've learned my mistake, your Highness," Sedriresa says.

Good for her. I start the cut. Elora must have some passive against cutting her because it was not this hard to cut into Isda. I'll need to make sure this doesn't happen again. This is too much pressure and blood for me to deal with every few months.

I've replenished her blood enough now that she starts to bleed through my cut. A good sign, I would say. It takes a bit for me to get her split open, and I can reach in for my kid. Carefully, I grab her and pull her out with the afterbirth. I'm not sure if that is supposed to come with the child, but it won't hurt anything with me right here and ready to go to extremes to fix everything.

I've added to the blood mess, but I'm holding my newest child. Just her hair color worries me a bit, golden like Isda. Did a new Goddess decide to get close to me?

The baby cries, daring to poke my right breast. Of course, Elora and I created a greedy baby. Probably mostly my doing. A lot of my babies are always asking for something. Or is that just babies? I should check in on the Hearth Priestess and see if she knows.

"Very well," I hum. "I think your Mommy is going to be fine even without me starting up a sister for you."

I shrink my breasts down so the dress slips past my nipples and then regrow them. A fun little trick Sedriresa just showed me, or maybe she was offering to feed the child herself? Either way, the child pokes me instead of feeding, and a small white light flashes.

"Sneaky bitch," I mutter. The new goddess latches onto my nipple, so I can't go investigating quite yet, but both nipples are going to have a marking on them now. I'll have to wait a bit to figure out what it looks like. Maybe I can guess her name before I ask Space about her name.

Elora, you managed it. You actually managed to do it. Shit. I promised her love for this, didn't I?

"Sedriresa," I say. "Are you able to clean the bed?" I can practically hear Kou telling me I have to get some sleep.

"Of course, your Highness," Sedriresa says. "I've cleaned a lot of blood in my time with Elora."

"Do it, then strip. I'm tired, and I made a silly promise to Elora. I have to keep my promises."

"Thank you, your Highness," Sedriresa says. He hands flow around the room, and the blood clears, even off Elora's body. "Is she going to be fine?"

"She'll live," I say. "Come join us. I'm tired, and sleeping near me heals everyone, so this will be good for all of us."

"The baby?"

"A Goddess," I say. "She won't die on us."

"My Princess actually managed to do it," Sedriresa says while she strips. "I didn't believe her. I thought she was killing herself over nothing. She'll get married to you, right, your Highness?"

"Yes. Somehow she managed that," I say. Sleeping at the altar really did help her out, I suppose. Even Elora didn't think it would work out for her. "She's lucky Mommy is so nice, otherwise she would just be a few bones right now." Makes me wonder if Luck wanted to help her out.

"Shall we sleep?" Sedriresa asks.

"That would be nice," I say.

*** Queen Yumanea ***

Thank the Goddesses, Alzi completed the ritual.

Still, there are groups of beasts that we have to clean up, but even with all the casualties we had in the hour-long fight, we have the women to handle it. Then we have to gather all the materials. I don't think we'll see beasts like this ever again. We'll have to be careful with the use and share it with the Phoenixes and Kitsune. They'll get mad about it if it doesn't happen.

Hopefully, nobody asks about the random woman who kept falling over from the pain. It would make it a lot easier to ignore their deaths if nobody brings them up.

Then Elora. I hope the ritual wasn't too painful for her, and the child made it fine.

*** Phrogni ***

The light ended our battle quickly. It wasn't hard to see that all was lost when Nature's forces just fell over. Our victory was taken away in seconds. Our great push stopped in a second by a massive ritual. More than one Goddess was behind that one. How Alzi managed to get them all behind her is amazing. I was surprised that Justice and Nature got together for this war, and Alzi managed at least three to kill all those beasts. Follow current ɴᴏᴠᴇʟs on novèlfire.net

"What are you all doing!" my sister shouts, slamming her fist against the table. "How did you all die out?"

"Nature used the wrong womb, I guess," the dryad champion says. "Think I care about this? I'm happy to have a reason to run back to my tree and dance around. Even Nature knows I'm the wrong woman to do this. All she does is complain about how Annoris and Louts were being watched too much. Curse, yell, and bitch all you want. But my army is dead, and I don't care. If you want to keep going, you'll have to find your own way to push forward. I don't have anything else for you. Nature lost, if you want to keep going for Justice, have fun yourselves. I'm tired and going home."

"Yes," I say. "This one is..."

"Pathetic," my sister says. "Dragons aren't as scared as you. Think we're going to retreat like you? Can't even listen to your Goddess. She has more troops for you to use."

"Listen to my Goddess?" the dryad chuckles. "Where is yours? Babying a mother-to-be, I believe, instead of caring about you. She even hurt your ability to field an army for this war. Don't tell me about my Goddess. I've given up caring about her centuries ago. You're the ones who are supposed to still care about your Goddess. She still helps you in a useful way. Nature's best action is that the forests are often too dangerous to cut down. So instead, they burn them when they have to tame them. Have fun by yourselves. I miss my tree."

The dryad dances out of the tent. My sister is trying to split the table as we watch her leave.

"Sister," I say. "We need to look to end the war the best way we can."

"I know how to end the war in our favor. Nothing will stop us from getting that traitorous bitch. Now we'll have her to ourselves. The right woman becomes the broodmares of the future royals. Not that silly red."

"My daughter?" I say. "We've lost. Don't throw more of our people into a grave."

"We'll have plenty of kids when we get Alzi, and we need to show the phoenixes that they've forgotten why they never pick a fight with us."

"No. We're done here."

"I've already woken her up. We'll have everything we need soon."

*** Alzi ***

I fell asleep easily and got to wake up naturally, by a baby crying. Both bodies get woken up the same way, of course. The new Goddess is still a baby, even if she's smarter than babies.

It is embarrassing to get tricked by a baby. Not surprising, but I'll need to hide that part of how I got my newest tattoo.

But why do I have a new pair of eyes?

"Alzi," Elora groans. "The baby? Why are there two of you here?"

"I got another body," I say. "Not sure what for, but I leveled a lot from the ritual, and I haven't been given many skills. I'm guessing this body is why. The new Goddess is fine, but did a number on you."

"They let me carry a Goddess?" Elora says. "I did it."

"Yes, yes, you did," I say. I let my second body pick up our baby. My new body doesn't have milk, so I'll have to have Elora or my main body feed her. Or Sedriresa, but I think Elora would rather do it if I pass for some reason. "I'll uphold my promise. But you understand your position."

"Yes, dear. I'm here to help you."

"I'll give you a few months and then we'll get you pregnant again on some Goddess's altar and provide the world with another Goddess. You'll sit on the throne with a fake collar and come crawling to my room when I call. I'll kiss you, whisper sweet things into your ear, give you massages, and fuck you silly. You'll be my wife and lover, but also my servant. Can you do that for me?"

"Yes, Alzi, my love, I can do that. I want that. Let me help my people and you. That's all I want."

"Good," I say. Hopefully, everything is fine. Going through everything the Goddess screen is showing me is going to take some time.