Oliver's body swayed gently from side to side with the motion of the ship. Eyes closed, he blindly turned his face towards the sun high over head and smiled as the wind ruffled his hair.

"Probably time for another hair cut." He chuckled to himself without opening his eyes.

Despite the picturesque day sailing across the black water of this world, his mind still circled around his numerous ideas for the near future- what to do with the potion and talisman tome, a training regiment for utilizing the warehouse in combat, a plan for potentially scouting their way forward... though that idea was still in the works.

"Dad! Dad!" Oliver's smile widened at the sound of his adopted daughter's voice and the pattering of her feet as she rushed across the deck. His eyes opened as she skidded to a halt in front of him, before having a piece of paper thrust into his face.

"Dad! Look what I did!"

Eyes focusing on the crisp, white page in front of him- he had given Jal an entire stack of paper to draw on just that morning- his heart lurched for a moment. Huge, blocky, letters written using a bubblegum pink crayon- Jal's new favorite color- were the words 'Jal loves Dad'.

In English.

"Mom has been teaching me how to write. See?" The young Devil girl leaned over the page, pointing at each word in turn. "Jal loves Dad. I wrote it myself!" A small blush crept across her dark skin, and she gave a hesitant shrug. "I had to ask mom to show me the word 'love'. She hadn't taught me that one yet..."

"But I wrote it myself! And I want you to have it, that way you can carry it with you on all of your adventures!"

"This..." Oliver paused to clear his throat as a surge of emotion threatened to overwhelm him. "This is one of the best things I've ever been given, Jal. Thank you." Pulling the girl into a hug, his voice dropped to a whisper. "I love you too."

Slowly pulling back once he had regained control of his emotions, Oliver smiled brightly at his daughter. "You know, I think this deserves to be framed."

"Framed?"

Seeing the confusion in the girl's eyes, he chuckled softly. Reaching into his warehouse, he pulled out the a plain wooden picture frame. Within seconds, he had the paper slotted into it, the glass cover protecting the fragile paper from the soft ocean spray. "See? This is to protect the paper, and it's got this nice little thing on the back so I can prop it up on a desk when I want to look at it!"

"Why are you carrying around a picture frame?"

While Jal marveled over the picture frame, he glanced up at his girlfriend who had just joined them. A shy smile flitted across his face at her question, and he shrugged awkwardly. "Ah... Well, before we left... I had the idea to take a picture of us while we were here... And frame it to hang up at the house..."

"So you bought a picture frame, tossed it in the warehouse, and forgot it was there?" Poli laughed at his look of embarrassment. Sooner or later, she was going to have to get him to dump everything out just so she could take inventory- it wouldn't surprise her if there were a few more things he had forgotten were tucked away in there.

Not that he was particularly bad about that; he just had so much stuff going in and out of the warehouse that it was inevitable he would misplace something... And she figured it would be a good idea to have an actual list at some point, for reference if nothing else.

"Yeah, pretty much." Oliver chuckled.

"Dad!" Jal jumped back into the conversation, nearly bouncing in place with excitement. "Will you teach me how to speak Engy-lish? Mom has been teaching me how to write, but she said that her magic thingy makes it hard to teach me how to speak it..."

"The language is called English." He said as he gently ruffled her hair. "And that's a good idea. We could start doing lessons after dinner every day. How does that sound?"

A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

"Yes!" Jal shouted, throwing both arms in the air before lunging forward for another hug- which only lasted a second before the excitable girl spun to face Polina again. "Is it ok if I go color more?"

"Of course." Poli chuckled as the girl bolted off. Raising her voice slightly, she called after the girl. "Slow down before you run into someone! And have fun sweetheart!"

Shaking her head at the 'Yes,mom' that was called back to her without the girl even breaking stride, Poli settled down on the deck next to Oliver. Bumping shoulders with her boyfriend, she turned a questioning look his way. "So, what has your mind spinning?"

"What do you mean?" Oliver asked a touch defensively without realizing it.

Rolling her eyes dramatically, Poli leaned into him as she spoke gently. "I know you, Oli. You don't just sit around staring up at the sky without something on your mind- admittedly, that is usually music... But, considering your reaction to the question, I'm guessing not. Otherwise you would already be rambling about whatever song had popped into your head."

Oliver opened his mouth to argue before pausing, only to shrug. "That's fair, I guess." Sighing, he leaned back against the rail and pulled two items from the warehouse- a glowing purple potion and a tome. "I got these from the auction last night... and now I'm frustrated and annoyed."

"I'm guessing that is a magical Tome... But what's the potion?" Poli asked slowly as she studied the strange objects, unable to see anything really special about them- not that she was surprised by that, as she really couldn't pick up on any of the 'magic' stuff, seeing as she was just a regular human. "And why would they annoy you? Isn't getting stuff like this out of the auction supposed to be a big win for us?"

"It is a big win. It's the combination that frustrates me." He grumbled. Shaking his head slowly, he picked up the potion. "This is an Arcane Awakening Potion. All it does is unlock the mana sub-attribute for the person that drinks it..."

"All it does..." She hissed in disbelief. "Isn't that what lets someone learn and do magic? That's not just big, Oli. That's fucking huge!"

"Yeah... But this-" Oliver said, tapping the Tome in front of him. "-is a Beginner's Tome of Talisman Creation. Like the name says, it teaches someone how to make some basic talismans."

"Ok... How about you explain to your non-geek girlfriend what a talisman is supposed to be?"

Snorting at the faux sweet tone in her voice, Oliver smiled at his girlfriend. "They are single use enchanted items that reproduce a spell effect. Basically, you activate the talisman and it does whatever the spell inside it is supposed to do."

"So... you use a fireball talisman and it launches a fireball? Then it disappears?"

"Pretty much." He nodded, glaring at the book. "And the tome has the blueprints for ten Rank 1 Talisman. Honestly, it's pretty incredible... Except the tome won't unlock the mana sub-attribute."

"It teaches someone how to make ten different talismans..." Poli mulled over the statement for a moment before she nodded. "Yeah, I see why it's frustrating you."

Seeing Oliver's questioning look, she shrugged. "It's pretty obvious, really. First, you aren't really interested in making talismans. Second, you want the potion so I can start learning magic- but the whole enchanting thing isn't really a good fit for me."

"I mean, either of us could do it. But neither of us is really drawn to it."

"But the real frustration..." She smiled impishly at him. "Is that you know exactly who would be perfect for the tome, but you really want to give the potion to me- and they are basically a matched set, unless we can find another potion or something similar."

"I know. I just..." Thumping his head against the rail, Oliver sighed. "I really want you to have the potion. That way you could start learning magic."

"I could get you a defensive spell first to help keep you safe, then a healing spell for when things go wrong. Maybe invisibility? An invisible sniper would be OP as fuck, and you being hard to spot would help keep you safe-"

Poli's hand covering his mouth cut off Oliver's words. "Oli, hon... Is that the only potion of its kind in the Multiverse?" Using her grip on his face, she slowly shook his head side to side. "No, it's not. That means we can get another one. Whether it's through the auction or the Bounty system- or even just while exploring some other world- we can find another one. Right?"

Gently pulling her hand off his mouth, Oliver shook his head emphatically. "It's not quite that simple, Poli. The potion costs half a million credits; with the way the Bounty system works, there's a markup for everything that isn't local to the planet we're on... Placing a Multiversal Bounty basically doubles the price!"

"We'll figure it out." Poli said, waving off his complaint. "And you haven't even considered the positives of giving them to Marty!"

"You mean aside from him being the perfect nerd for making talismans?"

"Yes, other than that!" Poli said with a playful shove. "Think about it, Oli! Not only is he perfect for it, and, once he learns, he could keep us supplied with useful talismans... But him having a bunch of talismans to help protect himself and the other guys takes some of the stress off of you!"

Thinking about it for a moment, Oliver couldn't help but agree. While he didn't know what blueprints the tome held, if even one of them offered a way to help keep his friends safe...

It still annoyed him that Poli couldn't start learning magic...

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