Cain wasn’t completely idle while the two newly arrived potential avatars were busy trying to build up their strength. He was dedicating his time to research. Spell Crafting got more and more difficult as the lessons went on, and he was struggling just to follow the lesson plan, much less accomplish the tasks necessary to master the knowledge needed to begin the next section.

Enhancing weapons and armor had been fairly easy at the start, just bringing up the level and quality, but the next section had him trying to instill specific properties onto it, and his mind simply couldn’t seem to comprehend what was required of him.

He had thought bonuses should be like spell effects, a standardized structure that he could just copy and paste onto a new item once he understood what it looked like, but that wasn’t the case at all. Every bonus interacted with the others, and changing a small bit of the intensity of one would affect every other bonus that the item had, and all the threads of the magic that granted the bonus were wound up with the ones that provided the base structure or showed the quality of the item.

Time after time he failed and wiped the enchantments off the item he was working with, forcing him to start all over from the beginning and attempt to rebuild the structure.magic

“Master Cain, I don’t feel well.” Cyrene interrupted his work, rubbing her lower body.

Cain could sense that she had already tried a healing potion, and it had no effect, but he could also see the gentle rippling of her scales as the muscles underneath worked hard at something. He briefly thought she had the Lamia version of an upset stomach, but then it dawned on him that her eggs were ready to be laid.

“How about we get you to the room we prepared upstairs? I think your eggs are ready, and you should feel much better once they are all out.” Cain suggested, picking up her curled form in his arms and leaving the library for the heated room in the basement that they had prepared for the clutch.

Lamia eggs were supposed to like warm, humid environments, so the rooms under the spa were perfect for them, being near the magical furnaces, the forge, and the kitchens, which all added up to give the area an almost uncomfortably warm presence.

For that reason, nobody else stayed there, preferring to live further out instead of in the cramped underground quarters, leaving the whole area secure for the eggs to hatch in peace. Tasha met them downstairs, eager to see what Lamia’s eggs looked like, but Cyrene locked her out of the room the second that they arrived.

“Alright, now find a comfortable position, and let your body do the work. I can call another Lamia here if you want some moral support.” Cain suggested, but Cyrene shook her head.

“I’ve got this. It isn’t painful, just uncomfortable and very strange.” She explained, letting out a moan as the first of the eggs slid onto the soft bedding.

One after another a total of five eggs joined the clutch, all shimmering purple on the outside, and giving off the aura of very strong magic. It was clear right from the start that these would be no weak and unremarkable beings, they had a power that anyone nearby could sense even this long before they hatched.When exactly that hatching would be was a matter of some concern to Cain, as there really wasn’t much to go on. The stronger the Lamia, the faster the hatching, and if they weren’t stopped the firstborn would usually kill off their unhatched sisters to reduce competition, so they needed to be watched carefully at all times.

Cain inspected the Eggs now that they were out in the open, and found a very interesting bit of data in their System information

[Lamia Egg]

[Level 0] Immature

[Cyrene’s Daughter]

He hadn’t seen the system give family information before, but then he also hadn’t inspected any demon or monster eggs before either. Looking through the group, he found that four were the same, all Level 0 Immature daughters of Cyrene, but the last one was an oddity.

[Lamia Egg]

[Grade] Ancient

[Level] 99 Immature

[Cain’s Daughter]

[Blessed]

The egg looked exactly like the others, but according to the system not only was it a blessed item, it was level 99 the moment it entered the world, and already Ancient Quality. Plus, why did this one say it was his daughter and not hers? It wasn’t like Cain himself had laid an egg. That egg also seemed to be the source of most of the powerful energy that Cain was sensing from the clutch, which made sense, being the only one that wasn’t level 0.

“Oh, that’s a relief. I feel so much less sluggish now, like a whole new woman.” Cyrene sighed, wrapping herself around the clutch of eggs.

“Can we let the others in now? I can hear them waiting impatiently outside.” Cain asked, smiling at the happy little demon.

“Sure, why not, just keep them away from the bed until the eggs have settled and matured a little more,” Cyrene told him protectively while moving so her upper body was between the eggs and the door.The room wasn’t soundproof, so one after another the other Manor residents came in to give her their best wishes, wondering what the appropriate sentiment for today was. Did it count as a birth, since the eggs were no longer in her, or did that wait until they hatched? If it didn’t what did they call today, which was clearly an important milestone?

They all brought gifts though, and that seemed to make Cyrene very happy. Some were food items, most were trinkets, armor, jewels, and other oddities that reminded the gift bringer of her. That meant a heavy bias toward white and red colored items that matched her scales, or bright pink that matched her hair, but Cyrene was happy to receive every one of them and piled them around her body in an orderly fashion, creating a nest of precious magical items.

“You doing alright in there? Not going to get crushed under a pile of armor or anything, are you?” Cain asked with a chuckle as Cyrene completed her intricate pile of a nest.

“Nope, I’m good. But can you bring me something to eat? I forgot to get breakfast before heading down here.” She answered, sticking her smiling face out of the pile.

Cain called for food to be brought, then merged with another Lamia to ask a few questions about demon behavior.

[Is that normal? The nest of items seems a little bit excessive.] Cain asked the Epic Demon in his mind.

[Totally. Normally they layer items between each other since Lamia normally mate and nest as a group, but we are obsession demons, so there was never an option of making a mediocre nest.

[And how long will they take from this point?]

The demon thought a little while before answering. [Four of the five seem pretty normal, but one is exceptionally high quality, and it will grow very fast. Have you experienced that before? A lot of demons suffer from it.]

Yes, Cain had seen it before. In the whirlwind of chaos that was known as Neffie. If this one demon was going to grow much faster than all the others the same way that she did, it is a good thing that Cain called for an extra Commander to help with child care.

Demon King Aggramor had a hard time with one Neffie, and both Aggramor and Cain are overwhelmed with the Blood Dancers, so adding a snake-bodied Neffie equivalent to the mix might just throw the entire Central Continent into chaos for lack of proper supervision.

The new exercise plan does seem to be helping with the Blood Dancers though, they haven’t been nearly as rambunctious the last few days with the Tracii clones to wear them out and Tasha to keep them in line with her webs.

The last question is what sort of abilities is this one exceptional egg going to inherit?

There is certainly a skill that would tell him in advance, at least what physical abilities they are likely to inherit but other than holding them up to a light and guessing at their forms, Cain doesn’t have many ideas that could be helpful.

Vala was the first to pay attention to his thoughts and send him a bit of assurance. [Look at it like a surprise present. You don’t plan for it, just go with it once it happens. But if you need something to take your mind off of things you can’t change, there has been another report of an attempted Guardian Assassination on the Southern Continent.]

[Another one? Has that alliance from the center of the Continent already spread so far that they are meeting up with the Cities that have allied themselves with us?] Cain responded.

The Echoes had the answer to that question. [No, if anything they are having trouble holding on to what they have. A number of cities have revolted against the heavy-handed treatment that they are receiving, but the closest confirmed city in the alliance is nearly two hundred kilometers from us. I suspect it is a distraction technique, trying to cause trouble in our ranks in preparation for their next expansion push.]

[Once Cyrene is settled and these two new arrivals are a bit stronger I need to come South anyhow. Let me know if things get out of hand and I will come down earlier. Until then, just keep everyone on good terms with each other, and try to find solid evidence against the ones who sent the assassins.] Cain instructed, then sat down to wait for breakfast while listening to the sound of Cyrene altering her nest.