[I hate to be a bother, but the rest of the eggs have started to move.] Cyrene sent the hurried message to Cain as she watched the four eggs still safely within her coils begin to shudder as the occupants woke up for the very first time.

It was great that they were all waking up at once. At least this way she wouldn’t have to wait any longer to see how their health was, but after Luna wanted to kill her siblings to reduce competition, Cyrene was a bit concerned that she wouldn’t be able to keep up with them.

[I’m on my way back. Give it three minutes.] Cain responded almost instantly.

“Sorry everyone, it seems that young Luna here has a bunch of siblings that are about to hatch, so I will need to go back home and keep them from murdering each other. Feel free to ask the watchers anything that comes to mind, I’m sure they will be happy to help you get settled here in Port Nefheim, or wherever else you might want to live.” Cain explained out loud for the benefit of the other people in the room.

“We will explore the city and return through the circle. Go ahead and be with the kids.” Jin announced while Jessica nodded her agreement. Neither of them had been here before, so it was all new to them and full of strange and exciting smells, both spices and exotic foods.magic

“Do the Serrah Woods still exist?” One of the Elves asked before Cain could leave the room.

“Indeed they do. Do you want me to have them send someone here to meet with you? I don’t have a very strong presence there, but we are on good terms, so it shouldn’t be a problem for them to come here and take you in to live with the other elves.” The Watcher suggested, waving Cain away to take care of the kids while he took care of matters in Port Nefheim.

Cain didn’t waste any time and had Moana take him directly to the travel circle at the Manor, then jogged through the house to get to the basement room where Cyrene had been nesting. The eggs still hadn’t hatched and were in the rocking phase as their occupants worked out the weakest point so they could smash their way out with relative ease.

Unlike Luna who was born at Ancient Quality, these ones were still showing as regular quality to Cain, so their strength would be closer to on par with a regular Lamia Hatchling. The first cracks began to form as Cain took his seat along the wall, handing Cyrene a drink and some snacks.

While Nesting she often forgot about meals, so Cain made a point to bring her something every time he came to visit, or he would send someone from the kitchen if he was busy at mealtimes.

The first hatchling emerged only a few minutes later, giving a joyful cheer at being first, and then grabbed a sharp bit of eggshell to go after the slower siblings.

“Alright, calm down. No stabbing.” Cyrene reprimanded.

The hatchling looked ready to argue, despite not even being fully out of her shell yet, but then she caught sight of Luna wrapped around Cain’s wrist with a smug look and a sword in all four hands.“I wasn’t first? I thought I was the first. I didn’t hear anyone else moving before me.” The hatchling complained, her jet black hair and bronze skin still glistening from the fluids in the egg.

“You were second by an entire day. They wouldn’t let me stab you either, they say there’s enough for everyone.” Luna told her. The words were a simple explanation, but after mentioning that she was first by an entire day her tone turned smug. Very smug.

Once she realized that she was one of the lucky ones, the new hatchling quickly crawled up Cyrene’s scales to twine herself in her mother’s hair and watch the process.

A few seconds after she made her way up, the second of the four eggs hatched, showing a perfect twin to the first, only her eyes were bright green instead of black.

She had been close enough to hatching that she could hear the earlier conversation, so she simply escaped her confinement and climbed up next to her clutch mate. Both had four arms, the same as Luna, marking them as Lamia Progenitors, but the power level between them had a vast difference.

These two also didn’t show any signs that their system was active yet, and they instead still showed [Undertermined] in the Class field. They most likely only needed a small nudge, like a new name, to trigger the Class option though. That’s all it took for Luna, and in normal circumstances, Lamia hatchlings were expected to be self-sufficient from the moment they left the egg.

The last two took their mother’s coloration. Pink hair and pale skin with white and red scales. They emerged at the same time and got into an intense slap fight before Cyrene could break them up, but they couldn’t reach any decent weapons, and neither had fangs the way Luna did, so biting each other was pointless.

“Calm down, or I will stretch you all out straight so you can’t wrap for an entire day.” Cain admonished them, and the misbehavior stopped immediately.

The girls joined their sisters in hiding inside Cyrene’s hair, but Cain could hear them complaining about him despite their attempts to whisper.

“He’s so scary. Is that why he’s still alive? He looks like the big boss, do you think he’s planning to sell us off or something? Why else would a male stay around Lamia even after breeding? Our poor mother must be a captive. Don’t worry, we will grow up strong and free you from the scary man.”

All of their opinions on their current circumstances painted Cain as the bad guy and Cyrene as the tragic heroine, contrary to Cain’s experience with Luna, where she immediately took to him and didn’t seem to care at all that Cyrene was in the room. Even now, she was still wrapped around his wrist and more interested in the sisters than her mother.

That must have been what the System meant by “Cain’s Daughter” versus “Cyrene’s Daughter”. It was a Daddy’s girl versus Momma’s girl distinction.

“Cyrene, how about you give everyone a name? They will do better if they have that sense of individuality, I read it in a demon parenting book.” Cain told her with a smile.

“I have just the right names for everyone. Starting from the first to hatch today, you will be Renee, Reika, Rachelle, and Remi.” Cyrene decided and the girls giggled.

“That’s so you can start with the sound of R and we will all panic about who is in trouble isn’t it? I’m right aren’t I?” Renee asked, giving her mother a sly look.

“You’re not wrong, but I won’t be the only one you might get in trouble with. There are a pair of very large Spider Demons here, and their Demon Bunny assistants. They have volunteered to help get you all ready for the outside world. Plus, you’ve got older cousins here, the Blood Dancers, who have been excited to meet new family members.” Cyrene smiled back.

“That sounds great. But is there any food? I smell meat, will you bring us to the meat? Is the meat coming to us?” The girls asked, making Cain laugh.“You were just like that yesterday. Now, look at you all grown up.” Cain told Luna, who gave a smug giggle before frowning.

“But there will be meat, right? It smells really good.”

The puppets from the kitchen brought in a platter of Lamia Hatchling bite-sized snacks moments later, leaving the door open so that everyone who had been eagerly waiting in the hallway could see the new arrivals. For their part, the girls didn’t care who was watching, the five of them were much more interested in what was on the platter, and getting themselves stuffed full than anything else.

As expected, they were all unconscious again within a few minutes, having gorged themselves into a food coma, which gave Cain and Cyrene time to talk without being interrupted.

“Should we have them activate their systems now, or should we wait and let them do it later?” Cain asked.

“We should likely do it now. If they are like Luna, they will be looking for people to hitch a ride with to find excitement, and there are a lot of interesting things to see and do around the Manor.” Cyrene suggested, and Cain turned to the group consciousness, looking for consensus.

[Yep, best to get them a class now, so they can start building themselves up before they get in real trouble. Any daughter of yours that is helpless is a target, and you never know what sort of crazy person might manage to sneak by the guards.] Laura pointed out, on behalf of the others.

[Alright, as soon as they wake up.] Cain agreed, relaxing in his chair while the girls slept on the large silver serving platter near the remnants of lunch.

Luna was the first up, followed by Remi, who viewed her ten-second shorter than usual nap as a great victory.

Once everyone was awake, Cain began his explanation of the System and the Class options, finishing by asking if anyone had questions. They all agreed they understood the process, but the moment the lecture was over, Remi went off track.

“System? Hello, System. Can you make me a Frost Mage? I really want to have cool ice powers.” She called to the open air, then went limp as she entered the Class options menu.

She came back only a few seconds later with a huge smile.

[Name] Remi

[Class] Frost Mage

[Level] 1

[Species] Lamia Progenitor

[Cyrene’s Daughter]

[Blessed]

“Wait, did you just get an advanced class by asking for it? How does that even work?” Cyrene stammered, looking at her daughter’s joyful smile.

The Watchers’ voices were suddenly forefront in Cain’s consciousness as they watched the event through his eyes. [That’s amazing. Nobody ever thinks to just ask for the class they really want. I didn’t even know that was an option.]