“Why not? I swear I’ll take extremely good care of them.”
“No means no.”
“And I’m asking why. I want to know the reason~”
“If I say that no means no, then it means no. Plain and simple.” In order to explain why he was forbidding her, he would need to also explain that Ristia’s powers towered above the entire tribe. Although he was fairly confident that it wouldn’t happen in Ristia’s case, he couldn’t guarantee that she wouldn’t grow arrogant if she was aware that she was the strongest of them all. Hence why her father could not reveal his reasoning, opting to staunchly refuse her instead. Ristia had been practically begging her father, but the unreasonable response he displayed was starting to irritate her.
“Grrrrr, you’re being mean, mean, mean~! You’re being a big meanie and I hate you~! If you’re not going to say yes, then I have an idea that’ll change your mind~!”
“‘H-Hate’ me?!”
The True Blood King was positively shocked. His beloved daughter had just screamed that she “hated” him. It was enough damage to nearly turn the mighty ruler to a frail pile of ash.
“I’m going to run away! And I’m not coming back until you let me make a little sister!!”
“R-Run away?! But I won’t be able to shower you with love and affection if you do that to me! Wait, wait just a minute! Ristia?!”
Taking a glance at her father as he scrambled to keep her in check, Ristia flew from her family’s castle.
—After that, Ristia gave her pursuers from the family the slip, using magic to fly to an underground labyrinth located in a corner of the continent. While technically a “labyrinth,” Ristia herself was the one who had created it. She had dug out the passages for this labyrinth while practicing her Eighth-Level magic, and inside of it existed a location unknown to anyone else.
“The nerve, after I told him that I would find one on my own and take care of it. Father is an uncaring jerk! Now that it’s come to this, I’ll fight this injustice to the bitter end!” Ristia said, spewing remarks in an abrasive yet adorable manner as she pondered over how she would go about making her new little sister.
The first thing she brainstormed was creating her sister without her father knowing. There was always the option of going to an inhabited town, picking up a girl with no relatives off the street, and giving her as much love as she could muster.
“That... isn’t going to work.” Ristia abandoned that plan.
With Ristia’s power and energy, the act of making her little sister was a simple task, but if she made a little sister fueled by rage just to have her family object to her, it would probably just make her new sister sad. Those thoughts drove her against the idea.
Ristia had a rather outrageous personality, but she was a kind-hearted girl by nature.
Ristia decided to move on to her next idea: Playing the long game. She could stop time with her with chrono magic, and either a little sister would be born, or she would continue to sleep until her father cracked.
“That’s... actually an option.” Ristia decided to carry out that plan. With her powers, stopping time for herself was a simple task. If she kept that up for a few decades, then even her father would crack and allow her to create a little sister for herself. Those thoughts drove her to do it.
Ristia was a kind-hearted girl by nature, but she had a rather outrageous personality.
She then put her pointer finger to her cheek, cocked her head, and started to concoct the details of her plan while waving her long black hair. As long as she had her True Blood power, stopping time for herself was easy. The flipside to that, however, was that Ristia’s family could just as easily break the spell. To start with, she needed to apply a seal to fend off against that happening. There was naturally a chance that even that seal might be broken as well, but they would still need considerable time to brute force the seal off. Even if they employed a sorcerer with skills greater than her own, it should buy her at least a few decades worth of time. Plus, even if they were to immediately crack the seal, all she needed to do was repeat the process again until her father cracked. That was the conclusion she drew since she herself was clueless to the fact that she was the strongest among the True Bloods. She also couldn’t overlook the chance that her potential little sister might be born while she still had time stopped for herself. It would also be unbearable for her if her sister were to be born and grow older than her while she had her own time halted.
Ristia then decided to take measures for that part of her plan. All that was left was to stop time for herself, but... stopping time was a wearisome task. Although it was unlikely, there was also the chance of her little sister coming to meet her, so she figured that she should prepare just in case she had to greet her. She pulled out the materials for her spell from her Item Box and started preparing the Eighth-Level spell which she was well-familiar with by now. She compressed the carbon under high temperatures, forming a transparent cage that reflected rainbow light and encompassed herself within.
“Crystal Cage, complete~♪”
Since she used high-temperature compression on carbon, it was actually a diamond cage, but Ristia thought that “Crystal Cage” had a snappier ring to it than “Diamond Cage.” It was material quality fraud at its finest. “Hmm, maybe I should have my eyes shut when I put this seal on myself?” While having time stopped only felt instantaneous to the person involved, to any visitors’ eyes, she would basically appear asleep, so she took that part of the process into consideration, as well.
“Right, let’s see... I’ll make it so that, if a certain condition is met, the cage will shatter into a million pieces. Theatrics are important, after all.”
The conditions for her waking up, her sleeping pose, et cetera—all things she was trying to take into account for a perfect execution. Finally, seemingly satisfied, she ran her fingers through her tresses to straighten out her hair and assumed a praying pose.
“Eheh, now we’re all set. Yup.”
With the perfect pose all picked out, Ristia used the highest level magic she had to stop time for herself, hoping that she would have a younger sister awaiting her when she next awakened.
Seasons then passed, and passed, and passed some more. A countless number of years rolled by into the ether.
“These are ruins from a once-prosperous ancient era... if I’m not mistaken.”
A band of adventurers appeared in Ristia’s constructed labyrinth.