章 24: Dressing up
A.N. Christmas is in a few minutes for me, so I thought I'd drop a filler. I know, I'm evil...
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~The mood is right~
~The spirit's up~
~We're here tonight~
~And that's enough~
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"There we go Bathsheba." Steve said as he ruffled her fur. They were both situated on the city wall were Steve had been playing around with some of his commands. For this particular one, he'd had to pull up his special admin console and use his admin commands. It was really amazing this interface he'd been given by the ROB.
Where he would have had to go through the web in order to login to his sever and access the mainframe, he merely needed to will that console up and he could manipulate the rules of the game as he pleased.
The specific task he'd been doing so far out at the edge of the city was making his Warg fundamentally stronger. The loyal wolf had fought ferociously all the way until the 40th floor. That was when the limits of her biology began to take effect on her and she could no longer fight against the powerful monsters there. A generous measure of power would be to put her at level 5, but Steve believed that was only out of desperation and a fight for survival.
Otherwise she was just a level 4 monster.
But by applying the /attribute command to her, he was able to change up her base stats. It had taken a bit of time trying to get the numbers correct, resolved only by physically wrestling her himself. But once her stats had been raised to a point where it put strain on him trying to hold her off did he stop raising her stats where it was. And then raising the other attributes to the same level of degree, he was completely confident now that...
"You're a level 9 monster now sweetie." Steve said as he hugged her face while scratching her jawline. "You won't have to be so sad about falling behind me anymore."
Bathsheba squealed as she lifted her neck, lifting up her papa in doing so and panted happily. She then gave a few questioning grunts.
"No, I'm certain you too could take on Balor now. Although you'd have to watch out for his magical attacks but in terms of physicality, you've definitely got the upper hand."
Bathsheba then yapped a little before whining.
"Balor's blast attack reminds you of someone from our family? What family? We didn't have no...ohhhhhhhh..." Steve said as he finally realized who she was talking about. She gave another few questioning grunts. "Hehehehe..." Steve laughed nervously. "...I'm not quite certain we should spawn him in. I don't think this world could handle...er.." Steve looked in his inventory at a spawn egg from a mod he was keeping right in the corner with big letters hovering over it. "...his size."
Godzilla...
"Anyway." Steve said as he let go of her snout. "I've got dinner to get to, so run along now and do some hunting of your own. Get used to your new power." He said as he smacked her rump to urge her on more quickly. "Go on, get lost."
Bathsheba howled before jumping off the wall, freaking the sentries out a little as she landed before she raced into the night, leaving behind a mile of dust trail in the blink of an eye.
"Oh do they grow up so fast..." Steve sighed dramatically but with no small amount of affection before he eyed the Kaiju spawn egg again. "I wonder what level they'd classify you as, big guy. I never bothered spawning you in much because the render distance couldn't completely capture because you'd either just disappear from screen or you'd lag my PC until it exploded. I'm certain you could kick old One Eye's ass though."
Steve teleported 'home' where his bed was in the grotto as he continued his train of thought.
"Then again, I wonder what would happen if I pitted Ghidorah against the black dragon. I'd assume from all the evidence provided so far that Ghidorah would be bigger. But being bigger and having more heads does not win a battle. Even worse than that, the bastard would probably just snuff the black dragon's light and then use his alpha screech to wake possibly any dormant monsters in this world to destroy it...damn it's so tempting!"
A knock at his door brought him out of his apocalyptic musings. Turning his head, he spoke to the only other person living in this hole and told them to enter. Ptah tentatively opened the door and peeked in.
"The hellspawn is gone right?" The little boy asked nervously.
"You really need to stop calling her that you know. She's quite fond of you."
"If by fond you mean trying to eat me every other minute!"
"She's not trying to eat you, she's just grooming you. You know, cause that's how mothers keep their kids clean in the wild and all. Even animals can't deny that you're-"
"I'M NOT A KID!" Ptah shouted in indignation. "What if the others heard about this? I'll be a laughing stock!"
"Then the first thing I'll do when we're invited to any godly banquet is to bring her along and give them all a front row seat to a real time demonstration."
"HEY!" Ptah shouted before huffing and turning back to the door. "I guess you don't want your gift then. I spent the whole week you were away making it for you because you're my first child but now I guess all just have to use it as-"
A hand clamped down fully around the little god's skull and he stopped dead in his words as Steve leaned down to bring his face to his level behind him.
"Oh I do apologise for my rude behaviour." Steve said in an unsettlingly apologetic voice . "I did not mean to be a rude, ignorant brat when you were the only one willing to take me in Ptah. Please do show me my gift, I would be most grateful." The gamer finished with a sweet smile on his face.
While it made his handsome face look like that of a supermodel or perhaps an angel, Ptah could not help but feel a bit apprehensive. Behind the smile looked to be something sinister lurking inside that head, and the Egyptian god felt compelled to do as requested.
"A-alright apology accepted." Ptah said as he shook off the hand. "Come on, it's in my room."
Steve straightened and dropped the large smile to a small one as he followed the diminutive god to his own bedchambers. Inside he found one of the looms Steve had been keeping in the storage unit, just in case they ever needed it. Draped over it was what Steve found himself gawping at.
There was a fine white Egyptian kilt with embroidered flowers of silver. Not the kind of flower patterns found on women's clothes but the less feminine ones that you'd find on men's waistcoats and the like. At the top of it was sowed in a tie belt made of gold cloth, and there was also an Egyptian shoulder rest made of black cloth with tiny rectangular gold plates stuck on to it. Under the loom was a new pair of papyrus sandals, a few sizes bigger than Ptah's.
"That is..." Steve began.
"I thought it was a fitting gift for my first child." Ptah muttered with his eyes closed and his arm folded. "No matter how much of an ass you are. Since you seemed to be so familiar with my culture, I thought a good outfit would be a good enough welcome present." Ptah opened his eyes and looked at him, hiding a bit of nervousness in his eyes. "Is it good?"
"...It's brilliant." Steve said, his own eyes lit with glee. "I've never seen clothes so beautiful before. I didn't know you could do that."
"Idiot." Ptah smiled a little. "I'm a god of craftsmanship and cloth making is as much of a craft as any other. More than that, the gold and silver is genuine. I forged strings of pure gold and silver that you left me and stretched them in strings which I ran through the looms and made cloth out of."
"The level of smithing skill to do that would take phenomenal talent." Steve gawped. "I would never have thought you capable."
"Well I am pretty amazing." Ptah said arrogantly, pleased with himself that he managed to get such a reaction out of Steve. "I don't doubt for one moment that no other god can come close to my skill when it comes to this sort of stuff."
"Except maybe...Hephaestus?" Steve raised a brow.
Ptah suddenly went red, which was odd given his darker skin but it was quite obvious how much blood was rushing to his face. In particular his cheeks. He began twiddling his thumbs a bit.
"Well...maybe just her...after all, she did learn under me for a time. And she was super thankful and so excited too when I finally taught her how to create growth weapons...if there is one person who could do the same, its her. She has amazing talent after all, and she's a real prodigy." Ptah looked down and his smile widened. "She's just the best. She's determined and good at everything she sets her mind on. If I had even half the drive she does, I'd be so much better myself."
"Damn, you have it bad." Steve commented. "Why don't you just spill the beans already?"
"You speak as if it's so easy!" Ptah thundered with his small fists balled up. "When have you ever just gone up to a girl and told her you liked her, huh? Yeah, I didn't think so!"
...
"Actually, I have done that." Steve said raising his hand.
"What?!"
"The day we split up and I went in the dungeon. I kind of fell head over heels for one of Loki's girls...and I just straight up told her I liked her then and then. And I told her I wanted to be friends and eventually lovers."
"Are you serious?" Ptah said, google eyed. "I don't believe you!"
"You'd know if I was lying though. Did I lie?"
"...No...Well then how about this? Have you ever been so confident of yourself that you'd look good and be good enough for girls that one could just come up and tell her she's fallen for you? With your personality, I highly doubt it."
"Actually..." Steve said. "...that's happened too."
"..."
"She also went beyond that and called me her hero...though I'm uncertain if I should accept her feelings. I mean I haven't even sorted out what it is I'm aiming for with the first girl."
...
Ptah squeezed his forehead and grimaced with the strain.
"Exactly which girls are we talking about here?" He asked.
"Well the one I confessed to was Tiona, the younger of the twins."
"Ah, the Crusher." Ptah said as he rubbed his chin. "Why that one though? I mean from what I hear, she's the most likeable of the bunch but I've seen her too. She's just like Loki, as flat as an old man's-"
Ptah was cut off as he looked back at Steve. Steve's face had sharpened the point where his jawline could cut steel, and there was an empty look in his eyes. A menacing aura covered the boy as he stared his patron down. Ptah started sweating cold on his back.
"N-Never mind!" Ptah waved his arms about. "A splendid choice, absolutely! I totally wish you all the best and hope you spend a happy life together." Ptah crossed his arms into a swearing gesture. "Please treat each other well and give me lots of grandchildren in the future too please!"
Steve lost his anger instantly and just raised an eyebrow.
"Okay, now you've just made it weird." Steve said. "You? As a granddad? If I were that kid, I'd probably kill myself for having to call a kid like you as his or her grandpa. I wonder how Pan managed to do it?"
"I AM NOT A KID!" Ptah threw a hammer at Steve's head but it just bounced off his skull like a plastic spoon off of a wall. The god then scrunched his eyebrows. "Wait, Pan? Pan doesn't have a grandfather."
"What?" Steve said confused. "What are you talking about?"
"What are YOU talking about?" Ptah asked.
"That's what I just asked you."
"No that's what I asked you."
"I literally said all these phrases first dumbass. Which Pan are you talking about?"
"Pan." Ptah said. "The god? From the Olympian pantheon?"
"Oh." Steve said, finally understanding. "No that's not the one I was talking about."
"I knew it. That's why it didn't make sense to me because gods don't even have parents, let alone grandfathers." Ptah said. "Which Pan were you talking about?"
"She's a girl."
"Is she the other one? The one that confessed to you?"
"No. Never mind. The other girl was actually Ais. Ais Wallenstein."
Ptah suddenly grabbed his forearms and stared up at him with great intensity.
"Are you telling me? That the girl who broke a thousand men's hearts? The one known as the ice queen? Has fallen for YOU?" Ptah broke it all down unnecessarily, but to further drive the point.
"Yes. That's what I just said."
"And you didn't accept her feelings?!"
"Why should I?"
"Why should you? Why should you? The Sword Princess is one of the most famous and most sought after girls in the whole damn city and the standards of whom no man yet has reached. Men have literally died out of sadness and grief because she rejected them and you didn't even consider her feelings when SHE CONFESSED TO YOU?!"
"Just because she's a celebrity, you think I should accept her feelings?" Steve asked. "Of course I considered them. It just came out the blue so suddenly that I couldn't process them. You can't just accept romantic feelings like that on a whim. In fact, I'm not even sure they are romantic in nature. She did that because she saw how powerful I was and when I thrashed her in a duel. You know about it, I told you. It could just be some misunderstood representation of her feelings."
"Listen." Ptah stepped back and pointed a finger upwards like he was giving a lecturer. "Women are way better at realizing their feelings than men are. If one says they like you, then they like you. And if you're not sure, you just have to swallow your fear and risk it. Because that's what love is about it it's fated to be...to take risks for the one you love."
"...You do realize how that sounds coming from you right?"
"What do you mean?"
"You know what I mean." Steve gave him a pointed look.
"I am an entirely different case." Ptah puffed his chest. "I am a god. But I can see that my child is confused over his feelings and it's my job to help you realize them."
"Realize what? I don't have feelings for her."
Ptah's eyes widened a little bit, before he sported a shit-eating grin that spread over his face.
"What?" Steve asked.
"You just lied."
"What?!"
"Say it again."
"I don't have feelings for her."
"You just lied again."
"Now you're lying."
"No, unlike you I don't lie."
"Now you accuse me of being a serial liar."
"Yes I am."
"YOU LITTLE SHIT!"
"YOU SELF DENYING PHILANDERER!"
"WIMP!"
"BLOCKHEAD!"
"PIPSQUEAK!"
"STOP POKING AT MY HEIGHT!"
"MY LITTLE TOE IS BIGGER THAN YOU!"
"AND MY **** IS BIGGER THAN YOU!"
...
"What is with you and making things weird?" Steve said as he stepped back a little.
"Just wanted you to shut your mouth for once. Listen, you have feelings for the Sword Princess and that is the simple truth."
"...Okay, yes. I will admit that I am ATTRACTED to her. But I've already got something starting with Tiona, so how do you think I resolve that huh?"
"Just take them both. Both is good."
"I AM NOT taking both. What do you think I am? A playboy?"
"A manwhore."
"You're the one that just told me to take both."
"Which makes you a philanderer."
"How am I the slag? You just told me to take them both!"
"I know."
"...You know these arguments are just petty and pointless right?" Steve sighed, exasperatedly. "Why the hell would that be the simple solution?"
"Zeus resolved it that way." Ptah said.
"Zeus?"
"Yep, whenever he had a dilemma like this, he just took all. Man's dream and a stroke of genius." Ptah smiled before looking away and putting a finger on his chin like Finn did. "Hera never seemed to appreciate it though."
"You really think Zeus's debauchery is a good example to take from?" Steve deadpanned before shaking his head. "Whatever. Stay out of the matters of my heart Ptah. And just show me how to put these clothes on properly."
"Running away from your problems isn't going to help either." Ptah put his fists on his hips and looked at him challengingly. "You can't say that the idea doesn't appeal though right? Both girls, the best of their types I guess. Highly sought after and really pretty. Just imagine as well. Amazons are pretty crazy about kids you know. And they're known to be quite loyal when they have a committed romantic partner so she will never let you get bored. And the Sword Princess is not all too bright, so you could probably just rope her into a three-"
Ptah yelped as Steve picked him up by the eyebrows. There the god hung suspended as he kicked about while holding Steve's wrists to pull himself up so he didn't hang by the hairs and risk his entire forehead tearing off.
"I was with you until you started sounding like a creepy nonce towards the end!" Steve said harshly.
"THE F***'S A NONCE!" Ptah screamed. "LET ME DOWN!"
"Get out of my love life, and show me how to put these damn clothes on you brat!"
"HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I TOLD YOU, I AM NOT A-"
'slap'
---
"I feel a little bit bare." Steve said as he fingered the shoulder-rest. "There are no pockets or anything."
Ptah slapped the hand away as he adjusted the rest once more. Angry swelling above his eyes throbbed red in pain as he fussed over the shoulder rest.
"What use would you have for pockets." Ptah said. "You've got your inventory to hide stuff in don't you?"
"I mean, yes I do. But-"
"Forget it." Ptah said as he pulled away satisfied with his work. From behind his back, the god pulled out some gold rings. Two of similar size and one that was significantly larger "Time for the accessories."
"Accessories?"
"From the gold you left me. Now." Ptah grabbed Steve arms and clipped the rings around them. The larger one was clipped around Steve's neck. "There we go. Now you look half decent. What do you think?"
Steve stared at himself in the mirror. The kilt hung down to only just below his knees and the papyrus sandals were taking some time to adjust to his bare feet. Around the waist hung a fancy loincloth similar to ones that pharaohs wore over their kilts in ancient times. The shoulder rest accentuated his broad shoulders quite a lot.
And in his opinion the gold rings kind of made him look a little vain but not too bad. The attire was eerily similar to that of the gods of destruction in DBS. The only difference was that he was not wearing baggy genie pants. But one thing he did like about this outfit was how it drew attention to his physical qualities.
The outfit put his muscular physique on full display and the rings on his arms would make one focus on him when he flexed his bicep. Again, Steve was aware of the vanity he seemed to be exuding but there was a nagging suspicion in his mind.
"Ptah." He said. "Is there a reason why you designed my outfit like this?"
"...I thought you looked hopeless." Ptah said sheepishly. "You looked to be such an asshole despite your pretty face, I thought you attracted no girls. You hid all the stuff that women are really attracted to. Like come on, how can any man with all that muscle hide it? It's a treasure to attracting girls. So I thought I'd dress you up a bit so you could at least have a chance. Then we'd work on your personality...all that work seems pointless now."
"...Are you by chance some sort of hopeless romantic dreamer?" Steve raised an eyebrow. "Because of your own failing at romance, you dress up other men how you would want to picture yourself to be."
Ptah looked around guiltily. "Uh...no?"
"...I'm just another one of your fancy sculptures now aren't I?" Steve said dryly.
"Well you look like you were cut from marble so stop blaming me." Ptah said as he pulled a small pot from the table and began mixing something inside it with a small stick of wood. He walked up to Steve, stepped on to a stool and pulled the makeshift pencil out, tipped in a back substance. "Now hold still."
"What are you doing?"
"Applying kohl."
"Oh, cool." Steve nodded in approval.
Kohl was an ancient cosmetic used throughout the middle-east by both men and women. Principally, it was used to protect the eyes from the glare of the sun but it was also quite a trend in fashion. No matter the sex or social class, it was a universal cosmetic that you usually didn't mind at worst and loved at best.
For Stephen, it was not something that he usually wore but he did like it. In his opinion, it made people focus on his eyes more, meaning it would be extra intimidating in a stare-down. Ptah drew along the edge of his eyelids and then emphasised on the tipped of bit at the outer corner of his eye the way the Ancient Egyptians did it. Steve was of the opinion they did that to signify the Eye of Horus, since Kohl was used in religious practices too.
"There we go." Ptah said. "One last thing. "Ptah walked over to his table and pulled off a weapon from it. Bringing it over, Steve saw that it was a traditional Khopesh. A sword of the ancient Egyptians shaped like a sickle. Ptah holstered it in the sash around Steve's waist and stepped back to view the finished product. "Like a proper child of the Great Ptah."
"...It's really good." Steve said. "I'm thankful. Perhaps you might consider going into fashion."
"Nah, this is going to be the uniform of my Familia." Ptah said. "From now on, this is how you dress in public."
"Say who?"
"Says me, myself and I."
"...Kind of a scumbag move to turn my own words on me."
"You deserve it."
"Touché."
"Well, come on." Ptah shooed him away. "Let's go have your fancy dinner."
"I don't remember inviting you."
"I don't remember ever caring. I haven't been able to dine there because of the ridiculous prices...but now we can because of what you've made." Ptah said. "I should be demanding a cut from your right now as is my right. But all I'm asking is to join you on this dinner you were invited to by that girl."
"It won't be fair putting our entire tab on her. She only invited me."
"Then good thing you're loaded." Ptah stopped a little as he scanned Steve up and down once more. "You know, there's something still out of place about this."
"What?"
"This fashion usually includes the bearer having a shaved head. Shall we quickly get around to it?" Ptah said, pulling out a pair of shears.
"...Come near my hair and I'll wrench your head off. Now come along..." Steve flung open the front door. "...before I leave you behind."
"Coming, coming." Ptah said as he dropped the shears. "Honestly, mortals are so ungrateful."
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Merry Christmas. God Bless Us, Everyone!
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