Fear

A/N: This is going to be a sappy chapter with nothing but an exploration of the character of Alaster and Velzard. It'll be explaining the character arc Alaster has been going through since chapter 1 and some of the more odd behaviors of Velzard. It's critical to the overall story if you care about the characters, but if you don't really care about that kind of thing, then you can skip this chapter as the plot itself doesn't move forward much.

.~.~.~.

"Stop poking at it," I said with half-closed eyes as I watched Velda continuously touch his sleeping wife's belly. She had fallen asleep while sitting on what was probably the world's most comfortable lounging chair, and now Velda was poking at her baby bump like it would explode if he touched it too hard.

"I can't help it! I mean, it's my kid you know?" He said with a bit of nervousness in his voice which was uncharacteristic of him. Sure, every now and then he'd feign nervousness for comedic effect, but he didn't actually feel uneasy about it.

I raised my eyebrow at this but didn't say anything more. He stopped poking the bulging belly of Lucia and stood up straight, finally ready to speak to me about what I had actually come to him to speak about. I snapped my fingers, creating a barrier around the two of us to keep out the noise of our conversation so as not to wake up Lucia.

"Thanks. I've been having trouble using magic as well as I used to." He commented.

"That's because you're a human now. A body made out o flesh and blood like what you currently have is a lot less conducive to magic use as opposed to your other body which was entirely made out of magicules." I explained as we walked.

"I know that, but since you always seemed to do it fine, I underestimated how much difficulty I'd have using it." He responded.

"That's because I didn't use Primitive Magic when I was a material lifeform. I'd use elemental or spirit magic, you only use Primitive Magic," I commented with a slightly accusatory look.

Velda chuckled a bit and scratched at his cheek. "In my defense, I've literally never used any other kind of magic so I'm actually a beginner. Knowing all the spells in existence and actually using them competently is completely different." He explained.

"If you say so. You're the god here, not me." I said, dropping the topic as we made our way out and onto the balcony of the mansion we were currently walking through.

It was a huge place that Rudra had prepared for them in secret. As a matter of fact, only Rudra, Velda, Velgrynd, Velzard, and Lucia knew of its exact location in this country. Even the three maids that were employed here and Noir, who was the acting Butler for the two, didn't know, though, in future Diablo's defense, he just didn't bother to figure it out as he didn't care to know, so long as he could serve them, it didn't matter where they were.

I leaned against the railing of the balcony and looked off into the distance, the setting sun dimly illuminating the forest that surrounded the estate. Velda smirked.

"Analyzing the barrier again?" He asked.

"It's just too weak you know. A good enough majin could get through it in a few hours." I complained.

"It's fine, Alaster. They'd half to at least be on the level of a Demon Lord's Seed to do that." Velda chuckled for a moment before briefly putting his hand on my shoulder to comfort me. "I know you are being cautious about the safety of my wife and me, but between Noir being here and the location being a secret even to the inner circle of Rudra's Imperial Court, I doubt anyone or anything will happen." He said, trying to reassure me it was alright.

I looked back at Velda as he tried to comfort me and gave him a sigh. "I- no. It's alright. I'll just keep an eye on you from my end." I said as I dropped this topic of conversation.

Velda smiled softly at that and joined me by leaning his back against the railing and turning his head to look up at the stars. "What's up? You were looking down when you came asking for advice earlier."

I looked down and sighed heavily. "Yeah, Velzard and I got into a fight... It was bad. I think we both said some things we didn't mean."

Velda closed his eyes but didn't react so I continued. "She wants to have a child with me and I said no."

"You don't want her to be weakened like me, do you?" Velda said, more of a statement than a question.

"Yeah... I mean, we already basically raised Lilith and everything, and it's not like I don't WANT another kid, it's just-" I couldn't find the words.

"You're afraid," Velda spoke.

I turned to look at him in shock, my mouth agape.

Velda didn't even open his eyes but smiled softly at my reaction. "Alaster, how long have I known you?"

"About a decade at least," I muttered.

"Exactly, and I know for a fact that you are one of the most amazing people I've ever met in my life. The fragile little human who pulled himself up from nothing to become the world's strongest. Who sent one of my strongest angels flying before he was even two decades old." He stated.

"If you stopped being stubborn and went back to being a True Dragon you'd reclaim that title," I said almost in defiance.

Velda chuckled and finally lowered his head, opening his eyes. "Alaster, despite everything you've been through, you are more afraid now than at any other point in your life. You fear for the safety of Lucia and I, just like you do for Velzard, despite all of her power."

"Thats-"

"It's fine. I get it. You were dealt a very bad hand in this life. You lost your parents and then your friends. Both right in front of your eyes while you were powerless to stop it. You and Ramiris nearly lost your lives against Twilight and you were further traumatized by your fight against Iver- Ivy- whatever its name was."

"Ivarage." I completed his statement.

"Yeah, that one," Velda said with a nod. "You are too concerned with what was and what will be. You've always been like that. When you came to me for training, you were preparing yourself to fight a war against the world, neglecting your mental health in the pursuit of more power. The reason why I didn't train you much personally at the time, was because what you desired wasn't power to live your life freely, but power for the sake of power." He said.

"I was going to throw you out at one point, but then, one day, you stopped, or well, you changed your motivation. I'll be honest, I didn't realize you had started to fall for Velzard nor she, you, until Velgrynd pointed it out to me. When you and her trained together, it wasn't just about increasing your own personal strength anymore. You were having fun. I saw Velzard laughing more and more, you were telling jokes and doing silly little tricks with your sword like a total goof." He explained as my cheeks became slightly red in embarrassment at having been watched like that.

"I think, one of the best things to ever happen to you was falling in love with Velzard. Loving her had helped you to grow more as a person than any evolution, powerup, skill, or magic that I could have taught you. Before, you were just surviving. You wanted to become stronger because that's just what you were supposed to do, it was the duty you'd committed yourself to. With Velzard, though you actually started LIVING."

I didn't say anything to his words as I had no counter to his point.

"You both know you're at your most goofy and cheerful when you're together with her. Between all the bad puns and constant flirting with one another, it's not hard to see two lovers just enjoying life when you're together." He smirked.

I let my head sag forward as I digested his words. It was kinda obvious, but he was right. Before I met Velzard, all I really cared about was becoming stronger and preparing for the events of canon, but now I couldn't care less. Don't get me wrong, I still wanted Rimuru to be born as his slimy self, but I didn't give a shit about things like preserving canon anymore. It'd suck to lose characters like Shion or Gobta, who'd be fun to watch irl, but I wasn't going to tailor my entire life around ensuring everything would be in exactly the right place for them so that all the events that happened in the story, did. All I really wanted was to meet a new cute slime friend. One I knew wouldn't die on me. I didn't want to outlive any of my friends, so I was careful about who to open up to.

It sounded kind of childish now that I really thought about it.

Velda noticed I was done with my introspection and continued where he left off.

"You don't want Velzard to be weakened because you don't want her to be vulnerable. You are afraid that if you slip up even once, especially while she is in that state, she'll die and you'll be alone." He said turning to face me. "What you fear isn't Velzard dying, you could easily respawn her using your Ultimate Skill if that were to happen, what you're actually afraid of is being alone. I think that's the one thing you've always been most afraid of."

My throat felt tight as he pointed this out to me. He had hit the nail on the head. I didn't like to think back to my previous life too much, especially now since I've spent more years here than in my previous life, but one of the things I struggled a lot with back then was loneliness, not that I'd ever admit to that out loud.

"I heard you had a harem plan when you were younger, you know." Velda continued, smirking in amusement slightly. I didn't say anything but looked away, slightly embarrassed. "It's fine. Humans are greedy and lustful creatures in any world, not just this one. But with you, I don't think it was really JUST about having pretty girls falling all over you, was it? It was because you didn't want to be alone. You didn't really care who it was with, you just wanted companionship, right?"

I didn't respond.

"Velzard is similar." He stated. I turned to look at him with incredulity.

"She is extremely clingy when she's around you, much more than to any of us. Sure, she loves us, but she was always a bit distant. She's an introvert who likes spending time alone, but that doesn't mean she doesn't feel lonely either." He stated before waving his hand towards me. "But when she is with you, she is completely different. She is cheerful and expresses herself freely. I didn't even know she liked to tinker with stuff and make magic tools, but you figured it out. You got her to open up to you and got her to love you more than anything in the universe.

She may have said it in a jovial manner; that she'd kill me and then herself if something went wrong when I went in and edited your skills, but she wasn't too far off what would actually happen. You are the first person who she could truly open up to and be herself around. The thought of you leaving her alone, of her going back to a time without you, terrifies her to no end." I nodded my head in understanding.

"I guess my issues have ruined the only good thing I had going for me, huh? Broke me and her." I muttered, clenching my fist hard.

Velda say this and sighed, shaking his head. "No. That's not it. You didn't ruin anything. That's impossible. No, I think she was just afraid of you rejecting her when she finally allowed herself to be vulnerable. And I don't just mean physically vulnerable. That's what you're afraid of. No. She's afraid because she's ready to take the biggest step any relationship can take, to create the culmination of her love and yours, and you said no."

I clenched my fists so hard they began to bleed. I was so incredibly frustrated right now and my mind was a chaotic mess. "Then what am I supposed to do?" I asked him, a bit of my aggravation leaking through into my tone.

Velda sighed and shook his head before shrugging his shoulders. "I don't know. I've never had to fear anything in my life." Velda started saying to me in a jovial manner to lighten the mood before he changed his demeanor to a more serious one and continued.

"You have to choose. Right now, you have to choose whether or not to allow your fears and traumas control your life. You said it yourself. You WANT a child with her, but you are afraid of what will happen if you go through with it. You're afraid of being vulnerable, just like she is-"

"But she chose to believe in her love of me. Choosing love over fear, huh?" I said somberly. I paused for a moment before chuckling softly. "God. This sounds like a cheesy drama..." I said as I looked up into the sky.

Velda didn't allow me to run away from this and hide behind humor. He continued to press his point. "Alaster, at this moment in time, you are the strongest being in this universe. In a one-on-one fight, no one can even come close to defeating you." He paused for a moment. "But are you strong enough to answer her? What was the point of gaining all that strength before now, huh? You said it was to protect the people and things you loved, but it seems like the only growth you've had was physical and magical. Your body grew, but your heart stayed the same." Velda pointed to the center of my chest where my heart would be for emphasis as he said that.

"Are you ready to open it? For the one that you love? Are you ready to finally be truly strong? Because it wasn't the power we gave you that made you the First True Hero. It was the strength of your heart."

We both looked at each other for a moment before Velda removed his finger and smiled at me, satisfied with his pep talk. He gave me a curt nod before turning and walking back inside. "I'm going to go back inside and poke at my wife's belly some more. Tell Velzard I said hi when you see her." He said, disappearing around the corner.

I stood there, digesting the words he told me. I looked up into the evening sky once more and closed my eyes to think.

.~.~.~.

A/N: I suck at sappy writing!

I hope I was able to convey both Velzard and Alaster's characters well here. They are both characters who are controlled by their fears.

At first, Alaster's goal was to become strong and get a harem, both of which stemmed from his internal fear of being alone which hasn't left him since he reincarnated into the world. He wanted a harem at the beginning more because he longed for companionship and hid his insecurity behind a lustful outer shell. He wanted to be strong because he witnessed what would happen in a world like this if he wasn't. He took comfort in Velzard being so strong that he really didn't have to worry about protecting her, so when the prospect of her becoming weak enough to die to just random humans after giving birth came up, he rejected having kids with her.

(He knows Veldanava was stronger than Velzard yet was still killed by the world's proxies which were just nameless humans, so how much more vulnerable would SHE be when she was weaker than him?)

He was so afraid of this that he rejected having kids with her even though that would have made him happy.

Velzard, on the other hand, was an introverted girl who was full of self-doubt and mild self-loathing at the beginning of the story. When she found out that she had feelings for Alaster, she ran away from him (figuratively and literally). When she found out he felt the same, she was ecstatic but deep down that doubt that fear still festered. She became afraid he would reject or leave her, which was shown in the fight with Ivarage when she thought he would leave her for making a mistake.

This fear has resulted in her being clingy and possessive of him, which is why she is so on guard against Evelyn despite knowing that Alaster loves her (Velzard). Seeing Lucia pregnant made her go into an introspective dive as to what she really wanted and what she wanted was to make a family with Alaster. She overcame her internalized fear he'd leave her and talked to him about having a child together, not really caring about how much weaker it'd make her, since she knew she'd be happy.

When she informed Alaster of her decision and he rejected her idea of having a family, she felt like she was personally being rejected and, while in a state of denial, got into a useless fight with Alaster.

I almost wrote that verbal spat (fight) for this chapter, and there were multiple drafts of it written, but none of them sounded right. They didn't flow well and made them both sound like petty assholes, and not in a good way (narratively speaking), and kinda assassinated both of their characters.

IDK. I'm a 25yo virgin whose only relationships haven't lasted past the third date because, if I'm being honest, I'm kinda a selfish asshole. I don't have enough relationship experience to properly right a convincing 'fight' scene between an extremely close and intimate couple which is a result of their underlining insecurities that are getting in the way of continuing their relationship.

A/N2: I didn't really write it like this on purpose, but if you look carefully at the whole story its themes are all about fear and people's responses to it.

Twilight was afraid of death and it turned him into a body-stealing monster.

Paul (one of the liberators from earlier on in the story) was afraid of losing the one he loved to Alaster, which strained his relationship with him.

Velzard was afraid of being emotionally vulnerable which caused her to run away from Alaster when she was asked.

Evelyn and Nolla feared losing Alaster's trust if they told him the truth about who they were, which resulted in them lying to him, which got his parents killed (from their point of view, as they didn't know Twilight's plot). When they finally confessed, he left them anyway when he wouldn't have if he'd been told from the jump.

Alaster's fear of being alone and craving for companionship is what initially caused his despite for a harem and was the driving force behind why he was so obsessed with getting stronger.

I wonder if this is how real authors feel when literature teachers point out that this 'thing' was blue because of the themes of the book, when in actuality they actually just made it blue because they were trying to be descriptive.