Chapter 1058 – Christmas Back Finale – A Christmas Stroll


    Snow crunched under John’s feet as he walked away from the Palace. Strictly speaking, there was no need for him to actually head out. He could have just gone to one of the many unoccupied rooms in the Palace and wasted half an hour with mobile games, reading a book, or swimming in one of the indoor pools they had. Coming from the cold outside into the warm arms of his harem, however, felt more up his alley.


    There was a soft wind, breaking on John’s jacket, caused by several air elementals that flew around the place in whimsical frolic. Many of the smaller ones would never have seen snow before and played with it by gathering several of the falling thick flakes and making a group effort to form a small ball.


    One such small ball landed on top of Velka’s head. The Magryph had followed John, if only because she wanted to see more of the odd cold flaky stuff that had suddenly appeared all around. Now her attention was swiftly redirected from playing with the snow to chasing after those that would tease her.


    John looked after the Magryph, as she flew after the dispersing, giggling air spirits. ‘I hope she won’t do anything stupid,’ he thought. This was Velka’s first encounter with thick snow. Even to John, walking through it was a hassle. He ploughed through the ankle-high snow, leaving a trail behind him. To the dog-sized bird-cat, running would be a much more exhausting and heat-sapping effort. Flying was similarly hindered by the cold air and the steady snowfall. If Velka overexerted herself and got snowed in somewhere, that would be the end of her. To John, losing body heat was mostly an unpleasant feeling. It would take days for him to die of hypothermia on its own.


    Just to be sure, the Gamer reduced the amount of snowfall from ‘constant’ to ‘sparse’. There was enough of the stuff anyway. Optimally, Velka would be able to find shelter between the trees or somewhere else the frozen water hadn’t fallen. It was highly probable that, if she managed to exhaust herself to a dangerous degree, a fire spirit would find her as long as the Magryph didn’t get snowed in.


    ‘I’m probably worrying too much anyway. Velka is a smart girl.’ John steered his thoughts in another direction as he crossed the bridge over to the Guild Hall proper. ‘Where should I go? It shouldn’t be too far; I don’t want to be out longer than I need... let’s just head to the next bridge over.’


    At a quick pace, he could make that 2 1?2 kilometre walk in roughly twenty-five minutes. Past the bridge, the snow wasn’t an issue either. Only a thin layer covered the stone, to be soon gobbled up by one of the three-slime units that formed a ‘wall’ progressing steadily over the pavement. It was an automatic procedure and, like all automatic procedures, it had a couple of bugs or oversights. Apparently, the slimes only cleaned the walkways, fully ignoring any Buildings directly attached to them. The result was that the bridges remained covered by snow. John finagled with some Guild Hall settings to try and fix that.


    When he was content with his adjustments, he put his hands back into his pockets. Being a superhuman had an odd interaction with the cold. His body retained the heat much, much better than a mundane person could have ever hoped to and Gamer’s Body let him regain that heat instantly. Despite that, the feeling of cold on his skin was the same. While that made the sensation harmless, it was still profoundly unpleasant. For the same reason, John still avoided putting his hand on active stoves or pouring hot tea down his throat.


    He reached Newman Shire. A group of teenagers, somewhere between 12 and 14 years old, were busy building a snowman. Only when the snowman waved at John did he realize that he was looking at some kind of snow elemental. It evidently didn’t mind the treatment.


    “Why’re you waving at that guy?” one of the teenagers asked.


    “He’s the ruler of this place,” the snowman explained, a series of pebbles serving as his mouth.


    “That’s supposed to be the great John Newman?” one of the teenagers asked and gave the Gamer a doubtful glance. “Mom said he looked really impressive.”


    It helped that a political event was planned for New Years, being the admission of the Lake Alliance to the Federation. That definitely made the case for this year, but John was probably going to stick to the principles outlined. Keep Christmas for the family and New Years for the nation. There was something innately unifying about counting down to 0 with one’s entire country anyway.


    Well, counting down with one’s entire time zone.


    John passed by the festivities, just happy to see the people enjoy themselves. Everyone had a lot of fun with the snow, which he personally sympathized with. Getting a proper white Christmas in this corner of the globe was rare, but more than that the people cherished the break from the sweltering heat the First Lady imposed on them. The Guild Hall was not a place for anyone but summer children.


    Suddenly, a window appeared in front of John.


    ‘Why thank you, supreme deity of the world,’ John sent a grateful prayer up to the heavens – or wherever Gaia currently felt like being located. The experience boost would come in quite handy for the final grinding session he had planned for the end of this year. As for the Skill Evolution, he wasn’t quite sure what to expect. Something perverted, doubtlessly, given the Skill that was evolving.


    The choice was obvious to John immediately.


    The Godhand easily overpowered the self-pleasuring decrease of Source of Satisfaction. Thing was that, for one, he had never needed nor desired to go back to masturbating. Between work and sixteen haremettes, when did he even have time to pleasure himself? Why would he do with his own hands what gorgeous babes would do for him with their mouths, cunts and assholes? All of that was putting aside the question whether he could stop once he started. At that level of pleasure increase, he may be stuck masturbating until he died of dehydration. Not worth the risk and not worth it in general, especially with what else was on offer.


    Sexual Ascendancy was certainly interesting. Of the three, it offered the highest pleasure output increase, as well as some utility that could come in handy during negotiations. The number of women not sexually attracted to him was certainly miniscule.


    However, Master Stud was the truly obvious choice. John had numerous ways to increase his blunt pleasure output in the future. If he even wanted that – his sexual supremacy was so absurd at this point that it took weeks to get ‘regular’ superhumans, like Lee, to get used to the full might of his ability. A second cock, however, was something he usually could only achieve by using Cumslut, which brought with it the drawbacks of spiking his Libido immensely and taking two of his elementals out of the equation. He rather enjoyed fucking Siena and Undine.


    John pushed the button and whistled innocently as he walked back over the second bridge.


    Revealing this ability would be a treat.