“Hi there~ little guy~, my name is Rachael, but most people just call me Rei-Rei, hehe~!” The moment that the tiny Nephilim heard that, he cringed.

Elina asked “It has to be a coincidence, right? There’s no way it could be ‘her’…”

Michael smirked and looked up at the mostly-mechanical girl, “It’s nice to meet you, Rei-chan… I’m Minari, but you could also call me Daddy if you want.”

Rachael smiled wryly, as she walked over to Hiro and casually hugged him tightly. They were around the same height, though his muscles made him a lot ‘larger’ than her small frame. After giving him a passionate kiss, she said “Anyway~, I don’t want to get yelled at by Angry Rick, so I’ll see you once my shift is over~…”

Alice whispered “Mike, this is really fucking weird… If that’s actually our daughter, then doesn’t that mean we’re gonna end up, well, ya know, killing her or something?”

Once Rachael entered those double-doors, Michael quietly mentioned “Ya know, I’m like, eighty-percent sure that your girlfriend is my daughter. Well, there were millions of people with that name, so who knows?”

As the two of them got into the jeep, Hiro asked “What are you talking about? I’ve met Rei-Rei’s parents… They live down the street from us.”

The little boy sighed, wondering “So~, where do we go from here? Do I need to go get an ID card or something? Maybe I need to register somewhere? Sounds like a pain in the ass though… Might be easier to just kill someone and steal their identity.”

“Why do I feel like you aren’t joking right now? Never mind, listen, you don’t need to have an ID if you’re just a kid. It would be impossible to get a legitimate job with your appearance right now anyway. You were serious about helping me save my sister, right?” Hiro was already driving out of the parking lot and starting to pick up speed, as he passed an orange tree grove and was coming up upon a small pine forest. They needed to grow more than just ‘food’; thus, many of the trees were either there to benefit the ecology or to be cut down and used as wood.

Michael grumbled “Ugh, I can’t believe this bullshit… I’m so dizzy right now~. I was perfectly fine riding a motorcycle or snowmobile, but this is just… Fucking car-sickness!” Then he finally answered “Ah, yeah, course… Why would I lie about that? Where are we going anyway? I think I can last maybe like… twenty minutes at most.”

The cyborg turned his head to the left and furrowed his right brow, but when he saw the pained and agonized expression on the child’s face, he couldn’t help laughing. He muttered “You’re supposed to be some kind of overpowered super-being… yet you can’t handle being in a jeep? There’s no windows, roof, doors or anything, so even a person with motion-sickness would usually be fine… I’d say to take some ginger pills, but I doubt that you’d be affected by that.”

“It’s not my fault! It might be psychosomatic or I don’t know, like magical issues? Actually, I feel like this is probably JJ’s fault somehow! Jasmine, are you doing this to me?!” When Michael started yelling at himself, while tearing his hair out and glaring up at the bright-green sky, Hiro finally realized that he was a bit naive when he decided to seek help from the mysterious creature calling itself ‘Minari’.

“Grah! Fine! I’ll ask him so just shut up for a second and stop crying!” After that furious shout, the crimson-eyed boy turned towards the startled cyborg and inquired “Um, this might seem kinda random, but is there a place we can buy a pistachio-flavored ice-cream cake? The annoying little pussy-cat in brainbox keeps complaining about how it’s her birthday and she wants uh, no, she changed her mind again. The current demand is for sushi, specifically, rainbow-roll… and sake, or wine or whatever kinda booze you can find really. Nope, now she want’s… Seriously, I don’t think they’re gonna have those JJ! This is an entirely different universe and I’ve definitely never heard of ‘Donkey-Dude Wasabi-Soda’, but it sounds absolutely horrendous…”

Hiro frowned, “Minari… don’t freak out or anything, just, do you have schizophrenia? Honestly, you’re starting to scare me… You aren’t going to go on a rampage or anything like that, right?”

“I wonder~… Well, in a world where magic exists, if you’re seeing or hearing things, then it probably isn’t just in your head. I mean, I won’t deny that I do have a clinically insane loli-nekomimi succubus in my mind, but that doesn’t make ‘me’ crazy! Sure~, there might be a homicidal psychopathic serial killer constantly trying to convince me to murder people… Then there’s a shapeshifting fox who refuses to use words and won’t stop barking! Goddamn it Inari, I know you can talk, so just do it already! No, stop, don’t encourage her JJ! Grah!? Shitsauce! Now there’s a duet of annoying cat-noises tearing apart my extremely fragile sanity!” While Michael was shouting at himself, they finally exited the forest and reached the first intersection.

The jeep kept going straight ahead, slowed down and passed over a small bridge, which was above a seemingly bottomless crevice. Back when there was ridiculous amounts of ice everywhere, those absurdly deep fissures would have been either covered up or totally filled. However, with the temperature being so high inside that gigantic ‘bubble’, even glaciers had melted long ago.

There were plenty of rivers in the distance, along with thousands of acres of farmland, which grew all sorts of fruits, vegetables, herbs, and even raised livestock. Minari immediately commented “I can’t believe it actually smells so nice here… It’s weird and kinda creeps me out. Like, I can see the cows and horses, but I don’t smell any shit. Hiro, why am I not gagging right now?”

He asked “The real question is: Why are you complaining that it doesn’t stink? It really shouldn’t be that confusing… There are nanites constantly cleaning the air and removing various pollutants. Especially the ones around your body and inside of your nostrils…”

It was incredibly strange being able to see huge glaciers and frozen mountains behind that forest and giant pykrete wall, while to the east and west was nothing but lush, fertile farmland all the way to the horizon. The top of the dome-like barrier was similar to an enormous magnifying glass, which grabbed sunlight during the ‘daytime’ and created the illusion that they weren’t in the middle of Antarctica.

However, when it was supposed to be ‘night’, the sky was rarely ever that dark. Aside from the auroras, it was also incredibly easy to see the stars, galaxies and other celestial bodies or phenomena. Thus, all kinds of plants could grow as if they were in their ‘natural’ environment, because New Tokyo was essentially a gigantic greenhouse.

As they were passing over the three-hundred meter long metal bridge, there were constant creaking noises and as Michael gazed down into the abyss, he commented “Wow, I would totally be freaking out right now, if I didn’t know how to fly… You have to use this death-trap every day? What if there was an earthquake?”

Hiro smirked, as they finally made it to the other side. Then he started driving much faster, since they had finally made it to a two-lane highway, which lead all the way to the city. He shrugged, “You get used to it I guess? Besides, there are barely ever any earthquakes in Antarctica… At least they rarely occur ‘naturally’.”

After a few minutes, there was another intersection and the jeep turned right, maintaining the same speed and heading east for at least thirty miles. Half an hour of relative silence had passed, when the vehicle finally stopped moving.

Of course, there was no way that Michael could stay awake for that long. In fact, he had fallen asleep practically the moment that they made the first turn.

The cyborg nervously reached over and was about to nudge the right shoulder of that unconscious boy, when a swarm of tiny wasp-like nanites erupted from the child’s mouth. Upon witnessing that scene, Hiro immediately jumped out of the jeep and yelled “Minari! Wake up!” while sprinting across his driveway and heading for the door to his surprisingly large house.

Instead of a lawn, there were lots of colorful flowers and even several fruit trees. The building was only two stories high, but it was incredibly wide. There was wooden paneling covering the second floor walls, while the first was red brick and the foundation was concrete. As for the roof, it was relatively wide, with black tiles and a white water gutters along the sides. It rained every few days, so it was a necessity.

Fortunately, before the nanites had the chance to do any damage, Michael opened his eyes and yawned loudly as he stretched his short child-like arms. Looking outside, he frowned, muttering “Dafuck? What the hell? Is this another dream? I haven’t seen this house in so long…”

Then his crimson eyes adjusted and he glanced around a bit more. When he got out of the jeep, he murmured “Never mind, this definitely isn’t my grandmother’s place… Though the resemblance is deeply disturbing.”

As he walked over to Hiro, he asked “Why are you freaking out again? Seriously, calm down, are you gonna act like this every time I almost kill you? Meh, once you die a few times, you’ll get over this silly phobia. Anyway~, what are you waiting for? Open the door and let’s go inside~!”