A Second in Command I

Riveria and Nox just looked at each other with a sigh before hugging Ais in between the two of them, like parents reassuring their child that they still loved them after a harsh scolding.

Ais just melted and apologized and while Nox wanted to say it was fine and it did not matter, he did not as letting her suffer a bit now so she would stop her crazy antics about growing stronger faster, was a much better alternative to comforting her and thus continued to enable such behaviour from her.

After the tearful three way hug well, Ais was really the only one who cried, Riveria asked Ais to go have a real rest, her first one in a long while while she discussed with Nox what should be done about her actions.

Still feeling immensely guilty, Ais immediately acquiesced and went to her room to lay down and sleep, her ability to drop and fall into slumber instantly was unrivalled so even though she wasn't particularly tired due to her abuse of the Panacea, Ais immediately went off into the dreamland.

After this, like two worried parents, Nox and Riveria went about deciding what should be done so that Ais would never be able to pull something similar, since as long as she found a way that would inconvenience no one besides herself, she would most certainly do so.

After all, against such a repeat offender who never reformed despite countless warnings and even some punishments, trust was very, very spare, almost nonexistent.

After some back and forth, the pair simply decided to enforce some Dungeon Diving and training restrictions on Ais and since she had the habit of sneakily disobeying such sanctions, they would be enforced through a magical contract.

Basically, a time limit for training outside the dungeon was enforced and on days that she dove into the Dungeon, all manner of training outside was forbidden.

After a certain amount of time elapsed in the Dungeon, Ais had to retreat to either the surface or one of the safehouses, as quickly and as safely as she could manage with an exception to this particular rule being made when it came to group expeditions with the others.

Additionally, certain specific parameters were set to measure how "harsh" to herself Ais's Dungeoneering was and, if she broke any of the imposed limits, the contract forced her to retreat to a safe zone, either the surface or a safehouse and rest for a certain period of time.

It was an incredibly restrictive agreement in terms of training and work, probably more so than it needed to be.

However, Riveria and Nox determined it was best that they started out with such heavy restrictions and then slowly loosen them over time if Ais competently stuck to the parameters without the contract having to constantly enforce stoppage, something which Nox had designed the contract to tell him of.

In other words, if Ais pushed her training to the limits until the contract forced her to stop, Nox would be warned and if that kept happening, restrictions would not be loosened.

If however, she adapted and stuck to a lower pace within the contract's imposed limitations, said limitations would be periodically loosened to some extent.

Naturally, these conditions would be made clear to Ais as she would most likely never figure out Nox would be willing to ease them, constantly pushing to the limit of what she was allowed.

It was in truth, not only a way to stop her self destructive habits, but also a way to teach Ais a lesson in patience as trying to increase her training ahead of time would just result in a setback rather than progress towards the power she so dearly wished and tirelessly searched for.

After this was all set an done however, Riveria revealed her second purpose in participating in this private meeting.

Helping Ais was of course a great priority but letting go of such a prime opportunity to discuss Nox's plans with him privately without raising the others' eyebrows was something she would not bear to pass up as she truly required it for nothing beyond helping Nox to the best of her ability.

She held up Nox who was about to leave and dumped her various concerns about the possible ramifications of basically enslaving Evilus.

Things like how operations using them would be, their purpose, the danger of associating with such hated individuals regardless of the nature of said association. Needless to say, they were very valid concerns . . . Concerns Nox had long pondered on before making his decision and plans.

Of course, Riveria had no way of knowing this, hence, her very justified worries. After all, unlike the others who seemed content of following Nox vision without worry or simply had moral concerns and didn't even consider Nox making mistakes in the more functional aspect, Riveria who was a competent leader and organizer, always considered such possibilities.

While she too saw Nox as someone extremely thorough and competent in most things, to her, no one was above making mistakes from time to time and she was right. Nox had made several mistakes over his relatively short time in the world of DanMachi.

The only reason none of them were obvious to others who saw him as infallible, was simply due to the fact he managed to turn those mistakes around and most of the time, even gain something out of the trouble he got himself into.

Now that Riveria had approached him with such functional concerns rather than questioning him morally, Nox realized the role she had taken upon herself and yet another error he had made in not having her be more involved in his overall plan making.

Being responsible for everything was a heavy duty as the lives of those he cared about laid in the balance whenever he made a big move or decision.

Having someone to shared that burden and another set of eyes to look over his plans would not ontl be a welcome relief of some of that weight, it would also greatly diminish the chance of his making a mistake to great to fix.

And so, realizing Riveria's troubles and how much more she could be, Nox decided to shared a lot more details with Riveria, involving her much more deeply in the logistic side of his plans and endeavours . . .

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