The Simulacrum

Chapter 93

It was an especially cold night. Snow fell in fat, fluffy flakes, yet not a single one landed on me; the effect of another superfluous enchantment on my armor, but one I didn't mind. For the moment, I was doing my best echo-locating-mammal-man impression, though only in moderation. My armor was mostly covered by the customary back long coat, but I made sure to stay a few steps away from the edge of the roof anyway. The last thing I needed was a stray reflection to alert my targets inside the outwardly abandoned warehouse across the street.

At the moment, I was accompanied by two Kage ninjas, on the flat rooftop of an unremarkable antique shop. They were the generic kind, and remained completely motionless like ice statues. Their uniforms weren't exactly winter ready, unlike my insulated armor, yet they didn't utter a single complaint. Maybe they had some fancy ninja-technique for staying warm? In any case, I made a small mental note about looking into their dress code. Later though. Right now, we had bigger fishes to fry.

Seconds slowly piled into minutes, but there was no movement on the inside of the warehouse. The only sign of occupation came in the form of the pale fluorescent light barely shining through the windows, and if the scout team didn't already testify about Mr. Raven entering the building a while ago, I would've never guessed it was their hideout. Though again, being inconspicuous was kind of the point of a hiding spot, I supposed.

Just when I was about to start getting impatient, my ears picked up the characteristic sound of crunching snow coming from behind me. Glancing over my shoulder, my eyes met with Rinne's, and she came to a halt right behind me. Based on her tracks, she probably scaled the back of the shop to approach me. She already had Onikiri on the ready, the sword's shroud unnaturally billowing behind her like a cape in a cheesy superhero movie.

"What's the situation?"

She gave me a curt salute, and told me, "Brang-san and his men are in position and waiting for Leonard-dono's signal. The warriors of the clan have set up a net around the perimeter, as instructed."

"Good. What about the inside?"

"Minor movements. They don't seem to be aware of our presence yet."

"So far so good," I whispered under my breath. Looking back at the building, I added, this time in a stronger voice, "Since everyone's in position, let's hit them before they could wise up to our presence."

"As you command," Rinne responded, but my gaze remained on the warehouse.

Truth be told, I was a little anxious. While this wasn't the first time I took part in an 'operation', this was the first time I did so with the explicit intent to fight. During the school incident, things happened too fast and I didn't know what to expect, while at the time of our joint attack on Fred's backup base, my goal was to sneak Mike out of captivity. This time, I was here to cause havoc on my own, and I could feel the difference.

However, that didn't mean I hesitated. I couldn't exactly afford it either. I was about to raid the hideout of people who tried to kidnap Judy. Sure, they failed, but only because we made multiple contingency plans to avert such a scenario. That wasn't something worth patting myself on the shoulder over; it was the bare minimum I had to do. This? It was a bit more than that, but I'd be bloody damned if I'd let them to their devices after what they'd done.

Feeling as ready as I could, I gestured for Mountain Girl to follow me, and after doing a few short hand-seals, she disappeared into my shadow. I've long since stopped caring about the mechanics of their ninjutsu, but seeing her use it even while I could barely make out the shade I cast on the ground was still a bit of a mind-bender, and let's not even get into the fact that Ichiko somehow figured out how to do it without the hand-seals. Or hands, if we were at that. It was one of those things that really made me wonder just how soft the metaphysics of this world were, but this was neither the time nor the place to ponder such things. Shortly, I focused on Brang's mark and reappeared right next to him.

The ex-general, decked out in his armor and surrounded by the rest of the Fauns, swiveled his ears and turned to me. He had a pensive expression on his face, visible even under the translucent layer of the cloaking sigil, nothing like the gentle grandpa vibes he gave off while in the base. He gave me a salute, and the rest obediently followed suit.

"[Be at ease, general,]" I growled in a low voice, and looked over the group of armed ram-men (plus Pip) in front of me. They didn't seem especially eager, but they were disciplined, which was better. "[Is the state of your readiness at a satisfactory height?]"

"[Aye. We're ready at which hour thou art.]" His voice was solemn and he tightened his grip on his spear, the spitting image of a veteran warrior ready for battle. Needless to say, he immediately ruined it by letting out a small sigh and absentmindedly stroking his beard. [But bid me, Blackcloak; art thou certain about this?]"

I was fairly sure he didn't mean the attack itself, so I made an educated guess.

"[Are you enquiring about the lack of Region of Purpleness?]" Brang nodded, and I shook my head in return. "[We possess not the advantage of foresight, so we shall employ the leverage of shock and wonder. Deploying a Land of Violet Colors upon our foes would foretell our coming.]"

The old Faun grunted in what I presumed was acceptance, so I faced the warehouse again.

While on the surface this might've seemed the same as when I had everyone assault the Knights' base during the Arbitration, it was actually radically different situation. For one, this was a reactionary raid, so we had zero prep time. I had no Far Sight access to anyone inside either, so we had no intel on their numbers or equipment. Didn't have any floor plans or guard post locations either, and last but not least, our forces were considerably less powerful, lacking Sahi, Pascal, Abram, and Sebastian. In exchange, I was here, but that wasn't exactly a fair trade.

Under normal circumstances, I would've taken it slow, infiltrating the place with the Kage ninjas and maybe planting a few disguised mini-shoggoths to keep an eye on the grounds, but considering they've just failed a kidnapping attempt, it was likely they would move bases soon. At least that's how they operated under Arnwald's guidance, and while I was sure the scout team could keep them under surveillance, it was best to hit the iron while it was still hot and capitalize on the element of surprise.

Not to mention, I still had a long night ahead of me, as I had to sit down and explain the situation to Judy's parents, which would also necessitate telling them about the supernatural elements of the world, so I wanted to get things done pronto. In other words

"[Fornicate with subtle bearing.]"

"[ Pardon?]" Brang blurted out in surprise, but I quickly dismissed him with a wave of my hand.

"[Cease attending to my stray words and heed my words instead.]" I could practically see the comment about being redundant on Karukk's tongue, so I barreled on before he had the chance to say it. "[I shall enter the lair of our foes through the gates and dazzle their senses with my presence. The warriors of shadow shall ensure that none shall escape our snare, so focus your attention on the unnamed men-at-arms.]"

"[Is thy plan to shoulder the battle against the entitled ones by thine lonesome?]"

"[Such matters are entirely dependent on the resistance they inflict on us. Should your assignment be fulfilled with unforeseen swiftness, I shall warmly welcome your assistance.]"

Brang nodded, and since there were no more questions, I turned my attention to the warehouse again. It was made of bricks, big enough to fit my house twice over, and with the island's track record, it probably had a basement as well. That was a lot of ground to cover, so to make the Fauns' job a little easier, I planned to break right through the main entrance and draw everyone's attention to me. With some luck, they would all gather to deal with the intruder, and it would allow us to catch them in one fell swoop.

I spared another glance at the ex-general, then began walking.

The sound of crunching snow under my feet and the subtle scraping of the plate covering my body both sounded deafening in the quiet of the night, and while I took every step cautiously, I didn't receive a single warning from my sixth sense. It was a little anti-climactic, but I made my way over to the main entrance of the building without anything out of the ordinary, and I stopped in front of the huge metal door. It was a tilting one by the look of the hinges, designed for trucks and heavy machinery. On the other hand, it didn't look especially thick, and on closer observation, I found that there was a human-sized door built into it as well, with a doorknob and everything.

Listening closely, I could make out a few stray noises coming from inside. Fragments of spoken words. The sound of metal against metal. Subtle things, nothing that would indicate they were even aware of my presence.

My first instinct told me that I could simply Phase to the other side of the door and hit them with a surprise attack. Or maybe check the smaller door to see if it's unlocked, and enter that way? Maybe throw in a jolly 'Why, hello there!' as I walked in like it was completely natural?

" Fuck that," I whispered under my breath, and carefully unhooked the swords hanging from my belt.

In my left, I tightened my grip on the unnamed sword that came with the Lion Knight set, while in my right, Cal's blade began to silently shine as I slowly ramped up the speed of the mana circulating within my body. Feeling a sense of clarity, I raised both swords and held them out vertically in front of me, and inhaled the cold winter air until my chest hurt.

Step one: get into the right mind-space. Right now, I wasn't Leonard S. Dunning, high school student. That wasn't the role I was playing. At this moment, I was Leonard Blackcloak, Chimera Slayer, son-in-law of the Dracis clan, and King of Knights and on the other side of this door, were the bastards who tried to kidnap my girlfriend.

It was at this point that I realized, much to my surprise, that I was still angry. I almost expected that spending nearly half an hour out in the cold would cool my head a little, yet the embers in my stomach burst into flames like they were never out, to begin with. It was a visceral kind of anger, not quite cold fury, but not exactly bursting rage either. I didn't like it, but if there was ever a time when it was appropriate, this was it.

Exhaling slowly, I raised the blades humming with power over my head and struck down with a single, forceful stroke. The sound was nothing I've ever heard, and considering I've experienced my fair share of strange noises, that said something. The corrugated metal panels split and crumbled like wet tissue paper, and the metal frame underneath didn't fare much better either, snapping like dry wigs under a sledgehammer.

I didn't stop there, and flourished my weapons before cutting upwards, slicing an 'X' shape into the already torn gate. This time the sound of groaning metal was accentuated by heavy thuds as pieces of the gate dropped to the ground. Keeping up the momentum, I swung my blades again and again, both horizontally and vertically, and in just the span of a few short seconds, I've successfully carved a hole large enough for me to walk across without lowering my head.

Stepping inside, I beheld a group of about ten people gathered around the middle of the spacious warehouse floor. The space was empty, save for a few concrete columns, and the armored men and women who hit up camp in the middle. As in, literally, with tents, camping stoves, and everything.

That was slightly unexpected, but I was confident to say I was nowhere near as baffled as my opponents. Taking measured steps, I carefully observed the situation.

Seven Squires wearing generic armors. Less than expected, but no matter how I strained my eyes, I couldn't see anyone else in the back. They posed little threat by themselves, but could be troublesome if they all attacked at the same time. For now, they remained still and only stared at me without even reaching for their weapons.

Moving on. Two obviously important people in the middle. One, I was familiar with; Morgana was wearing her armor and looking exactly the same as when I encountered her during her meeting with the grand elder. She was hunched over a young man and held an unrolled bandage in one hand.

The patient wore a felt-covered black brigandine with matching spaulders and vambraces over a gambeson, and he was lying on his side on a foldable field bed, with his greaves on the ground. He didn't have his helmet on either, and I was surprised to see that he was quite young, potentially younger than even Penny. He had dark olive skin and short black hair, and while he was fairly handsome in a delicate, androgynous way, it was hard to see behind the shocked grimace he had on his face at the moment.

Nobody moved a muscle until I came right up to their little indoor campsite, but the moment I halted, the woman in the purple armor stood tall and all the squires backed away simultaneously.

"What is the meaning of?"

"Silence." By no means did I shout, yet she shuddered like I just hit her over the head. "I'm not here to parlay."

"Parlay? What?" Confounded, she glanced between the boy rising to his feet with a pained hiss and me, and uttered, "Leonard, put your weapons down and"

"Did I stutter?" I asked, and for emphasis, I swung the blade in my left hand. Since I was running my armor at full throttle, its edge was already surrounded in a haze of vague 'cutting power', and the motion made a thin wave of mana lash out from the tip, resulting in a crackling sound and a visible mark on the concrete floor. "I told you I'm not here to talk. I've let you roam around on my island long enough. You've overstepped your boundaries, so I'm here to put you in your place."

I could feel the Gorgon Knight's incredulous eyes on me even through her visor, but then she mechanically turned to her head towards the boy gripping a parrying dagger he took out from his bag of holding and spoke in a voice colder than the winter night outside.

"What have you done?"

Raven Boy trembled in surprise, but didn't answer, so I used my bluntest, flattest voice to tell her, "He sneaked into my girlfriend's room and attempted to kidnap her." I paused for a moment, mostly for theatrics, then added, "Did he forget to tell you how he got shot?"

"Is that true?" she asked, and somehow her voice ended up even icier than before.

"It was a sound strategic decision," the boy answered defiantly, though I could hear just the faintest tinge of panic under his bravado. "I only planned to interrogate her and then return her before sunrise, with her memories erased."

"Was that supposed to be an excuse? Because if it was, I'm afraid you suck. If anything, you just convinced me to definitely beat you to within an inch of your life."

Saying so, I took another step forward.

"Wait, Leonard! This is!"

Once again, she was cut short, though this time it wasn't me. Without any prior indication, Raven Boy was suddenly covered from head to toe in black, almost as if all the bright colors on him got inverted. At least, that was the impression I got, but it didn't last long, as a heartbeat later he completely disappeared from sight.

Invisibility? No, I would see through that, so it was something else. That meant it was either a speed buff that would let him overcome my mana-enhanced dynamic vision, or a teleport skill. The former was unlikely, while the latter was conventionally impossible. Either way, my danger sense was giving me a surprisingly anemic warning, so I followed its tug and twisted my upper body, barely avoiding a stab aimed at the gap between the plates on my side.

Shifting my posture, I swung my sword, and it met with another sword Raven Boy produced from the convenient inventory-style enchanted item on his side. The impact on my hand was close to nothing, much to my surprise, though it was quickly explained by the blade in my opponent's hand snapping right above the cross guard. Not an enchanted weapon, a detached part of my brain noted while I shifted my feet again and swung Cal at his shoulder.

Shockingly, he didn't even attempt to guard or evade, but it all made sense when he suddenly flashed black again and disappeared, at which point my blade sailed right through the space he occupied a split-second ago.

Huh. Was this how Brang felt when he was dueling me in Domination, I wondered? Before I could ponder too much, my opponent appeared again, this time wielding a buckler in his off-hand, and taking a more cautious approach.

I was just about to engage him again, when the armored woman roared loud enough to fill the whole warehouse with her voice

"Stop this at once!"

Barely managing to keep the startled gasp trapped in my mouth, I gritted my teeth as my whole body froze mid-motion. Luckily, this wasn't my first time experiencing this situation, and it only took my phantom limbs half a second to sever the connection between us.

Of course, Raven Boy had no idea about any this, and he rushed in to capitalize on my moment of motionlessness. Unfortunately for him, he tried to do so by switching his parrying dagger to a reverse grip and aiming for my neck. Welp, that was a lethal attack. There went my last bit of reservation, and so I stepped right into his incoming strike.

Since he fully committed to this one stab, it left his torso wide open, even though he had a shield in the other hand. Now, I had no idea whether I could stab through his brigandine, but in any case, that wasn't the plan. Instead, I also switched Cal into a reverse grip, and as our bodies collided, I planted my feet and focused all my enhanced strength into my arms. With a swift motion, I hit his abdomen with both pommels at once in a clean, unobstructed strike. The results were a deafening boom, followed by a frankly comical yelp and Raven Boy flying off like his namesake, at least if ravens were ever shot out from cannons.

I would've loved to watch his impact, but there was fighting to be done, and as Mrs. Applebottom had drilled into our heads during physics lessons, every action had an equal and opposite reaction. In this case, launching Raven Boy naturally resulted in the counter-force pushing me in the opposite direction. Never to let good momentum go to waste, I used it to give me a boost towards the still unarmed Gorgon Knight.

She noticed my intention, but by the time she was about to take up a proper stance, I'd already channeled all the extra power into my legs and propelled myself towards her, with Cal back in a standard grip and extended out as I closed in on her.

A blink of an eye later, I came to a halt, in front of my second opponent, so close I could clearly make out her eyes shaking behind the visor. As for my sword, I aimed it right over her left shoulder, close enough to her head where it almost touched the owl ears of her helmet.

I waited for a long beat, to let the situation sink in, as well as to plunge my phantom limb into her armor, and once finished, I calmly told her, "That's not how you stop someone. Let me show you." Before she could react, I twisted a few metaphorical knobs on the enchantments of her gear, and added, "Don't move. It's an order."

Just to be sure I didn't mess up, I pulled back Cal and, using my other hand, I gave a stiff shove to her breastplate, and just as expected, she toppled over with a panicked cry. The metallic impact of her helmet hitting the ground was a little disconcerting, but I left the defensive enchantments intact, so I wasn't too worried about her health. I had to admit though, watching her rock back and forth on her heel and the back of her head, stiff as a statue, was oddly satisfying.

"Auntie!"

My sixth sense came before the voice, and my right weapon already moved to intercept the incoming strike even before Raven Boy appeared out of thin air, this time with a spiked war hammer in place of his dagger. Needless to say, upon meeting Cal, the head of the weapon practically disintegrated on impact, staggering my attacker. I was just about to follow my parry up with a horizontal slash, but then he flashed black and disappeared again.

Okay, this was getting annoying. What the heck was this power? And furthermore, why did it look so familiar? I meant the flashing part, in particular. I could swear I'd seen it somewhere else, but without taking a closer look

"Aargh!"

Speak of the devil, Raven Boy reappeared again, this time right in the middle of my blind spot. Too bad for him, I didn't actually have one, so I easily avoided the running stab with a fancy half-pike coming my way, and this time I paid closer attention to the moment he disappeared. Then, it finally clicked.

Itching to see if my guess was correct, I waited for my foe's next appearance, and the moment my danger sense gave me a hint, I faced him and asked, "For the record, are you maybe slipping in and out of a tiny little Purple Zone?"

Instead of an answer, I got another angry shout and a short sword aimed at my neck, which I casually parried without breaking a sweat. Since he didn't have his full gear, he didn't pose much of a threat beyond his faux-teleportation ability. Unfortunately for him, my guess was spot on, as he backed away, only to freeze in his tracks and nearly stumble, still perfectly visible to the naked eye.

I admit, I momentarily considered giving him a headman's haircut, or at the very least taking one of his arms, but my better self reminded me that I had to be mindful of the ever-present threat of grimdarkness sneaking into our world as a result of my actions, so after considerable internal debate, I flicked my wrist and threw the weapon in my left hand high into the air.

Raven Boy reflexively followed it with his eyes, giving him little time to react to the iron-gloved backhand coming right at his face, and my strike landed on his cheek with an immensely satisfying smack that honest to goodness echoed in the hall. Then, just as planned, I used my weapon-catching skill to casually grab the falling sword out of the air.

For the next couple of seconds, the only sound in the warehouse came from the guy groaning on the floor in a fetal position, slightly accentuated by the scraping sounds the Gorgon Knight made as her struggles to move kept her rocking left and right. At last, I let out a pent-up breath, placed Cal onto my shoulder, and looked over the Squires still motionlessly surrounding the campsite.

"Does anyone else want to join? Don't be shy, the water's fine."

The men shared a couple of uncertain looks between each other, then, as if they rehearsed ahead of time, they all raised their hands in unison.

"Wow, look at that. People with working survival instincts. I'll be damned."

It was around this time that the Raven Knight unsteadily rose to his feet again, holding his head in one palm and glaring through his parted fingers.

"You bastard! What did you do?"

"Do you mean about your trick?" I reached down to my waist and pulled the flap of my coat aside to reveal a long, cylindrical artifact wrapped in a thick burlap pouch fastened to my belt. "I borrowed this from my sister. I brought it along just in case some of you tried to make a run for it in a Purple Zone, but it came in handy in an unexpected way. Oh, speaking of which" I raised my hand again and pointed at the guy, "Before you get any funny ideas and try to run, I order you to stay perfectly still."

"What are you?" his outraged voice instantly shifted into a startled one when he realized he couldn't move anymore. Or rather, he could barely move, unlike the armored woman still lying on the ground over there in grudging silence. It was probably because he was only partially equipped, yet by the looks of it, he had to use all his strength to move a single finger.

First things first, I put Cal into the hoop on my sword belt to free up my right hand, then I walked over to Raven Boy's side, and after inspecting his equipment, I quickly found a small, silver-plated flat bag attacked to his belt. It wasn't too hard to notice, considering that it was gloving extra-brightly with magic, and I helped myself to it without paying any heed to its current owner's protests.

"Inventory, get," I whispered under my breath, and after pocketing the spoils, I raised my voice. "Gather up everyone, and carry these two out of here. Afterwards, dismantle the camp and erase any evidence of our presence."

The Squires were visibly confounded by my words, apparently thinking I was talking to them, but it only lasted until Hrul undid his cloaking sigil, soon followed by the rest. Then the Kage ninjas emerged from their shadows, and in a couple of seconds, we outnumbered the armored men three-to-one. Not that it mattered, as after the first shock passed, they obediently surrendered.

"What is this!? Unhand me at once!"

"[Easy does it]" Pip grumbled as he unceremoniously lifted the stiff Raven Boy onto his shoulder and headed outside. Hrul did the same to Morgana, and things became really busy around us once the ninjas began disassembling the tents while the Fauns herded the Squires into a single line.

"That went smoother than expected," I admitted under my breath, and I found someone agreeing with me once Rinne exited my shadow.

"Indeed. It was a marvelous display of power, Leonard-dono."

"That wasn't my original intention, and where exactly were you? Weren't you supposed to back me up?"

"Rinne saw that Leonard-dono required no help, so Rinne took the opportunity to marvel at Leonard-dono's masterful swordsmanship from up close!"

" Are you pulling my leg?"

Before she could respond, a certain jovially chuckling Faun general arrived at my side.

"[Thine display was truly spectacular. Not since serving under the venerated second lord of House Inanna had I seen such ruthlessly domineering bearing.]"

"How is that supposed to be a good thing, and Wait. Are you wiping your eyes?"

"[Please do forgive this old heart, Blackcloak. Sentimentality has gotten the better of me.]"

"Okay, at this point I'm about ninety percent sure you two are just making fun of me, so cut it out."

"[I assure you, Blackloak, I would not dare to do so.]"

I had a reply on the tip of my tongue, but then I noticed Karukk waving at me, so I gestured for him to speak.

"[Say, boss? Where should we take the captives again?]"

That was a good question. Taking them to the base was the most obvious answer, but letting them meet with the rest of the Knights right away might not have been the best idea. Not to mention, I still had to figure out what they were planning with the grand elder, and why they tried to kidnap Judy. Depending on their answers regarding the last topic, I might've even had to reconsider integrating them into the group at all.

"Hm. Last I checked, Fred's backup base in the docks was still vacant, and it has an emergency exit we can use as a sneaky backdoor to get in without the Magi noticing. Nobody should look for them there or hear their pleas for mercy, so it should be an adequate location for interrogations."

"[Understood!]"

Karukk nodded and turned on his heel, and only when he joined the rest of the Fauns did I realize that they didn't know about the entrance of the hidden tunnel I was talking about. However, before I could go after him, I noticed Brang giving me an inquisitive look that bothered me for some reason.

"Is there something on my helmet?"

"[Nothing of the sort. This old one was simply wondering art thou completely certain thou art not a forgotten descendant of one of the Abyssal Great Lords of old? Or maybe of a lost bloodline?]"

" Still not funny."

And with that, I left the furtive old man and the dazed monster huntress behind in favor of directing the mass capture and kidnapping of a bunch of knights in more-or-less shining armor by a task force of scary growling ram-people and slightly less scary ninjas, so that I could squeeze every drop of information out of them in a secluded location. Nothing nefarious to see here, please move along.

Part 2

"[It's cold in here.]" Rabom sounded almost absent-minded as he propped the Gorgon Knight against the wall. I had to agree with him, but I also had a question: why was the warehouse so warm, considering it's the middle of December, and they only had a single camp stove in there?

It was a rhetorical question, of course, as I was sure it had to do with that thing starting with 'n' and ending with 'arrative convenience', but I would've preferred some consistency. At least it only mildly bothered me, thanks to my gear, but I imagined the Fauns were getting quite chilly already.

"We have electricity, so I'll bring a couple of infrared heaters over later," I noted as I looked around the room. The last time I'd been here, this was where Mike was being held captive, but after the Magi took over the place, it had been scoured clean of everything, leaving only the four blank walls.

"[Hey, boss? I found a couple of chairs!]" Karukk's excited yell made the very, very slowly moving Knight on the floor let out a surprised squeak, but a moment later he resumed his attempts to bore a hole into my helmet with the power of his glare alone. Needless to say, it didn't do much.

"What are you planning to do to us, traitor?" Raven Boy hissed at me, finally realizing that I'm not going to talk to him first just because he was glowering at me, and I shrugged.

"I'll have you sit down first, I suppose," I said, and took two of the dozen or so chairs Karukk was carrying on his shoulder. I set them down next to each other, facing away from the door, and then gestured for the Fauns to get the two guests into position.

Raven Boy wasn't particularly difficult in this regard, as Rabom could simply set him down onto the left chair and be done with it, but Morgana was still too rigid. In retrospect, I might've overdone it a little when I fiddled with the enchantments on her gear, but there was no sense crying over spilled milk.

Rabom was still busy getting the young Knight into position, moving his limbs around like he was a mannequin, so I gestured for Pip to carry our other guest over. There were some appearances to be upheld here, so once she was roughly in position, I extended a phantom limb and simultaneously said, "We can't have a conversation while you're like that, so for the time being, you're allowed to move again." Saying so, I pushed and pulled a couple of metaphysical levers in her armor, then sternly added, "Don't get any funny ideas."

The Gorgon lady stumbled for a moment as she suddenly regained control over her movements, but quickly regained her balance, and once our eyes met, she plopped down onto her seat without uttering a single sound.

"Now then, how about we have a nice, friendly chat, like the adults we are." I purposefully glanced at Raven Boy, and corrected myself. "Most of us are."

"Stop looking down on me!" he growled back, and I couldn't help but shake my head at his bravado.

"Give me a reason not to. Also, it's not like I have much of a choice in the matter. I don't have a place to sit, so I'm unfortunately forced to look down when talking to you. That's just how it wo" Just as I was about to finish heckling him, I felt something touch the back of my leg, and when I looked over my shoulder, I found Karukk gently placing a chair behind me. "I didn't say that to... Oh, never mind."

Sitting down, I said a curt thanks to the grinning Faun. In the meantime, Morgana was already in the process of unbuckling the straps of her helmet, and I followed her example. The two of us took off our headgear more or less at the same time, and so I could finally take a good look at her face.

She was younger than expected, probably in her late thirties or early forties at most, with lean, attractive features and dark hair with a slight greenish tint woven into a bun at the back of her head. Fittingly, her most striking feature was her piercing pair of amethyst eyes under thin eyebrows, currently drawn into an uneasy frown.

"Before we discuss anything else, I have a question," she said in a level voice, and while my first instinct was to shoot her down and maintain my grip on the conversation, after a second thought, I gestured for her to go ahead.

Based on her earlier behavior, she was at least decently reasonable, and if their earlier interaction was to be believed, she was in the dark about Judy's attempted kidnapping and therefore mostly innocent. Considering all that, I figured there was no reason to completely antagonize her yet.

"Sure, be my guest."

"I already am," she answered a touch flatly before looking me in the eye and asking, "Are you Bel of the Abyss?"

That.. definitely threw me on a loop, and I honestly regretted taking off my helmet too early. That way I wouldn't have had to focus so much on maintaining a poker face.

"What gave you that idea?" I asked back with an amused smile, trying to play it off as a funny misunderstanding, but she remained entirely serious.

"Similar build, movements, and a complete lack of fear-response. You broke out of my Gorgon's Gaze the same way as well. Also, you referred to this island as 'yours', just as Bel of the Abyss did."

"... So, circumstantial evidence." I sighed and continued with, "Let's say that I'm Bel. Why would I tell you? And why would you even ask? The information doesn't help you, and even if you were right, by accusing me to my face, you'd be just asking to be silenced."

Completely unfazed by my rebuttal, she simply pointed at my waist.

"You have Caledfwlch," she stated dryly, eliciting a confused "What?" from Raven Boy. We both ignored him.

"Is it just me, or are you unusually observant," I muttered as I unhooked Cal from my belt and held them out in front of me. "Yes, as a matter of fact, I have."

"Impossible!" Raven Boy protested loudly, and if not for him still being restrained by his equipment, I was sure he'd have jumped to his feet for emphasis. "It must be a trick! There's no way the Kingmaker approves of him!"

"{He is correct, young knight.}"

"Oh, stop moping, you big baby," I responded with a roll of my eyes. "I only told you to stay silent during the battle, because I didn't need any distractions."

"{I exist to give advice to my wielder, both in and out of battle! You have denied my reason of existence!}"

"No, I didn't." Cal didn't respond, and the two Knights were giving me strange looks, so I whispered, "If I apologize, will you stop sulking?"

"{I'm not sulking!}"

"Fine, you're not. We are kind of in the middle of something right now, so I'll make it up for your later. I'll even make you a cool scabbard and everything, okay?"

The sword in my hand stayed stubbornly silent, but as for the two in front of me, Raven Boy somehow managed to barely lift a hand and pointed a finger in my general direction.

"Did you think we would believe you just because of some kind of moronic charade like that?"

"Charade? Do you mean my disagreement with Cal?"

"Yes!"

" Maybe it's because it's late and I'm tired, but I seriously can't connect the dots. Can you explain the problem in detail?"

He glared at me like he was thinking I made fun of him, and declared, "Swords can't talk!"

Normally this would've been the point where we had a beat of awkward silence to accentuate the moment, but it was ruined by Pip in the back failing to stifle his snickers. As such, I sighed and raised Cal to eye level.

"You just denied poor Cal's reason of existence. How cruel of you. This is definitely the darkest of times."

"{ the darkest of Hey! I was about to say that!}"

This time I was the one who chuckled and casually pointed the sword in my hand at the guy.

"For your interest, Cal can certainly talk. Furthermore, the little girl who beat you up used to be a talking sword as well. They're not even that uncommon, really."

"Little girl?" Morgana repeated after me, sending a sideways glance at the very slowly squirming Raven Boy. "I was under the impression you were ambushed by several armed ruffians."

"Nah, just my girlfriend's bodyguard, plus her father. If it makes you feel any better, one of them is a fox-girl ninja, while the other is a police officer with a shotgun." Since I suddenly reminded myself, I pointedly cleared my throat and added, "Speaking of which, I still have to go back and explain to my future in-laws what a lad dressed in medieval armour was doing breaking into their daughter's room in the middle of the night, so how about we get this discussion rolling?"

"I agree," Morgana responded without missing a beat, but then she looked at Raven Boy again. "After this, we're going to have a long talk as well. Your mother didn't leave you in my care for you to get up things like that."

He didn't answer, only gritted his teeth. Morgana exhaled a soft huff and looked me in the eye again, so I said, "I believe before we went off-topic, we were discussing how holding Cal has somehow justified your accusing me of being Bel."

"It's entirely reasonable," she replied without batting an eye. "If you are holding Caledfwlch, it means you are found worthy. If that is so, you are now the King of Knights approved by the Kingmaker, which means you wouldn't cause any harm to us."

" That's a lot of assumptions you'd made just now."

"I also have another reason," she interjected, and before I could respond, she also pointed at me. "You have Penelope's treasured unicorn horn. She absolutely wouldn't let anyone have it unless they had her complete trust. She's also living with you and attending your school, which she wouldn't do if Arnwald and the others were in danger. That tells me they must be safe, and since you are now the King of this generation, they must be working with you. This would mean that, despite the rumors of being engaged to the Dracis heiress, you hold no hostility towards the Brotherhood, therefore asking you about your connection to Bel of the Abyss should be entirely safe."

It was only when she finished that I realized my mouth was hanging open, so I forcefully closed it and began massaging my temple with my free hand.

"That was a completely disjointed mess of reasoning with little through-line, but the most annoying thing about is that you are mostly correct," I grumbled, but I couldn't leave it at that, so added, "However, I actually do have quite a bit of enmity towards you after your little kidnapping stunt."

"That was Agravain's doing in its entirety. Feel free to discipline him."

"Auntie"

Pretending that she didn't hear her nephew's moan, she crossed her arms and continued musing.

"I presume you have chosen to adopt the Bel identity to sow discord among our enemies. I have to admit, the way you disappeared and reappeared repeatedly was both fascinating and frightening. How did you do it? Is it a power granted by the Kingmaker? Is it also how you can control these Fauns?"

"Hold on! Since when did we conclude I was Bel?"

"You didn't deny it, so I took it as a given," she answered me dead seriously before continuing on where she left off. "I'm also curious about how you deflected the Feilong elder's breath attack with your bare hand. Was it a defensive technique? Or maybe an artifact?"

By this point, I graduated from temple massaging and moved on to full-fledged facepalming.

"{Face it, young knight; she completely figured you out.}"

"No, she didn't," I whispered back at Cal's comment. "She just made a bunch of logical leaps that coincidentally let her land on the truth. It's not the same."

Morgana stopped talking, probably thinking I was addressing her, and after some consideration, I sighed in defeat.

"Fine, you got me. I'm Bel," I said just a touch wearily. "Unfortunately, the fact you figured it out puts us into a bit of a predicament."

"What is the problem?"

"You see, this was a secret I've kept from the others, and I can't risk you accidentally revealing it to them just yet. That means I'm afraid I'll have to keep you in custody for now."

"Custody?" Raven Boy repeated after me, half confused and half outraged. Unfortunately for him, I was fresh out of damns to give, so I completely ignored him.

"Now that you mention it, Penny and you are in the open, but where are Arnwald, Roland, and Duncan?"

"In our secret underground base."

"You have one of those?"

"I've been busy."

"I can see that. I'm happy to hear they are safe."

"How can you believe him that easily!?" Raven Boy cut in again, and this time she actually responded.

"Leonard is the King. If he says so, then that's how it is."

"Bull!"

"How come they didn't make contact?" She cut him off and went back to ignoring him. "The Squires couldn't find any traces of them in the city, and we didn't receive a single pigeon since we arrived on the island either."

"We are currently in the process of reforming the Brotherhood into a new organization that will keep the Draconians in check from the inside, but until I can convince the clans to accept our supervision, I have them train indoors to avoid any incidents. As for the pigeons, I'm afraid they misplaced them."

"Again?" Morgana shook her head like a disappointed elementary school teacher. "I'll have to tell Arnwald to take better care of them. Speaking of which, how is he? Is he eating well?"

"Wait, auntie! Aren't you skimming over something really important?!"

"He's fine. I have a Celestial friend who has a knack for healing magic, and after his back injury got fixed, he's been working out a lot."

"Don't ignore me!"

"Really? At his age?"

"He's not that old" I told her a touch uncertainly, acutely aware that my yardstick for age was most likely irreparably warped by being acquainted with Brang, Ichiko, and Sebastian. "More importantly though, for this reorganization to work, I need the cooperation of the Feilongs and their influence, so I'd appreciate it if you could tell me about the deal you made with their grand elder."

The Gorgon Knight blinked a few times, but at last, she uncrossed her arms and said, "I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this reorganization and working with the wyrmbloods, but you are the King, so if you say so, that's how it's going to be."

She shrugged, and this time she linked her fingers in her lap before she began her explanation.

"The Feilong elder reached out to us during our reconnaissance of the island. We were told our brothers were captured by the Dracis, and they were held in an underground fortress hidden on the island."

That was actually a fairly accurate description of the early affairs. How was grand elder Xinji so well-informed? Was there a spy in the Dracis mansion, I wondered?

"Since they couldn't tell us the location, they proposed a mutually beneficial agreement. During the upcoming martial arts competition, the elder's men would set up a Sealed Restricted Space. Using it, we would trap everyone in the arena, and use them as hostages to demand the release of Arnwald and the others. He also handed me a key to the anchor of the Restricted Space, but we couldn't be sure if it had any tracking of surveillance enchantments, so it's currently inside Agravain's arsenal."

"I guess you mean this?" I patted the inventory artifact, and she gave me a nod. "When were you supposed to do this whole hostage-situation plot?"

"The last day of the competition."

"And what does the grand elder get out of this?"

"He told us that he only wished for us to cause as much chaos as possible, and so long as none of the Feilongs got hurt in the process, he would ensure a safe escape route for us."

"And you took him on his word?"

"Of course not," she answered with a scoff. "It's obviously a trap, but it doesn't mean we can't take advantage of it. Of course, now that we know that the others are safe, there's no reason to go through with the attack, so our plans are completely irrelevant now."

I let out a hum and silently contemplated the situation. While hearing their side of the story didn't clear up the grand elder's goals or motivations, it at least revealed the nature of the upcoming episode, and to be honest, I wasn't too surprised. A tournament getting interrupted halfway because of some kind of incident was about as much of a clich as the tournament itself, so I was more or less expecting something like this.

However, why did the attack have to happen on the third day in particular? It made sense in a Doylist context; tournament interruptions almost always happened either during or near the culmination of the competition, but what kind of Watsonian reasoning could explain why it had to be that day in particular? I had no idea at the moment, but I figured there had to be one. Maybe the grand elder only wanted the most powerful participants to be caught up in the event? Or maybe the more important Draconians would only gather for the finals? Or maybe it was something else entirely?

For the time being, I put this conundrum on the backburner, at least until I could ask Abram and Naoren for more details on the tournament. Let's just focus on the other dilemma at hand, namely the question of what to do with these two? With their capture, I've already derailed the presumed interruption-plot, so I figured I would have to deal with the fallout of that. Knowing the modus operandi of the presumed Narrative, it would probably throw a curveball at me later, but what choice did I have? I couldn't just let them go and have them go through the whole thing and

"Actually, hold that thought. We might have some use of your ideas after all."

"We?"

My words made Morgana pucker her brows, but I was too caught up in the moment to let it bother me. Elly had been on my case about opposing the Narrative instead of trying to make it work for me, so wouldn't it be fun to subvert her expectations? I mean, just because the tournament-interruption was a tired old trope, it didn't mean there was no way to make it 'fun' and 'interesting'

"[Uh-oh The boss is smiling.]"

"[He must be scheming something big again]"

I graciously ignored the peanut gallery, and once the rough outlines of a plan materialized in my head, I turned to the knightly duo in front of me and asked, "Say? How do you feel about becoming the evil henchmen for Bel of the Abyss for a day?"

"You know, I thought your father would be more worried about all the magical malarkey over us being in a poly relationship," I quietly grumbled as I walked up the stairs in my house, and my dear assistant in front of me lightly shrugged.

"It was probably the most comprehensible of the outrageous things we talked about," she whispered back.

"I guess it was also in character," I mused, and she nodded with a hum.

We were talking in a low voice and walking on tiptoes because it was half-past eleven, in the middle of the night, and my sisters were already fast asleep, even though I lifted their curfew during the winter break. Habits die hard, I supposed.

More importantly, since Judy's window couldn't be repaired yet, it was decided that she would spend the night over at my place. Coincidentally, Ichiko remained in the Sennoma household, because after discovering that she could turn into a girl, Judy's mom became completely enamored with her and insisted on adopting her into the family. In fact, she had the little miko sit on her lap throughout the whole discussion, and seemed to be completely lost in her own little world. The fact that Clarke didn't find that odd at all spoke volumes of her.

But speaking of my second father-in-law, during the mandatory explanation about the supernatural and how we were related to it, I let it slip that I was dating both Judy and Elly, after which point he seemingly completely forgot about the wild and wondrous world of mystics, and instead proceeded to rake me over the coals about my relationship. Thankfully it didn't go any further than a few stern looks and disapproving harrumphs, but I had a feeling it wasn't the end of that discussion.

That was all in the recent past though, so let's focus on my present. Namely, Judy throwing herself onto my bed the moment she walked inside and letting out a content sigh.

"Chief? Do you think I should take this opportunity and finally move in with you?"

"Too soon." My instant deadpan answer didn't exactly please her, so I rolled the conversation along. "It's a little late, so do you want to discuss today's events now, or tomorrow morning?"

"I'm not sleepy," she declared, followed by a yawn and a flat, "Ignore that. That's just physiology."

"Yeah, sure," I responded with the smallest of smiles and took a seat on the corner of my bed, and she also sat up properly. "Before anything else, I want to ask you something: have you heard or read anything about Bel in the past?"

"Do you mean recently?"

"No, just in general," I clarified. "Did you ever come across the name in any of our sources?"

My dear assistant paused while she leafed through her mental cabinets, but ultimately shook her head.

"No, I didn't. Why? Are you worried about the lack of fame your alter-ego garnered?"

"Not quite. You see, I caught an interesting conversation through Far Sight earlier this evening"

After priming her like that, I gave her an abridged explanation of the discussion in Crowey's office and my subsequent browsing of the Celestial Hub. She listened attentively, occasionally nodding along, and once I've reached the end of my description, she let out a thoughtful hum.

"So in short, this Bel of the Tenebrous Flames was the Abyssals' emperor, he had been struck from the records, and he was fantasy-Hitler." She paused here, then added, "Do you think he's the reason why we don't have banker goblins in this setting?"

"That's terribly offensive. Shame on you," I responded flatly, but she didn't take it to heart at all.

"Someone had to say it. More importantly, you do realize how this impacts the Narrative concerning Joshua's prophecies, right?"

"He's supposed to be the herald of the second coming or reincarnation or whatever of this Emperor of Chuuni Titles, right?"

"Precisely," she said as she pointed at me. "And you, his most prominent male friend, is now the closest thing we have to this person."

"You mean my alter-ego."

"A distinction without a difference," my girlfriend scoffed. "As far as the Narrative is concerned, you are the perfect square peg fitting into the square hole it has for an antagonist. The real question is whether it molded the hole to fit you, or sneakily shaped you into fitting the already existing hole."

"That's a weird analogy." After a short beat, I wiped the grimace off my face and shook my head to clear it. "In any case, we can't be sure whether it was a result of Narrative influence, sneaky retconning, or if there's a perfectly reasonable and logical Watsonian explanation, but it doesn't really matter right now."

"It doesn't?"

"Nope. Whatever the reason might be, I decided to go ahead and roll with this and use it to our advantage."

Judy's eyes slowly narrowed into a suspicious squint, and after a long beat, she said, "You're planning to make your Bel persona into the main villain."

"I probably won't take it that far, but yeah, that's the gist of it," I replied with a toothy grin. "You know how you've been joking about me uniting all the antagonists under my wing and becoming an arch-villain, right?"

"I wasn't joking."

Ignoring her retort, I continued with, "Originally I was a little miffed by this development, but on second thought, isn't that great? By assuming the mantle of the bad guy, and filling in the role whenever the narrative progression demands it, I could maintain the big dramatic action-climaxes this world seems to be so fond of while also completely neutralizing the dangers they pose."

"That would require knowing about these climaxes the Narrative is planning ahead of time," Judy said contemplatively, drawing an ambivalent grunt from me.

"Yeah, that's the tricky part, but if you think about it, it's not that hard to predict these situations in advance. Case in point, the whole plot with the new Knights and their planned attack on the tournament."

"Speaking of which," my dear assistant interrupted me with a finger raised, "You told my dad that you had apprehended the perpetrator who broke into my room and that he shouldn't involve mundane authorities in the matter, but you've yet to explain exactly what happened after you jumped out my window. I presume you've captured the Knights."

"Yep. It was simpler than expected, and I managed to overpower them fairly easily. Thankfully, neither of their armors were plot devices, so I could lock them up with minimal trouble." Suddenly a new thought surfaced in my mind, and I hastily added, "On the topic of armors, your father apparently shot the Raven Knight in the butt, but most of the pellets were deflected by the wards on the greaves, so he only suffered minor injuries."

"So birdshot is mostly ineffective against Knights. Noted."

"I wouldn't call it ineffective, considering the armor was deformed and rendered temporarily inoperative where it was hit. By the way, please remind me to fix that before the last day of the tournament. He's going to need it for the attack."

"Hold on, I'm getting confused. Didn't you capture them?"

"Yeah, but there were some complications, the Gorgon Knight guessed that I was playing Bel, and so I decided to make them into accomplices." Judy still looked perplexed, so I did my best to clarify my plans to her. "Let's make sure that we're on the same page: the interruption of the tournament is a given. The grand elder has been scheming around it since the beginning, and it's a clich, so we can more or less consider it a guaranteed event. If I tried to cut it off at its root, it could lead to unforeseen consequences, but what if I actually play along and have the attack happen, just in a different context?"

"So you're going to have them attack the competition venue to keep the script. Where does Bel come into the picture? Are you going to make it into a three-way conflict?"

"Nah, that's too chaotic. The plan is still in the shimmering phase right now, but so far I figured I'd make them into Bel's brainwashed thralls or something. That's all I can say for now, as it's still pretty much a work in progress."

"I see. Next question: where are you going to be during all this?"

" I just said that."

"No, I don't mean Bel. I was asking about Leonard S. Dunning." She paused for a beat here, only to then add, "Does the S' stand for scarce?" Another beat followed, then she concluded with, "It's because there is only one of you, even if you play two. Therefore, you're scarce."

" I guess you must be tired, because you've reached waaay too hard for that one. How about I answer it tomorrow, after you had a good sleep?"

"Don't be silly, Chief. The night is still young, and there are lots of things to be done."

"True, I suppose. We still have to compile all the new implications about Bel and the narrative, plus I still have to go back to the Hub and check if"

"Chief, don't be dense. You know perfectly well what I meant by what I said."

"Nope, I understood the implication, but I'm stonewalling you," I told her just a touch miffed. "You've just been through a near-kidnapping, I've had a long evening, my muscles are still sore from combat, and now I have a second secret base to secure, furnish, and heat, even if only for a short while. In other words, no lewding tonight."

My dear girlfriend clicked her tongue and uttered a sulky "Spoilsport," so I put my arm around her shoulder and pulled her closer.

"I think you wanted to say 'responsible' but don't worry, I understood your meaning anyway. Now go ahead and have your beauty sleep. We'll have all the time in the world to discuss this topic tomorrow."

"Before or after the date?"

"Either/or."

"Can I say both?"

" You know, Dormouse, lately I've started to feel that you might be a bit too into this whole lewding business."

"It's just your imagination." Declaring so, she gave me a kiss, then stood up and began to undress. "Can I use one of your shirts for pajamas again?"

"Sure, feel yourself at home."

After thus concluding our discussion, I got up as well and headed outside. As I'd just explained, I still had a long night ahead of me, so I quietly headed downstairs to grab a snack to keep me on my feet. Sparring with Penny and co. and then solo-raiding the hideout of Morgana and Raven Boy was quite exhausting, and since I only ate half a bowl of porridge in-between, my body was craving something high in calories at the moment.

My first stop was at the fridge, but since we haven't cooked anything in the past couple of days, it was only filled with raw ingredients. For a moment, I considered throwing together something simple, but I didn't want to make too much noise in the middle of the night, so I switched my attention to the cupboards and settled on the cookie jar instead. Plus some peanut butter. Also, a glass of hot cocoa. With marshmallows. I'm not going to make any excuses for any of that.

Anyhow, once I sat down with my calorie-kick, I could feel myself slowly deflate with each bite, and as relaxing as this midnight snack was, it couldn't completely wipe away my tension.

While I was doing my best to be confident in front of Judy, I still didn't have a full plan in mind, and that was a bit of a pickle. While I had derailed the 'plot' a couple of times already by anticipating and disrupting the events the potential Narrative may or may not have carefully laid out in front of us, this was the first time I was trying to completely supplant one with my own, and I wasn't exactly fully prepared for the task.

Worse yet, I only had a couple of days to iron out the kinks before the whole grand hostage situation would go down, further increasing the pressure. The fact that I was practically flying by the seat of my pants when it came to predicting the original plot I was about to hijack didn't help things either.

Actually, maybe it was the sugar-rush speaking, but I was feeling a little fanciful at the moment, so I decided to come up with a fitting analogy for this whole situation. Since I was in the kitchen, I figured I might as well go with a cooking theme, so here goes nothing:

First off, let's take a look at the ingredients the Narrative prepared on the counter. The main dish was the attack on the tournament, and it consisted of the competition itself, the Knights, and the grand elder's conspiracy, with the mystery ingredient named Xiao sprinkled on top to spice things up.

As for the side dishes, there was the Eastern Draconians' penchant for dueling, my potential conflict with Naoren over Elly, Josh's rivalry with Zihao, and the auction.

As for my contributions, by sneaking a spoonful of Bel into the conspiracy between the grand elder and Morgana, I shifted the focus onto the auction, potentially changing it from a hors d'oeuvres to a full dish. On the same note, I brought various enchanted items and my big bait there as well, the latter of which became kind of redundant due to tonight's events. Then on top of that, there were also my own negotiations with Naoren as well, to offset the grand elder's scheming.

Last, but certainly not least, I brought my own spices to the tournament hostage situation by introducing Bel into the mixture and subverting the Knights.

Now then, that is what I had to work with, but how do I take all of that, and make it into a great scenario-dinner? Honestly speaking, just randomly mixing all the ingredients into a big pile would've been the simplest, and the resulting chaos would technically serve as a meal, but if I've learned one thing about our more-than-hypothetical-but-less-than-theoretical Narrative, it was that it was one of those prima donna chefs, and if things weren't up to its standards, it would throw an enormous hissy-fit.

In less food-centric terms, I had a distinct feeling that if the climax I orchestrated wasn't bombastic enough, we could end up with another contrived 'Mountain Girl and the Knights coincidentally both cause a scene at the exact same time while we're already in the middle of something' kind of situation. Needless to say, it was something I wanted to avoid no matter what.

Still pondering, I finished my meal, if it could be called that, and I was still ruminating by the time I headed upstairs. Once I made sure that everyone was asleep, I planted a sneaky peck on my peacefully slumbering girlfriend's cheek, then immediately Phased away into the secret base's storeroom.

Almost everyone was asleep over there as well, so I quietly picked up a couple of spare electric heaters and Phased over to my next destination. The basement room of the abandoned warehouse was a little cramped at the moment, since my new accomplices and their Squires decided to set up their campsite in there. Surprisingly enough, they weren't sleeping, but I didn't dally for long, and after depositing the boxes, I moved on to ferry over the rest of the daily necessities they would need to stay hidden for the next couple of days.

On my trips back and forth, I ran into a few familiar faces and discussed a few miscellaneous things, such as whether or not the base could have a giant Christmas tree in the middle of the main hall, or if eggnog was really an essential research material, but I didn't really have my heart in any of it, as my brain was still busy trying to combine all the ingredients into a proper full course meal, with a dessert and all.

Because of this, I kind of lost track of time, and before I knew it, it was already five in the morning. The Fauns were early birds, so the ones who returned to the base were already getting ready for the day, while most of the people in the research division were just going to bed after getting caught up in doing their thing and pulling another all-nighter. According to Fred, half the reason why they were getting so friendly with me as of late was due to me moving around the base at night, and them mistaking me for a fellow night owl.

I wasn't going to correct the misunderstanding, and after getting things into order, I had one last stop to make before I headed home. Even though things went in an unexpected direction last evening, Judy still insisted on going on the date we planned in advance, and I didn't really argue with her. We would first go sledding before heading to an inner-city theater to watch a play recommended by Elly, and it was also our last chance to get Christmas gifts for everyone, so there were plenty of reasons I didn't want to miss this day.

However, before all that, there was something I needed to take care of, and since I managed to arrange the ingredients into a more or less coherent set of dishes in my head already, it was time to make contact with the sous-chef. Luckily for me, he was also an early bird type, so without any further ado, I Phased over to his suite.

"Good morning, Naoren," I greeted the man currently still wearing his sleepwear and brushing his teeth in the bathroom, and after the first shock, he jumped back and took up a martial arts stance, made somewhat silly by the toothbrush still hanging out of his mouth.

"Leonard?" he muttered in mild confusion once he recognized me, and after exchanging the toothbrush for his glasses, he added, "What are you doing here? How did you even get in?"

"I needed to talk to you in private, without anyone else being the wiser. As for how I got in, let's just say I have my ways."

"Is that so?" the young clan head muttered in mild annoyance, then gestured for me to wait before he turned back to the sink.

Without any reservations, he proceeded to rinse out his mouth and then used a thick green string to tie his long hair up. That was already enough to put him into presentable shape, thought to be fair, he was quite good-looking from the beginning, silly toothbrush-antics and all. Main characters were annoying like that. Anyhow, he swept his front bangs aside and turned a pair of critical eyes at me.

"I presume you had a very good reason to invade my personal space so early in the morning, so I'm listening."

"I'm happy you are so quick to catch up," I answered with an approving nod. "Long story short, I need your help with something crucial."

"Go on..."

For a second I hesitated on how to best put it, but I ultimately decided to go with the straightforward approach and simply said, "I need you to start a feud with me and challenge me to a duel in public." The guy remained silent and only raised a single puzzled brow, so I flashed my best reassuring smile and added, "Oh, don't look at me like that. Trust me, it's going to be fun and profitable."