The Simulacrum

"Chief, you're burning up," my girlfriend told me with one hand on my forehead.

"I've already noticed, thank you," I answered with a tired grumble, though she didn't seem to mind and simply retracted her hand.

"I'll go get a cold towel then," she proposed and waited to hear my response.

"It didn't help much the last time, but I would still appreciate it."

My reply apparently pleased her, as she gave me a determined nod before she swiftly turned on her heel and walked out of my room, leaving me alone in front of my PC. Well, okay, not entirely alone, as the tiny miko, still in her fluffy fox form, was currently curled up in my lap and watching the monitor in front of us with sparkling eyes.

"Ue-sama! Ue-sama! Click on that!"

"On what?" I griped under my breath, and she raised one stubby paw to gesture towards the corner of the screen.

"They have hakamas! And kosodes too!"

It took me a couple of seconds to figure out just what she was talking about, but then I finally noticed an animated advertisement banner near the bottom. It was… certainly a miko outfit, except less of an 'authentic traditional' style one, but more of a… Oh, fine, let's not beat around the bush: it was an ad for a webshop selling fetish costumes for frisky couples who wanted to spice up their sex lives. If the see-through nature of the upper-wear didn't make that perfectly obvious, the various latex 'tools' showing up as the banner kept scrolling made things blindingly obvious. Thankfully the fox-girl on my lap didn't know how they were supposed to be used (even I was a little baffled by a few of them), so before she could ask, I quickly right-clicked on the banner and added it to my ad-blocker's blacklist.

"Sorry, but I doubt they would have it in your size," I told her flatly, but then after a moment of consideration I added, "If you behave yourself, I'll get you one from a cosplay-maker or something."

"Really? Thank you, ue-sama!"

I ignored her wagging tail and, after placing my orders on the currently open site's shop for the various materials required for making a holding cell or two, I closed the window. Under that, there was the utilitarian interface of the Celestial Hub. I originally internally debated whether or not I should even show this to Ichiko, but considering I still had my off-switch for her, I didn't think letting her catch a glimpse of the Hub would make a difference.

More importantly though, a quick glance at the 'recent uploads' section told me that there were already a couple of reports coming in regarding today's events. I quickly skimmed them, but there was nothing in them I already didn't know about. In fact, there was actually quite a bit of misinformation, which was nice. That meant even they weren't sure what was going on, so I could probably completely lead them astray by a few well-placed reports with 'validated' information telling them that, say, it was all Lord Grandpa's fault and the teens involved in the incidents were totally unimportant. Speaking of which, a quick glance at the forums also showed that the regulars were all busy speculating about what happened, and the prevailing theory was that everything surrounding the break-in at the school was just an elaborate ruse by the Assembly to try and get a reaction out of Celestial Information Network, and advised the local agents to stay low. That also sounded like a nice lead I should 'encourage'.

But now that the resident assets came up, it reminded me of a certain Celestial, so I went back to the repository, yet couldn't find any reports or posts made by Mike. That was a little odd, considering how deeply involved he was this time around. On a whim, I decided to Far Glance at the guy, and I found him in his apartment, seemingly safe and sound. He was sitting in a well-lit room, he was hunched over his computer and, coincidentally, he was staring at the very same interface that I was. That was odd, considering that the last time I checked his status it showed that he was offline, but then I came out Far Sight and used my administrator privileges to check his profile directly, and it showed that he was actually just hidden.

This all felt slightly suspicious, so after thinking things through, I decided to send a PM to him and see how he would react.

"Admin: Ninja, are you online?"

I waited for over a minute for him to react, and I was even considering another Far Glance when he finally wrote back.

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: HELLO ADMIN! THANK DEUS YOU CALLED, I'M IN SOME DEEP POO RIGHT NOW!!!

〜(＞＜)〜"

"Admin: I see there was an incident on Critias. Were you involved?"

I just finished typing that when Judy came back with a familiar ice bag wrapped in a white towel. She wanted to apply it to my forehead right away, but when she noticed I was busy, she put it on the back of my neck instead.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm probing Mike," I told her while readjusting the towel.

"I see," she whispered, and then a short beat later she pointed at my left hand. "Why are you only typing with one hand?"

"My right hand is still a little numb," I lied to her without batting an eye. In fact, I literally couldn't move my fingers at all, and even raising my arm hurt like hell, but she didn't need to know that.

In the meantime, the Celestial on the other side of the screen finally finished typing.

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: I WAS KINDA INVOLVED BUT KINDA NOT. IT'S COMPLICATED……… (〃＞＿＜;〃) "

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: MORE IMPORTANTLY, PLEASE HELP ME OUT!!! (シ_ _)シ"

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: I'M ASKING THIS FOR A FRIEND: LET'S SAY MY FRIEND HAS A FRIEND WHO IS NOT REALLY A FRIEND AND IS ACTUALLY A LITTLE SCARY! THIS FRIEND OF A FRIEND HELPED OUT MY FRIEND, AND NOW MY FRIEND KNOWS ABOUT HIS SECRET! (￣ω￣;)"

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: I MEAN I THINK IT'S A SECRET, BUT I'M NOT SURE, BUT IT'S A BIG DEAL, AND OTHER PEOPLE WOULD PROBABLY LIKE TO KNOW THIS SECRET, BUT MY FRIEND OWES HIM ONE AND DOESN'T KNOW WHAT TO DO!!! (O_O;)"

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: ADMIIIIIN! PLEASE HEEEEEELP MEEEEE!!! (シ_ _)シ"

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: I MEAN, PLEASE HEEEEEELP MY FRIEEEEEND!1!!!! (シ_ _)シ (シ_ _)シ"

I pondered how I should respond for a few seconds, and in the end I decided on a slightly forceful approach.

"Admin: When you said 'helping out', do you mean a small favor, or something more significant."

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: VEEEEERY SIGNIFICANT! LIFE-SAVING AND STUFF!!! (⁄ ⁄•⁄ω⁄•⁄ ⁄)"

"Admin: I see. And is this friend of a friend a threat to our cause?"

This time there was a longer pause before the answer.

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: I DON'T THINK SO. HE IS REALLY COOPERATIVE AND HELPFUL. (≧ω≦)"

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: AND SCARY… {{ (>_

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: BUT NOT A BAD GUY! DEFINITELY NOT! (＞﹏＜)"

"Admin: So he is helpful to us, not a threat, and saved your life."

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: YES!"

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: I MEAN NO! HE SAVED MY FRIEND, REMEMBER!!!!1!!!one!!! (⁄ ⁄•⁄ω⁄•⁄ ⁄)"

"Admin: Yeah, sure."

"Admin: Anyhow, this friend of a friend sounds like a useful asset. Unless his secret is directly threatening our continued operations, I'd personally prioritize maintaining a productive relationship with them."

"Admin: If sharing certain information about them would jeopardize that, I'd recommend keeping it a secret for the time being."

"W1NG3D N1NJ4: YESSS!!! THANK YOU ADMIN, YOU ARE THE BEST!!! ＼(≧▽≦)／"

"Admin: You're welcome."

After I finished typing, Judy took the opportunity to shift the ice pack over to my forehead while simultaneously sticking a thermometer into my mouth.

"He's quite gullible," my girlfriend noted after a single glance at the screen, and if it wouldn't have disturbed the pack on my head, I would've probably shrugged in agreement.

"That's a mean way to put it, but not inaccurate. That said, I'm actually glad he isn't particularly competent; this way I don't have to worry too much about him secretly subverting us."

"He could be playing a role to lower your guard," she moved the conversation along while wiping the sweat off my neck, and I could instantly tell that she didn't actually mean it.

"I keep him under surveillance, so unless he plays the fool even when he's all alone on the toilet, I'm fairly sure I would have noticed any nefarious scheming by now."

"You like to peep on people on the toilet? Chief, I never figured you would have such a fetish."

"You're not funny," I grumbled, but instead of responding, Judy took the thermometer from my mouth and raised it to her eye-level.

"Thirty-nine point seven degrees Celsius." She noted before pocketing the device and adding, "That's almost forty. If it doesn't go down soon, you're taking a cold shower."

"That sounded more like an order than an advice…"

"Because it was. If this continues, we might have to go to the hospital."

"Or we could just ask Angie to heal me?" I proposed, only to be immediately shot down.

"It didn't help the last time you had a fever from overworking."

She locked eyes with me, and after enduring the mounting pressure for a few seconds, I let out a sigh and told her, "Fine, cold shower it is; a visit at the doctor's if it doesn't work."

"Good. Now behave yourself, and no more random teleporting today."

"… Are you still mad about that?"

"I'm not mad, I'm just concerned," she replied a tad unenthusiastically while removing the wet towel, airing it a bit, and then re-wrapping the ice pack before placing it on me again.

"Ue-sama and Judy-ue have such a beautiful relationship," the little fox commented on the side between stifled giggles, and for the love of me, I couldn't see what she meant.

Judy was about to say something else, but then we were all slightly startled by the sound of a car horn coming from the outside. My dearest assistant swiftly moved over to the window and, after a single glance outside, she turned back to me.

"Father's here. I'll be right back."

"Wait, hold on for a moment," I stopped her in her tracks before she could leave the room. "I think I'm missing something. Why is your father here again?"

"When I phoned home and told my parents that I'm staying over, I also took the opportunity to ask them to bring over some of my old clothes that no longer fit me." I probably made quite a befuddled face, because she quickly added, "I told mom that one of your distant relatives is staying with you, but her luggage got lost and she needs a change of clothes."

"Clever."

"Thank you," she responded with a thin yet obviously delighted smile. I was a little taken aback by that. I mean, it wasn't like I didn't praise her when she deserved it (which was quite often), so her reaction felt a little too much… but then again, most people probably couldn't even notice her smile, so maybe I was getting oversensitive?

"Judy-ue brought me clothes!" the chunky fox on my lap exclaimed with obvious mirth and jumped off me with a happy 'Yip!' noise, instantly cutting my train of thought short in the process. "Can I come along? Can I see them?"

Judy glanced at the fluffball on the floor, then back at me, and when I didn't voice any objections, she ultimately told her, "Yes, but no talking in front of my dad."

Ichiko nodded over and over again in response and scurried next to Judy's feet, but before they left, my girlfriend sent me one last sharp look.

"No Phasing while I'm away," she warned me, and I couldn't decide whether I wanted to laugh or cry.

"Dormouse, I'm having a forty degrees fever and can barely stand on my legs, let alone teleport around."

"It didn't stop you an hour ago," she countered.

"Yes, because back then I only had a thirty-eight degrees fever. Big difference." She apparently didn't find my objection amusing, so I heaved a sigh and told her, "Fine, I promise I won't disappear anywhere. Just go, don't keep your father waiting."

She looked me in the eye for a while with an expression that could be easily translated to 'You better be here when I come back, or I will kick your butt!', and considering how weak I was feeling at a moment, she actually had a good chance of keeping her end of the threat. That would have been pretty embarrassing, so I put on my trustworthiest visage and flashed a hopefully not too strained smile in her general direction. At last, she left in the company of the foxy miko, and the moment she closed the door behind her, I couldn't help but let a long groan escape through my clenched teeth.

I really was feeling pretty terrible at the moment. The headache was back, with a vengeance, and more troublingly, it was still getting worse over time. My right hand also hurt like crazy, though if I didn't try to move it, it was still bearable. All my other joints were sensitive as well, but that was probably because of the fever. Oh, and I could barely feel my legs, but that was mainly due to Ichiko sitting on them until now, so it didn't count.

In conclusion, I was in pretty bad shape right now. That was nothing new though, so once I collected myself a bit, I turned to the PC again so that, if nothing else, it would at least divert my attention a little. I refreshed the hub, and to my momentary surprise, I actually found a new report signed by Mike.

"That was quick," I whispered under my breath while I waited for the file to open.

After skimming it, I was relieved to see that, while he broadly detailed his perspective on today's events, the method of his escape was left fairly vague. Also, if what he wrote was to be believed, he interacted with Labcoat Guy using a fake identity, so even if he spilled the beans while in Lord Grandpa's custody, at most he could only give a general description of Mike's appearance. Even if the Arch-mage decided to look into him, there was a good chance he wouldn't be found… but then again, the guy was quite enamored with his granddaughter, so that might complicate things.

I was just about to Far Glance at Labcoat Guy to see if he was being interrogated, but then Judy suddenly burst into the room, startling me for a moment.

"… What?" I blurted out with a no-doubt quite befuddled grimace spreading over my face.

"Nothing," my assistant stated with an even pokerier face than usual as she gently closed the door behind her. "I'm just glad to see that you really didn't go anywhere."

"I told you I wouldn't…!" I objected, only to swallow the rest of my complaints and instead tell her, "Never mind. In case I forget, please remind me to ask Labcoat Guy about how much he told the Magi about Mike."

"Will do," she answered while walking up to me and putting a hand on my cheek. "You're still burning up."

"Yeah, and I have a feeling it's not going to get better any time soon." It was around this time that my brain finally registered the conspicuous absence of a certain red fur ball. "Where's Ichiko?"

"In the guest room. She said she wanted to see if any of the clothes that dad brought fit her. Also, speaking of my father, he told me to remind you that he still has a shotgun."

"Your dad is as charming as ever," I griped in a voice flatter but the salt plains, and Judy simply shrugged my complaints away.

"He's just protective."

That line of conversation fizzled out right there, so after a long but not necessarily uncomfortable beat later, I gestured for Judy to sit on my bed, and I also rolled closer in my chair.

"So, since hopefully the day is over, how about we discuss this epic mess we just weathered?"

"I concur. The sooner, the better," she agreed right away and took out her phone with practiced motions.

"Good. So, let's start by summarizing the current situation." I paused to take a deep breath, then began. "First off, Labcoat Guy is neutralized, and I 'convinced' Lord Grandpa to put him in our custody. With some luck, that should put an end to the genre shift and we could prevent any future resurgence of sentai shenanigans."

"You say 'custody', but what exactly are we going to do with him?"

"Good question. I haven't thought much about it yet, but for the time being I think I'll lock him up in the secret base and have the Fauns keep him under surveillance. As for later, I think we might be able to use him. So long as we provide him the means and the incentive, I think he could be useful for probing the supernatural substrate and the limits and exact mechanisms of the world. He could also aid us in performing some of the experiments we couldn't do because of lack of equipment and resources."

"Sounds feasible. He's a scientist, even if a mad one," Judy commented while speed-tapping on her phone, and I nodded while waiting for her to finish.

"That's right. As for the fembot, we might be able to put her to use after her weaponry is removed."

"Are you planning on turning her into a maid too?"

"Oh, ha-ha," I said, rolling my eyes in the process. "That's a really original joke that I've never heard before. How utterly amusing."

"I was serious though."

I sent my assistant a flat look in return for her honestly and told her, "For the umpteenth time; I don't have a maid fetish."

"We did get a reaction out of you when we dressed up though," she noted without even a hint of shyness, prompting me to roll my eyes again.

"Yes, but it was just a tiiiiiiiiiny reaction, and only because it was you two. I don't want to just arbitrarily put everyone into them."

"So, if I understand this right," Judy began, only to dramatically pause and lower her phone before finishing with, "You don't like maids, but you like it when Elly and I dress as maids."

"… In a manner of speaking," I admitted a tad begrudgingly.

"So it's all right if we dress as maids."

"Maybe every once in a while," I finally relented, at which point my girlfriend directed a downright triumphant smirk at me, annoying me to no end. "We're veering way off-topic. How about we discuss your fetish for dressing up as maids later and return to the previous conversation?"

"Chief, don't just insinuate something like that and then change the subject," my dearest assistant protested, only to be summarily ignored by yours truly.

"Too late, I already did," I declared with a grin before adopting a more serious expression and saying, "Next, the Knights attacked sooner than expected. Thankfully there were no casualties on either side, and we even got a new sword and a rare artifact out of the deal."

"We also learned that they were specifically looking for the dragon-slaying spear," Judy noted, though the way her brows were ever so slightly angled told me she was still sore about my previous comment.

"Yeah. Good thing I figured something like this would happen and took it ahead of time. It will be a little tricky to explain it to Sebastian though, but I'll cross that bridge when I get there."

"You marked one of them, didn't you?"

"Yeah, I did. They are going to be staying on the island because of the lockdown, and there are more of them coming, but for the time being they should be laying low. I'll try to keep an eye on them, but I only managed to mark one of the grunts, so I won't be able to see all of their movements."

"That still leaves us with more information than what we had yesterday," Judy remarked, and a few taps later she also added a question. "Let me address the elephant in the room: what are we going to do with Rinne and Ichiko?"

"You mean the fox not in the room?" I jested, but then exhaled a short breath and told her, in a more serious tone, "The two of them weren't exactly in their right mind when they attacked us, but they still tried to kill me. Rinne is a little tricky to place. Her temper seemingly calmed down quite a bit after she was separated from her sword, but I think we're probably best off keeping her in custody for a while. If she behaves herself, we can probably let her go."

"You don't want to recruit her?" she asked, though I couldn't help but feel that there was the tiniest of edges in her words. "You have a habit of doing that to people that tried to kill you."

I wanted to protest, but then I thought about it for a moment. Brang, Snowy, Labcoat Guy and his fembot, the fox-girl in the next room… Okay, maybe she did have a point, but not in this case in particular.

"Not if I can help it, though I admit she would be a nice hidden card in case things go south like today. Unfortunately, I don't really have a way to ensure her loyalty, and considering she's a wandering monster-slayer, she probably wouldn't stay here for long anyway. Not to mention, if we detain her for too long, her as-of-yet-only-mentioned-but-never-seen clan of ninjas might come and pick a fight with us, and I really want to avoid that."

"Reasonable. What about Ichiko?"

"That's… a trickier question," I mused aloud and, after fixing my posture and readjusting my ice pack, I came to the following conclusion. "Unlike Rinne, she both owes me a big favor, and I have a direct means of control over her. Not to mention, she seems to be quite attached to me already."

"That's one way to put it," my girlfriend whispered under her breath, but did so loud enough for me to hear her. Probably on purpose. "So you plan to keep her?"

"That's also one way to put it," I confirmed her suspicion with a small nod. "I mean, she's technically a sentient, shape-shifting Chimera under my control. No matter how you look at it, that could come in handy in a number of scenarios."

"Such as?"

"Such as being your bodyguard," I dropped the bombshell I was preparing ever since I first thought of putting the tiny miko into the Chimera's body and learned that she could transform into other shapes, and based on how Judy immediately froze up, it actually rattled her a bit.

"Come again?"

"All right, just keep an open mind and hear me out: I told you I plan to outfit you with some defensive artifacts, but those are hard to make and require regular refilling because you can't use magic. The thing is, as long as you're around me and Elly, which I presume is going to be for quite a long while, it's only a question of time before someone gets the bright idea to target you as well. So, since I can't hover around you twenty-four-seven, the next best option is to have a bodyguard. Someone who can stay with you in your house, doesn't draw attention, and yet powerful enough to deter most kidnappers, assassins, and other assorted bad guys. If you think about it, I think a tiny Chimera disguised as a fox would be perfect for the job."

Judy gave me a very long, very deadpan staredown, put her phone down, looked me in the eye, and calmly stated, "Chief, is it just me, or does that sound like yet another major case of post hoc rationalization to you as well?"

"Oh please, Dormouse! Give me some credit! There's nothing 'post hoc' about it; I thought this up at least five minutes before I put her into that body!"

"Your defense of your actions makes paper seem like battle-tank plating," she jabbed back at me, but at last she sighed and told me, "I'll consider the idea, but I don't know if my parents would agree to let me adopt a fox."

"Tell them it's just a rare dog breed. Also, you can have her act cute in front of them; that should convince them."

There was a long pause in the conversation as my girlfriend's guard slowly but steadily crumbled, and at last she asked, "If, theoretically, I would take her home, what should I tell mom and dad?"

"Well… how about this: say that she belongs to the distant relative that came to my place, but she cannot be kept at my place, because Snowy is allergic to dogs, so I asked you to take care of her for a few days. Then a couple of days later we tell them that there were some complications, and she would have to stay over a bit longer, and then make that 'a bit longer' into 'indefinitely', and then she can stay over at your house forever."

"Not forever, only until after we finish high school and I move in with you," she corrected me, and I couldn't help but smile at her.

"You're thinking way ahead, as usual. Anyhow, I think that takes care of the fox issue, so let's move on. Next, there is Lord Grandpa. I have finally marked him, so now I can keep a direct eye on him. More importantly, while I managed to keep him in check for now, he strikes me as the type who would try to scheme anyway just for the heck of it, so even though we aren't exactly enemies, we aren't going to be friends either."

"I remember you saying you wanted to gain access to the archives in the School. Did you manage that?"

"Yeah, though I have a feeling they are going to scrub them before they'd let us in. Still, access to the papers on magical theory and more cross-reference materials for the Hub and the Dracis library could be invaluable in the long run."

"I see. Anything else?"

"Not much. We had some collateral damage in the secret base, some minor injuries, and Rinne's clan and the Knights are currently rogue elements, but otherwise things are under control."

"I mostly agree." Saying so, Judy theatrically swiped her finger across the screen of her phone, probably to switch to another file in the note app, and proclaimed, "Since the in-universe issues are clarified, I believe this is the point where we discuss the narrative ramifications of today's events."

"And you'd be correct," I answered, "Though I'm not fond of the term 'in-universe'."

"Mundane?"

"That just sounds weird when all we are talking about are supernatural things."

"Then how about 'profane' then?"

"Sounds a bit too religious."

"Intradiegetic?"

"… And to think there was a time when I had to explain to you what an 'otaku' was…" I uttered in mild amazement before stifling a chuckle and telling her, "Sure, let's go with that."

"Noted," she answered as she did just that on her phone, and then she waited for me to speak my mind.

"First and foremost, we can more or less conclude that we put a forceful end to the potential sentai genre shift. That part went as planned, in a manner of speaking. However, the way the rest of the events happened is very suspicious."

"Should we go with the usual Doylist and Watsonian explanations?"

"Yeah. I start with the Watsonian one this time," I answered, and once I collected my thoughts a little, I began with, "The attack on Labcoat Guy was, while rushed, technically under our control, and we had good reasons for it, as we needed to rescue Mike. We needed to rescue him because we needed to get him out of the crossfire before Lord Grandpa captured him along with Labcoat Guy, and he would do that because I borrowed his Grimoire Key without telling him ahead of time." I waited here for Judy to finish taking notes, then added, "Rinne attacked the base because she followed the trail of the Chimera left behind by the Faun transporting it. The Knights attacked the mansion with the intent to smash and grab the dragon slayer spear while Abram and Sebastian were away. Each of their actions makes internal sense, and none of them were aware of the others."

"Yet the timing was way too much to be a coincidence," Judy added with just a hint of skepticism in her voice.

"Not necessarily," I posited, as my role as the devil's advocate demanded from me. "Our own operation was done on short notice because of time constraints, but Rinne showing up at the base a day after the apparent defeat of the Chimera was entirely reasonable. I mean, if she did it out of the blue, that would've been pretty contrived, but since the trail was still fresh, her being able to follow her nose to the base still makes a modicum of sense."

"But if she could follow the trails of Abyssals so well, how come she never found the base by following the Faun?"

"That's… a very good question. She also couldn't recognize Snowy being an Abyssal, so maybe there are some conditions? I don't know, we should ask her about it later."

"Among other things. We still haven't properly interrogated her."

"True, but it's not like we're in a hurry; I doubt she could escape any time soon while being hogtied and guarded all the time. Putting her appearance aside, let's move on while my brain's still operational." Judy nodded along, so after another deep breath, I moved on to the third party of today's incident. "Explaining the timing of The Knights is a bit trickier, but still possible. Let's presume that their main goal was the spear and nothing else. Abram and Sebastian leaving ahead of time was something they couldn't have foreseen, but if their goal wasn't assassination, then two being absent actually provided a great opportunity for them. As for why they chose the exact moment when we attacked Labcoat Guy and Rinne showed up… I can only chalk that up to freak coincidence."

"So that was the Watsonian version. Do you want me to do the Doylist?" Judy asked, and a quickly shook my head.

"Wait, I'm not finished yet," I replied, and once I heaved the mother of all sighs, I began in earnest. "So, while the perfect timing of the events is still up in the air, I think the reason why everything crescendoed today is not. Simply put, it's because of my actions. For one, if I didn't tell Brang to bring the Chimera to the base, Rinne could've never find it in the first place. In fact, if I didn't try to keep it but disposed of it on the spot, she would have had no trail to follow to begin with."

I paused here for a moment to let Judy digest and note down my explanation, and I only continued after she finally looked up from her phone.

"As for Mike, he got captured because I asked him to gather artifacts. If he didn't contact Labcoat Guy and get captured by him, and he used some generic placeholder Celestial to construct his frame-job instead, we would've had no reason to rush in to rescue him. Not only that, but the only reason we needed to rescue him today was because I took the MacGuffin from the School, Lord Grandpa went on the warpath against Labcoat Guy, and we needed to get to Mike before he did." I punctuated my reasoning with a short pause here, and then concluded with, "Finally, for the Knights, they attacked ahead of time because I told Elly's family about myself and the original date of the attack, and because of that, they set a trap that inadvertently prompted the Knights to strike earlier than planned. In short, by going against the grain, I messed up the original order of events, and thus I'm indirectly responsible for what happened today."

I fell silent after my monologue and waited for Judy's response, and soon she put her phone aside and told me, "A valiant effort, Chief, but you didn't go far enough."

"Oh? All right, I'm listening," I prompted her, and she gave me a curt nod in return.

"The attack by the huntress and the Knights could certainly be chalked up to one-off coincidence, but it is also entirely possible that they were influenced by the Narrative. Rinne's supposed role was to hunt down the Chimera on the island. There's a possibility that, due to your interference, she didn't technically fulfill this role, and thus the Narrative led her to the base to finish the job, with her supernatural olfaction serving as means to explain how she could find it."

"Maybe, but whether it was because of the trail or because of narrative influence, it still leads to the same conclusion, and while we still don't know enough about the way the world enforces certain events, it was already established that she's a hunter, tracker, and that she can smell supernatural nasties like a hound. In short, I find the presence of narrative influence in this explanation to be superfluous."

"So you are invoking Occam's razor?"

"More or less," I supposed with a shrug.

"Fair enough. However, the other two events coinciding is still too conspicuous, and I believe it's because the narrative was trying its best to course-correct."

"Please do elaborate," I asked, and she immediately complied.

"By stealing the Grimoire Key, you caused a serious disturbance in the original plot. For the sake of the thought experiment, let's presume that the original involved Robatto butting heads with Lord Endymonion, and Josh and the others helping to defeat and capture him in the following days, and then when it looked like things would return to the status quo, The Knightly Brotherhood of the Most Heroic Bloodlines would stage their attack, raising the stakes and paving the way for the next arc. Are you following me so far?"

"Yeah, of course. I might look bad because of the fever, but my brain still works. Mostly."

"I'm glad to hear that," she said, though she still looked more than a little skeptical. Or worried. Or both. It was hard to tell, but in my defense, my brain was only 'mostly' working at the moment. Anyhow, she soon continued her theorizing. "With the previous hypothetical scenario in mind, here's what I think happened: by stealing the Grimoire Key while framing Robatto, you did two things that unintentionally messed up the narrative: you completely changed Lord Endymonion's priorities regarding Doctor Robatto, and you caused the island to be locked down. The first was an issue because it would logically force the Arch-mage and the School to strike down Robatto on their own, thus robbing Joshua and the others of their final confrontation with the antagonist."

"So you think the Narrative manipulated us to take down Labcoat Guy before Lord Grandpa could do it?" She nodded in confirmation, and I couldn't help but frown in return. "I… honestly don't think I felt manipulated or side-tracked though. Sure, I wasn't really happy about how much we had to rush it, but the whole idea felt logical at the time, and it still makes internal sense to me."

"I don't think we were all influenced by the Narrative, only Amelia," Judy proposed in a solemn voice.

"Now that you mention it, she really was the one who pushed the hardest for Mike's immediate rescue." I concurred while crossing my fingers in my lap. "Not to mention, her rapidly developing a fondness for the guy is also a little suspect."

"Precisely my point. In my opinion, to preserve the final confrontation without breaking the internal consistency of the world, the Narrative rushed the scenario and had Amelia be there to justify it to the rest of us. I also think that the way we all agreed was a little too easy, but as you said, I didn't feel anything out of place at the time."

"So the first point is that to preserve the action-climax against Labcoat Guy, the Narrative twisted itself into a pretzel to justify a rushed resolution, and Ammy was manipulated, either directly or indirectly, into pushing us all in that direction. Okay, I can grant you that as a hypothesis for the time being. What about the second point?"

"The School locking down the island and the coming of the Assembly investigators," Judy reiterated. "I believe it was the cause behind the Knights' abrupt attack. I doubt the lockdown would be lifted for a while, even after you gave the Grimoire Key back to the Arch-mage, because they have to keep up appearances in front of the rest of the Assembly. That means the Knights currently on the island cannot leave, and their reinforcements would have a harder time infiltrating, limiting their numbers to just the small group already on the island."

"There's going to be one more Knight on the island," I noted, and since Judy gave me a curious look, I explained, "I used Far Sight on them, and overheard that one more entitled one was already on the way to the island. She's probably the Unicorn Knight, and if these guys are to be trusted, she should be able to join them without triggering any alarms."

"Good to know," she responded half-heartedly, and after jotting the new info down into her notes, she continued with, "Either way, their numbers on the island were limited at the time, and since Abram and Sebastian were already back, the narrative likely pushed the attack forward in the small gap where they would still have the opportunity to take the spear without the interference of the men of the family or the Assembly."

"Except I already took the spear."

"Yes, but by that point things were already in motion and I think the important part was the confrontation itself, not the spear. You also further interfered with them, effectively neutering them as a potential threat. This might have some serious consequences on the next arc."

"In case we really are operating on arcs, you mean. Anyhow, let me try to sum up your argument: by taking the MacGuffin, I accidentally caused a situation that would've sabotaged the original climax of the theoretical arc if it played out as theoretically planned, so the Narrative tried to course-correct by rushing the Labcoat Guy and the Knight plots to a conclusion, while Rinne was just…"

"A spanner in the works," my assistant stated. "Either that, or she was always meant to go crazy and attack us, and since the Chimera-subplot was already resolved, the narrative arranged things so that she could do it anyway."

"Considering how unstable she used to be, that's not entirely off the table," I whispered in response, but I wasn't exactly convinced either.

Her interpretation of the events sounded plausible, and this time I was almost tempted to believe her hypothesis, if for nothing else then because it meant that this nebulous Narrative of ours was not infallible. After all, if she's right, then everything happened today because I accidentally derailed the original plans, but instead of forcefully course-correcting us, it resulted in a patch-work mess where events were pushed around and a couple of plot-devices, such as Emese's wound or the taking of the spear ended up completely subverted. We still had a scary entity that may or may not be consciously orchestrating our lives, but at the same time, it wasn't omnipotent or omniscient enough to keep things stick to the rails. Judy got her Narrative pet theory seemingly validated, and I got my reassurance that hard work and some arguably less-than-reasonable stunts can still provide us a way out of possible predetermination. It felt like having my cake and eating it too. In a way, it was almost too good to be true.

Maybe that was why I had a hard time accepting it. As far as hypotheses were concerned, it was an okay one, but it all hinged on her hypothetical original scenario without my interference being on the mark, something we simply couldn't confirm. In fact, while exploring the supernatural limits of the world provided us with something to work on, and we could still perform certain simple experiments, the original roadblock we ran into a while back was still present: without actually being able to see what the 'original plot' was supposed to be like, it was impossible to tell what effect, if any, our actions had on it. Case in point, while we've spent all this time discussing how my actions may or may not have affected the Narrative, and how it may or may not have pushed back by influencing Ammy, the Knights, and possibly Rinne, there was no guarantee that today's events weren't how things were supposed to happen from the very get-go, and we were still solidly on the rails. Until we can find a way to somehow overcome this hurdle, I was afraid most of our theorycrafting would stay just that.

Anyhow, all of this was something that definitely required more mental elbow grease, and preferably when my head wasn't feeling like it had a red hot woodsman's axe embedded in it.

"I still think we're missing a few steps, and coming up with a few alternative explanations wouldn't hurt, but considering how fresh the events are, I don't think we can analyze them any further right now. Also, I'm feeling really damn battered right now, so should we stop now, or do we have something else to discuss?"

"We have a lot of things to discuss," Judy answered a bit peevishly, probably unhappy about how I still wasn't in complete agreement with her, "But considering how sick you are, I'll let you rest after one last thing."

"How gracious of you," I replied with a grin that made her look a tad worried, so I quickly wiped the expression off my face and said, "I'm listening."

"What happened after you 'came out' of the sword?"

"Oh, that?" I collected my thoughts for a second and told her, "Well, since Ichiko was in trouble, I decided to move her into the body of the Chimera. It wasn't exactly simple, but since it didn't have a soul but an already installed control enchantment, I managed to do it anyway aaaaaaaand that's not what you wanted to know, is it?"

Judy immediately shook her head with a miniscule frown.

"No, I meant while you were acting weird. The Fauns said you completely ignored them, and you didn't answer to me when I called out to you either."

To my surprise, and concern, she seemed almost rattled for a moment, so I quickly told her, "I honestly don't know. I can remember what happened, but everything is a little fuzzy. I felt… kind of detached for a moment. Like I was not completely back in my body after I finished tinkering with Onikiri."

"So it was caused by the sword?"

"Not necessarily. My five cents are on simply overworking myself, or some kind of interplay between spending so much time inside the supernatural stratum while already being sick from Phasing too much. We probably wouldn't know until I tried overexerting myself again under controlled circumstances."

"Not now," Judy warned me, and if I wasn't afraid the ice pack would fall off my head, I would have rolled my eyes harder than eyes have ever been rolled in the history of mankind.

"Obviously. Still, it was… How should I put it? Back then, I think I was hyper-aware, or knew things. Important things that I can't remember right now, but they felt really important. It was… kind of like when you are in a dream, and inside the dream everything makes sense, but when you wake up, you don't remember any of it."

My girlfriend sent me a wry look and immediately reached out to touch my forehead.

"Chief, I think you're starting to get delirious. How would you know what it feels to dream when you never sleep?"

"I'm talking in general, not from personal experience."

"Either way, you're getting that cold shower, and then we discuss this again."

I was just about to protest, but the words could never leave my mouth, as our alone-time was interrupted by a new voice entering the fray.

"Ue-sama! Judy-ue!"

We both looked towards the slowly opening door, and from the other side came a little girl wearing a light-green summer dress that reached down to her knees. She wasn't wearing anything else than that, not even socks, but hey, it was still better than running around naked. Though again, she was doing that as a fox anyway, but that's beside the point.

"How do I look?" Asking so, Ichiko did a small pirouette, both her long hair and the long skirt billowing around her before she came to a stop.

"Decently cute," I noted, only to receive a sharp look from my girlfriend. "What?"

"You're only allowed to call her cute when she's a fox," Judy declared with the kind of finality usually reserved for supreme judges.

"Well, whether I'm allowed or not, she is. Anyone would be cute in those clothes. In fact, I bet that you would look downright adorable in that kind of outfit."

For a moment Judy didn't seem to be able to decide how to react to that, but in the end she chose to take it as a compliment. Or at least I think so, because she didn't bother me about it any longer. In the meantime, the tiny miko started squirming, and after a short while, she turned to my assistant.

"Judy-ue? Where's the toilet?"

She gave her a skeptical look, but since she looked entirely serious, Judy stood up and took her by the hand.

"This way. I told you not to drink so much tea."

"But it was sweet…" the little girl whined, and before I knew it, I was once again alone in my room.

Well, at least they got along. That was a positive.

Thinking so, I rolled back to my PC, opened up the browser again, and once I saw that there was nothing noteworthy happening on the Hub, I opened a new tab and typed 'summer dress, light green' into the search bar while wondering how I could find out Judy's size without her being the wiser…

The morning of the first day of November was mild for the season yet otherwise fairly unremarkable; especially considering it marked the beginning of the third month I've lived in this weird world of ours. This kind of occasion normally warranted standing by a window and looking at the dawning sun with a forlorn expression, with either a warm cup or a cuddly cat to complete the picture, but considering that I was feeling like ten pounds of agony packed into a five-pound bag, I graciously refrained from doing so. I was, however, standing near a window, if only so that I would have a good view of the street outside. It was exactly at nine in the morning, not a minute later, when a black passenger van with tinted windows leisurely rolled into our street and came to a halt in front of my driveway.

"Chief, I think they are here," my dear assistant called out to me as she walked down the stairs, wearing a set of 'backup clothes' she stored in my guest room in case she would be staying over, and her hair was still slightly damp after taking a shower not too long ago.

"Yeah, but not all of them," I answered as I absently observed the generic-looking yet impeccably dressed men-in-black letting our friends out of the car one at a time.

"I'll let them in."

I wanted to quip something about how it was obvious she would, as I probably couldn't drag myself to the door even if I tried, but by the time I formulated something suitably snappy, she was already out of the room. I didn't dwell on the missed opportunity for… doing something unnecessary? Why did I want to do that again? Man, my brain was a mess.

Anyhow, since there was no reason for me to stay by the window any longer, I hauled myself over to my traditional sitting spot, dropped my posterior onto my trusty comfy chair, and waited for our group to arrive. Oh, and incidentally, Ichiko was also in the room, and once I moved, she also scurried behind my seat with a guarded expression. She was also in her human form at the moment, because after we discussed things with Judy, we decided it was best to quickly come clean about her so that everyone would be aware of her and her abilities.

Speaking of abilities, it turned out that the way she shifted between her fox and her little girl form was not at all like how Chimeras transformed. If anything, it was closer to Elly's way of changing into her Draconic form, but with some extra magical lights thrown into the mix to hide the process. Oh, and not only that, but she didn't adhere to the laws of conservation of mass either, which wouldn't have been all that weird, except both the Chimera and Elly did! Or rather, I can only speculate regarding the Chimera, based on what I saw when I encountered it, but for the princess, I actually asked her to tell me her weight before and after transformation… and she didn't, because apparently that was something I shouldn't aske from a girl. Go figure. In the end Judy did the experiment in my stead using our bathroom scale, and she assured me that her mass remained the same. The little miko, on the other hand, weighed less than half as much as a fox as she did as a human.

That was a fairly interesting thing to think about… or maybe not, and I was just zoning out again. Either way, I rubbed the bridge of my nose to compose myself, and in the meantime the new arrivals entered the living room. There were only four of them present, with Snowy at the front, followed by Angie and Elly, and finally Josh closing the procession, though I could barely see him because he was all but completely hidden under a pile of colorful boxes.

"Wow, Leo! You look terrible!" Angie declared the moment she laid her eyes on me, much to my chagrin. I mean, she wasn't wrong; I was currently in my casual clothes, wrapped in a blanket around my shoulders, and a wet towel on my head, but the upbeat way she made the remark was still annoying.

"Yeah, I second that," Josh agreed after placing the boxes onto the table. "You look like you didn't get a wink of sleep last night, and you weren't even the one who got imprisoned in a room underground for the night! "

"Hey! Leo has been working the hardest out of all of us yesterday!" the princess sprung to my defense right away, and both Snowy and Angie were in wholehearted agreement with her.

"Hey, I never questioned that! I just find it peculiar, that's all," my friend defended himself, and to be fair, he had a point.

For one, they were wearing their magiforms while they were fighting, so even though they went through quite a scuffle, their actual school uniforms were perfectly clean. Not only that, but even though they were officially 'in custody', they were given the opportunity to clean up themselves, so unlike me, they looked like perfectly healthy and lively high-schoolers ready to go to school.

"Where's Amelia?" Judy cut in between the three frowning girls and the rapidly backpedaling Josh, and he immediately took the opportunity to change the subject.

"Ammy and Pascal are coming with the next car. She said they have something to take care of first, and then they will be joining us later."

"So Pascal's coming too. That means I need to prepare eleven drinks," Judy murmured and, after sending one last glance at me (probably to see if I was still alright), she headed towards the kitchen.

"Wait, I'll help!" Snowy proposed right away and she dashed after my girlfriend.

"Eleven? That doesn't add up," Josh whispered while obviously counting on his head, but no one paid him any notice at the time.

In the meantime, the princess made her way over to my side and leaned closer to take a better look at me.

"You really look sick," she noted before gingerly extending her fingers towards my forehead, and her eyes opened wide as saucers the moment she made contact. "Wait, you don't just look bad, you have a fever!"

"Well, yeah. I overworked myself a little. Again." I was only very slightly downplaying my current condition, but my draconic girlfriend refused to have any of it.

"Angie, come over here! Leo needs healing!"

"I can check!" the upbeat Celestial proposed right away and bounced over to my side, much to my momentary annoyance. I mean, being worried about me was sweet and all, but we had more important things to discuss, and I could ask Angie myself later.

"Don't look at me like that, Leo!" Elly protested in a low voice, followed up by her trademark pout. "Your health comes first, we can talk later."

"… Princess, did you just read my mind?"

"I don't need to! I just know how you think," she stated with just a hint of that subliminal smugness that I found so adorable, so before I knew it, I gestured for her to come closer.

She didn't understand at first, but then she must've figured out what I wanted, as she carefully put her arms around my shoulder and leaned in for a kiss, which would've probably landed right on the intended target if not for a sudden squeal coming from behind the back-rest of my favorite chair.

"U-u-ue-samaaa! What are you doing!?"

After the expected moment of complete bafflement passed, I heaved an exasperated sigh befitting the situation and gently pushed Elly back, if only so that I could lean to the side and take a look at the little girl hiding behind the chair.

"The better question is, why are you curled up behind me like that?" I asked the first thing that came to mind, and the tiny fox-girl immediately stiffened in response.

"I-It's because he is scary!" she declared in a heated yet at the same time mousy voice while pointing in the general direction of Josh, though even if she wasn't, considering that he was the only other 'he' in the room beside me, it wasn't hard to figure out who she was talking about. However, before I could ask just why exactly she was wary of him, she collected herself and let her hand down, facing me again. "More importantly, why is ue-sama cheating on Judy-ue in front of everyone?"

"I'm not cheating. She's also my girlfriend."

"Really?" Her eyes opened wide for a second as she digested the new information, but then she finally registered that she was in the crossfire of everyone's attention. A blink of an eye later she blushed crimson in embarrassment and exclaimed, "I will ask Judy-ue!"

And just like that, the little miko dashed out of the living room and into the kitchen, leaving an odd silence in her wake.

"Soooo… Who was that?" Josh voiced the question on everyone's minds while trying to peep into the kitchen, but when he couldn't catch a glimpse of her, he turned back to me and reinforced his question by directing one of his world-class single raised eyebrows at me.

"Her name is Ichiko," I told them, my voice feeling a little weary even to myself, so I quickly cleared my throat and continued in a more normal tone. "She used to be a shrine maiden who then turned into a sword, but now she is a Chimera that turned into a girl. Also a fox, but not right now."

The people in the room shared an incredulous glance between each other, and it once again fell on Joshua's shoulders to ask, "Which part of that was the punch line?"

"Neither. I'm entirely serious," I responded, but since they still seemed skeptical, I decided to move things along. "I'll explain in detail when they are back."

After saying so, I gestured for my draconic girlfriend to come closer again, so that she could receive the welcome kiss she missed because of the interruption, while Angie took the situation in stride and began to hum some kind of song, no doubt as part of either her diagnosis or treatment of me. I wasn't holding my breath, since she couldn't do much about my fever the last two times I overworked myself, but considering I had a couple of other injuries, I wasn't going to turn her down.

"So, I counted again with the kid included, but we are still short of eleven people," came the unexpected comment from Josh, and after some consideration, I decided to straight out tell him what's going on.

"It's because Labcoat Guy and his android are also coming."

"Wait, what? Why?"

This time the question came from Elly, and she seemed baffled and outraged by the prospect in equal measure.

"I've made a deal with the Arch-mage. They are not going to be prosecuted for the mess they caused, but instead they are going to be in our custody, and I'm planning to put them to work in the secret base."

"Custody? Since when are we allowed to do that?" Josh followed up with yet another skeptically raised eyebrow.

"It's not really a question of being allowed or not, but necessity. For now, I plan to stick them into one of the unused rooms in the base."

"And who's going to guard them?"

"These guys," I answered while pointing with my left thumb, and it took an embarrassingly long time for the two Fauns in the corner to realize I was talking about them and remove their cloaking.

"Ack!" Josh of all people reeled in surprise, but once he regained his wits, he let out an embarrassed groan followed by a peevish, "I hate it when they do that!"

"Apologies," Karukk said in the characteristic, rumbling voice of the Faun, while Vurrok beside him averted his eyes and pretended this situation had nothing to do with him.

"Hold on! Why are they like that?" Elly spoke up again as the obvious white bandages failed to avoid her eagle eyes.

"We had a bit of a battle in the secret base, there was some collateral damage, the perpetrator was detained, and her sword is now the little girl you just saw." I noticed that Josh was giving me another 'Is this guy pulling my leg?' look, but before I could clarify myself, Angie called out to me for a change.

"Collateral damage? Is the hockey-table safe?"

Now it was my turn to give someone a doubtful look.

"I'm glad to see that your priorities are the same as usual," I jested. "And yes, it's fine."

"That's good. We still need to have our rematch with Elly," the Celestial girl noted while moving her hand in a circular motion in front of me, only to then pause and ask, "You have a small cut on your stomach. Do you want me to treat it?"

"While you're at it, might as well," I shrugged, and she gave me a happy-go-lucky 'Yessir' before resuming her humming. "So, hockey-tables aside, I'll explain everything in detail once everyone arrives. Now, here's a question from me for a change: what's with those boxes?"

"Oh, you mean these?" my friend asked back as he raised the top-most one to show its front to me. "I have no idea why, but Ammy's grandpa gave all of these board games to us last night. We didn't even have time to try them out yet, but then when we wanted to give them back in the morning, he told us we can keep them."

"They look pretty sweet!" Angie chimed again. "I really wanted to try the one where one player has a castle and the other has an army, and you have to shoot each other with catapults and cannons!"

"Of course you'd want to play the one game where your goal is to break stuff," Josh scoffed on the side, earning him a not at all unexpected glare from his childhood friend.

"Says the guy who only wanted to play the game where you crush clay figures with a Rube Goldberg machine!"

It looked like the two of them were just about to descend into yet another one of their usual childhood friend spats, but then it was cut mercifully short by the reappearance of Judy and the two youngest girls following behind her, all carrying trays with either soft drinks or snacks. For some inexplicable reason, my kitchen had those stocked all the time, but it was a mystery I was already used to.

Judy and Snowy looked the same as usual, but Ichiko in particular was unusually twitchy, and while on her way to the table to place her tray, she kept sending sneaky glances at me, Elly, and Josh, in that order. Then, the moment her hands were free, she dashed away from the others and came to a screeching halt in front of me before melodramatically falling to her knees and doing that weird bowing thing when her forehead touched the ground.

"I'm sorry, ue-sama, for lacking faith in you! I couldn't know that Princess-ue is also your lover! I brought shame upon myself!"

"Please get up and stop being so overdramatic. You're embarrassing me." The moment I said that she immediately jumped to her feet, but didn't quit bowing her head. "Stop that too. Also, only I'm calling her princess, her name is Eleanor."

"We call her Elly," Josh commented on the side, pretending to organize the boxes while obviously paying full attention to our conversation.

"So it is like with Judy-ue and her second name! I should have known!" Saying so, she immediately bowed to Elly in turn. "Please excuse my lack of etiquette, Elly-ue!"

My draconic girlfriend looked at the newcomer with considerable confusion, and after some consideration she eventually concluded, "She's weird."

"Yep, she is," I agreed before pointedly clearing my throat. "So, I think it's about time I properly introduced her. Everyone, this is Ichiko. As I said, she used to be a sword, but due to some circumstances, right now she is inhabiting the empty body of the Chimera that we encountered during the incident with Crowey. Oh, and as I said, she can also turn into a fox."

"Seriously?" Elly suddenly asked with a surprised look on her face.

"A fluffy one," Judy added with a solemn nod that was way too serious considering the situation.

"Can I see it?" came the next interjection from the Celestial girl by my side, and I shook my head.

"I know you guys like cute things, but this is really not the time. Also, let me introduce you guys too." I waited for the little miko to pay attention to me, and then I began our roll-call by pointing at the people present one at a time. "You already know Judy and the big guys in the corner, so let's skip them. This lovely girl is Elly, my other girlfriend, and she is Draconian. This silly girl over here is Angie, and she is Celestial. That scary guy over there is Josh, and he is weird, so you better not get too close to him."

"Hey," Josh protested, but I summarily ignored him.

"Finally, that cute girl is Snowy, currently my little sister, and she's from the Abyss. We are also soon going to get more company, but I'll introduce them when they get here."

"I see, I see…" Ichiko nodded a couple of times. "So it's Elly-ue, Angie-san, Josh-san, and…" Suddenly she paused when she got to Snowy, and after wracking her brain for a second, she sends a pitiful glance at Judy, and somehow my girlfriend could read her intention right away.

"Snowy is what the Chief calls her. Her real name is Neige."

"So it's Neige-ue!" she beamed like a well-fed cat or, well, fox, and once again nodded to herself in satisfaction.

"So first Lily, and now her… Are you going to adopt her too?" Josh teased me with a smirk, but I kept my cool and shook my head.

"Nah, I'm perfectly satisfied with one little sister, thank you very much."

"In other words, she's going to be your daughter. Ichiko S. Dunning, huh?" Josh remarked with absolute seriousness, and if I had any suitable projectiles in arm's reach, I swear I would've totally thrown something at him. Oh, wait. I did.

"Blegh!" my friend yelped out as I flung the towel from the top of my head at him, which earned me a scolding from Judy and a few stray giggles from the rest of the girls, so it was a net positive.

Things quickly calmed down afterwards, allowing the little fox-miko to personally introduce herself to each member of our group in turn while we waited for Ammy and co to arrive. As luck would have it, we didn't have to wait long, and we still had more than half of the snacks left when another black van pulled up to my house.

"Leo, they are here!" Snowy reported from the window, and I gave her a thumbs up with my left hand before reaching behind me and pulling the blanket off my back and handing it over to Judy.

"Please put this away. Also, am I in a presentable condition?"

"More or less," she told me in a deadpan tone, but knowing her, she would've at least combed my hair if I wasn't, so I straightened my back in my seat and assumed the closest thing I could manage to a self-assured, complacent posture.

I didn't mind the class rep seeing me under the weather, but in front of Armband Guy and our two new 'recruits', I had to pretend that I had no chinks in my armor. Once I felt suitably poised, I gestured for the Fauns using one of the hand-signals that Brang taught me, and they grudgingly put down the cheese scones they were eating and silently walked upstairs with their cloaking sigils turned on. I already knew that the fembot could see through their invisibility, so I had to send them away, lest she drew attention to them while Armband Guy was still around. With that done, I glanced down at the girl on my right, but she was too engrossed with her work to notice, so I had to let out a small cough to get her attention.

"Angie?"

"Hm? Yes?" The celestial girl glanced up at me with a distracted look in her eyes, and after finally realizing what I was getting at, she shook her head. "No, I'm still not done."

"Then how about we continue later?" I proposed, only to be immediately shot down.

"No, I'm at an important part. Just stay still."

We locked eyes for a second, but considering how unusually serious she was, I figured it was better not to get into an argument right now. I mean, everyone knows that if you know what's best for you, you never mess with the party's white mage.

As such, I had to let Angie continue her work, and in the meantime the new guests finally arrived at the front door and my sister and the princess both rushed out to let them in. A short time later, Ammy finally entered the room. Unlike the rest of the group, she was no longer wearing her school uniform, but a thick orange turtleneck sweater with matching skirts instead. She also procured a spare set of glasses, and since the ones she was wearing right now had thicker rims, the combination with the rest of her ensemble made me think she was about to jump into a garish van and start solving monster mysteries with a talking dog at any moment.

Jokes notwithstanding, the look fit her surprisingly well. On the other hand, Armband Guy behind her stuck out of the environment like a sore thumb, as for some reason he was dressed in a khaki business suit with a blue tie and a matching hat. On second look, I figured he was trying to emulate the style of Lord Grandpa, but he simply wasn't pulling it off at all.

Finally, behind these two stood the pair of Labcoat Guy and Galatea. The fembot being tied up no longer surprised me anymore, though at least they had the courtesy to put a loose grey trench coat on her so that it wouldn't be obvious at first glance, but Labcoat Guy was another matter entirely. Gone were the yoke, the frayed lab coat, and the silly clogs. No, he was actually wearing a perfectly sensible pair of washed jeans, sneakers, a plaid flannel shirt, and most importantly, he had his semi-long hair properly combed and parted in the middle. In fact, if I didn't know him already, I would've thought he was one of those stereotypical otaku types from certain shows, only missing the big swirly glasses and the headband. I was so surprised by his appearance that it took me several seconds to collect myself and greet the newcomers.

"Um… Hi, class rep. You guys too. Come in, we still have some snacks."

Armband Guy ever so slightly narrowed his eyes, but otherwise didn't react, and instead he walked over to me. It was at this point that I noticed that he had a briefcase in his hands, and the moment I laid my eyes on it, he instantly offered it to me.

"The Lord told me to give this to you. It contains the inventory of all the items confiscated at his hideout, which will be delivered to a location of your choosing by the end of the week. You can also find the necessary forms to requisition further resources, pre-signed documents you may use to employ specialists contracted to the School, as well the required forms to file for tax-exemption on the island."

"I'm happy to see that bureaucracy is alive and well even in the supernatural underbelly of the world." I followed my words up with a sigh and gestured towards the spot next to my chair. "Just put them over there, I'll give them a look later."

Armband Guy immediately followed my instructions and placed the briefcase next to me, after which he added, "The Lord also instructed me to give you all courtesies, and to forward the following message: in the future, his doors will be always open for you, but he would kindly ask you to announce your intent to parley in the future."

"Of course. So long as he keeps his side of the bargain, I'm happy to be the very model of courtesy," I told him with a smile, and that seemed to be enough for him, as he gave me a nod and immediately turned on his heel.

"Please excuse me, but I'm afraid I cannot stay. The delegation from the Assembly will arrive soon, and the Lord requested my presence by his side."

"No problem, have fun."

He completely let the words in through one ear and out the other, and after giving a meaningful glance at Ammy, he bid his farewell to the rest of the group, including the slightly baffled Ichiko, and left the house as quickly as he came.

"Well, that was unexpected," I whispered with a wry bend in my lips, but before I could say anything else, I was suddenly assaulted by the class rep breaking right into my personal space and glaring at me from a hand's width away.

"Leo. What exactly did you do to grandfather?" she hissed through her teeth, and after overcoming my first surprise, I gave her a flat look, put my index finger on her forehead, and gently but firmly pushed her away.

"I made a deal with him. For now, please be satisfied with that explanation. We have to take care of a few other things first."

"Such as?" she asked back, so I pointed at the two captives silently glaring at us in on the side.

"Those guys, among other things. But even before that…" I put my fingers in my mouth and let out a loud whistle, and a few seconds later, the Faun dashed back down the stairs. "Take those two. Also those boxes and this briefcase. You know the rest."

The two invisible Fauns nodded in unison, gave me a salute, and then immediately jumped into action.

"Wait, Leo?! What's going on?!" The class rep raised her voice in protest, so I raised a hand to calm her down while Karukk picked up the flabbergasted fembot (which incidentally turned her invisible in the process) and headed towards the kitchen back-door leading to the garage.

"Don't worry, it's something I've already planned for," I told her while gesturing for the panicked Labcoat Guy, who also disappeared a moment later when he got picked up. "Since your grandpa learned that I can detect his surveillance balls, I figured he, or someone else, might try something more mundane to spy on us, so I bought an anti-surveillance kit online and taught the Fauns how to use it. We're first going to check those two and everything else we received from him for bugs, and only then would we take them to the secret base."

Ammy gave me a withering look, and ultimately uttered, "There's no way grandfather would do something like that."

"You can never know. After what happened last night, I wouldn't be surprised if he went even further than just a few listening devices. Oh, speaking of which," I gestured for the Faun who was just about to pick up the briefcase, and told him, "Just to be on the safe side, first take that outside and open it from a distance with a rake or something, just in case there's a bomb in it."

"Leo!" Ammy cried out in pure, undiluted outrage, apparently completely revolted by the mere idea I was suggesting.

"It's better to be safe than sorry," I told her without any room for disagreement.

"Chief, that's not really convincing when it's coming from you of all people…"

"Hush, Dormouse. I'm trying to be a responsible leader-type here. Please don't undermine me."

I took my girlfriend's subtly rolled eyes as a sign of agreement, and soon things calmed down after the helpful Fauns left the room. In fact, things might have been a little too quiet, as everyone was giving me odd looks. As such, since we were all present, and there were no further hindrances in the way, I decided to stop delaying the inevitable.

"All right. I believe I promised that I would explain things in detail once we were all here."

"Yep," Josh nodded.

"You said that," Elly agreed with an even bigger nod, for some reason.

"Yes! I also remember that ue-sama said that!" came the third, and this time wholly unnecessary agreement from the little girl in green.

"… Who's she?" Ammy broke the chain with a small frown and a habitually menacing tweaking of her glasses.

"Well, I suppose I might as well start there…"

And with that, I began my long, detailed, and mostly white-lie-free description of the last day's events.

"So she's like a familiar," Ammy concluded after hearing my explanation regarding how Ichiko ended up in our group, and at the end of the day I resorted to an ambivalent shrug to convey my answer.

"Something like that, I suppose."

"Interesting," she whispered, and then picked up another tea biscuit to nibble on. Incidentally, by this point it was almost noon, and everyone was sitting in a close circle around me made possible by taking all the dining chairs from the kitchen. I spent most of the morning explaining the previous day's events, and due to a quick agreement we made before I started, they listened to me without interruptions. That was a nice change of pace, but talking for so long made my throat a tad sore, so I didn't mind the slight lull in the conversation.

But then again, while I make it sound like the last few hours were just me dryly describing the events of the past evening, there were plenty of breaks in there. Such as when the girls convinced Ichiko to transform, and then…

"Yip!"

"Haha! She's so cute!"

… Yeah, that. She was currently in her fox form, lying on her back, and enjoying the attention of Judy, Snowy, and Elly. Not only that, but even the ever-serious class rep and the currently preoccupied Angie couldn't help but occasionally glance at the furry little menace with longing eyes. In the end, I had to conclude that women really were remarkably weak to cute, fluffy animals. This was, of course, terribly clichéd, so to save them from becoming so stereotypical, I had no choice but to keep her in my lap, and yet even so, she still commanded all the girls' attention. As such, I was forced to scratch her behind the ears, because… um… Wait, why was I doing this again? Damn, my brain must be malfunctioning again. That's the only reasonable explanation.

Okay, let's put silly stuff like that aside for a moment, and let's be serious. Like Joshua, who actually listened to my explanation from beginning to end without ever letting himself be distracted by the fox's perky ears or her fluffy tail. Truly a man of principles. Or he was just afraid of her because she bit him. One or the other.

Anyhow, after doing his best to absorb everything I had said, Josh crossed his arms in front of his chest and said, "All right, I suppose I'll break the ice and ask the obvious, though I would bet my left kidney you won't give me a straight answer."

"Give it a go, you might be surprised," I replied with some forced playfulness in my voice, and my friend gave me a mirthless smile in return.

"Fine. If I get this right, we attacked Robatto, the hunter woman attacked the base, and the The Knightly Brotherhood of the Most Heroic Bloodlines attacked Elly's house all at the same time."

"Yes, but don't say 'the the' like that. It's giving me 'the The Gathering' flashbacks."

"What's that?" Elly asked while she sneakily leaned over to pat the little fox's snout, and I immediately shook my head.

"You're better off not knowing, right, Josh?"

"Yeah, we can agree on that," he concurred with a troubled nod, but then he quickly re-focused himself and said, "But that's not important. What I want to know is how you could be at all three places at once."

"Four," Ammy corrected him and adjusted her glasses. "He also was there with me in the room where they locked up Mike."

"That's even more confusing then!" Josh exclaimed with smoldering indignation, as if somehow being at three places at once was less impossible than being at four places. "Don't tell me it was an illusion or something like that; I saw you throw a rifle at someone and it hit her squarely in the head. Illusions don't cause concussions."

"Some can," Snowy added, but then didn't elaborate, so the class rep took the stand in her place.

"She's right. Some very high-level illusions can not only fool your eyes and ears, but all of your body, and they can cause actual harm that way. That said…" She paused here to tweak her glasses again and ominously added, "I doubt even the world's most powerful illusionist could make steel bars believe they were cut."

Figures. I hoped I might've been able to use the 'master illusionist' misunderstanding to my advantage, but they've seen too much for that to work anymore. The cat was well and truly out of the bag. As such, I had no other choice but to take a bigger bag made out of subtle misdirections and stuff the cat into that instead.

But first, I needed to set the scene. Step one, I had to act like I was really reluctant, so I spent a couple of seconds glancing around the room with my best 'I'm totally conflicted and stuff' expression. Then, once they were getting suitably impatient, I let out a long, lung-rattling sigh and hunched my shoulders in an obvious, if maybe slightly overdone, show of resignation.

"Listen up guys; what I'm going to tell you now cannot leave these four walls. Am I clear?" They obviously expected that I would say that, as everyone nodded right away, including not only the fox in my lap, but even Judy and Showy, who were already aware of my Phasing ability. "Fine then, let's not beat around the bush. I'm sure you already figured it out on your own, but I can, with some restrictions, teleport on my own."

"I knew it!" the class rep yelled out with unusual intensity and leaned closer, as if afraid that she would somehow miss some small detail of my clarification if she was a few centimeters further from me.

"Simply put," I began with an expression of utmost sincerity plastered on my face, "I can create anchor points, and with some effort, I can move between those points instantaneously."

"So that thing in your closet really isn't a proper magic circle after all, right?"

"No, it's not," I admitted, much to Ammy's triumphant delight. "It's just the point from where I teleport people between here and the secret base."

"So the circle is your anchor," Josh mused as he rubbed his chin, then he slightly tilted his head and asked, "But then how did you teleport around in the middle of the battle? There were no circles there."

"Oh, I get it!" Elly suddenly exclaimed with an enlightened look on her face. "Leo made the magiformers, so they must double as his anchors."

"That makes sense," Ammy agreed, and I patiently waited for them to 'figure out' the rest.

"Hold on. None of us were at Elly's house, so how could Leo teleport there?"

"I think I already know," the princess declared a tad smugly. "Leo gave me a charm to put on the doorknob of Sebastian's study! It was an anchor too, wasn't it?"

"Yes, I used that bracelet as a way to get into his room and take the spear before the Knights would show up and could take it," I told them in my most truthfullyest voice, which wasn't hard considering I technically didn't tell a single actual lie so far.

"You could've told me," Elly stated with a frown, so I mouthed a silent 'Sorry' in her direction, but by then the conversation already moved along.

"So you could move between these 'anchors', even when they were inside a Restricted Space?" Ammy pondered aloud while sizing me up. "But how? Teleporting to a designated target without a proper receiver array is theoretically possible, but incredibly risky and wasteful. Just doing it once could sapp a lesser ley-line dry for days, but you did it repeatedly. How did you…?" It was at this point he recalled a crucial detail, and she pointed at my face. "That mask. The one you were wearing back then! You said something about it being a unique artifact that could affect space-time."

"Yes, that's what I said," I agreed with a small smile, playing into her preconceived notions.

"That was something like that?" Elly spoke up on the side, and for a while she was deep in thought. "I could swear I've seen that mask somewhere…"

"It looked like one of those jester masks," Josh contributed, and the others nodded at once.

"Where is it now, anyway? Can I take a look at it?" Ammy inquired, and I shook my head with a pained grimace.

"The mask is powerless at the moment, and it needs a lot of work if I want it to do more than just hide my face. You see, I kind of overexerted my powers while wearing it," I said two truths, which added up to one lie, so to speak.

"Did it fizzle out from overuse?" The class rep was suddenly crestfallen upon hearing the 'news', but then she suddenly perked up as another question came to her mind. "Does that mean that you cannot freely use your power anymore?"

"To put it mildly, currently I can't even teleport between here and the secret base. That's why I had the Faun take our two 'guests' to there on foot."

"Speaking of which, do you think they arrived there in one piece?" came the next question from Josh, who still seemed to have some reservations towards Fauns, especially when they had tied-up people draped over their shoulders. It probably gave him some unpleasant flashbacks.

"More importantly, how are we going to move there in the future?" came the next perfectly reasonable question from Amelia.

"Don't worry, I'll figure something out," I told so to reassure her, and she apparently took my words at face value, but only to pause when she noticed that Snowy was still busy playing with Ichiko, and her eyes soon narrowed into apprehensive slits.

"You three are suspiciously silent," she addressed Judy, Snowy, and Angie at once.

"Hm? What?" the celestial mumbled as she looked up in mild confusion.

"Did you know that Leo can teleport?" Josh reiterated the question, and his childhood friend's eyes opened wide in surprise as she looked at me.

"You can?"

"Yep. With some limitations," I stressed, but she was strangely impressed all the same.

"Weren't you paying attention?"

"Sorry, I was kind of busy," she answered Josh a smidgen half-heartedly, yet he didn't press the issue, and instead he turned to the others.

"What about you two?" he inquired in a polite yet somewhat critical tone, and after a moment of hesitation, Snowy raised her hand.

"I… I knew about it," she admitted as she awkwardly averted her eyes.

"I also obviously did," Judy added while she patted my sister's head. "I'm his girlfriend."

"What do you mean 'obviously'?" the princess suddenly burst out in protest. "I'm also his girlfriend; why didn't I know about this?"

"Because you are terrible at keeping secrets," Judy told her with the bluntness of a boxing glove, and even though at first she wanted to object, at the end of the day the princess closed her half-open mouth, crossed her arms, and began to sulk with the power of a thousand suns.

"Come here, princess," I waved for her, and although she was still pouting, she stood up and walked over to me nevertheless, so that I could hold her in a one-handed hug. After I pulled her close enough, I directly whispered into her ear. "I'll tell you some other stuff Judy already knows later, so don't sulk."

"I'm not sulking," she muttered, but then instead of returning to her seat, she sat down onto the arm-rest of my chair and stuck close to me. I didn't mind that the slightest, though the fact that she used the opportunity to monopolize the attention of Ichiko in the process has drawn the ire of the other girls in the room. Maybe keeping her was a bad idea after all…?

"So we've finally learned another of Leo's secrets," the class rep mused on the side, apparently feeling quite satisfied with the 'truth' they have uncovered, only to then abruptly raise her hand to her glasses. "But you still haven’t told all your secrets to everyone."

"We talked about this before; secrets are a resource like any other, and it's best not to waste them."

My answer obviously didn't satisfy her, but Josh came to my rescue.

"Considering how sick Leo gets every time he uses his powers, I suppose it makes sense he keeps them a secret." Ammy now directed her oh-so-intimidated glasses at him, so my friend hastily added, "I mean, knowing about this would've made some things easier, but if we took it for granted that he could swoop in at any moment to bail us out of a sticky situation, it would put a lot of pressure on him."

"I suppose you're not wrong," the class rep conceded, if begrudgingly, and Josh took this opportunity to move things along.

"So, Robatto is now going to work for Leo, and the Chimera is a fluffy fox. Does that mean things are going to calm down a little?"

"Hopefully," I said, though I had a feeling it was just wishful thinking. "There's still some fallout after yesterday's kerfuffle that we have to clean up, and I still have to explain to a certain butler why I borrowed the spear from his collection…"

"Sebastian's going to be maaaaaaad," the princess said something really scary with a cheery smile, which felt really foreboding, but for the time being I put it out of my mind and focused on Josh's original question.

"We still have a couple of loose ends. The Knights are still on the island, and while I have a deal with Lord Grandpa, it might actually draw us into Assembly politics in the long run, and then there's always the possibility of an outside context problem rearing its ugly head… but for the short term, yes, things should settle down a bit."

"Good," Josh sighed in relief. "I was getting really tired of all the ambushes and fighting."

"Tell me about it," I concurred. "I think we all need some downtime."

"Mainly you, Chief," Judy interjected with her eyes locked on my face. "Somehow you're looking even worse than you did this morning."

"Should we continue this conversation later?" Josh proposed on the spot. "Leo needs rest, and Angie's dad already called me because they were worried about where we disappeared to."

"Why did he call you instead of her?" came the entirely logical question from my draconic girlfriend, prompting Josh to let out a tired groan.

"It's because she is a total scatterbrain who left her phone home."

"Hey!" the subject of our conversation protested with palpable indignation. "Don't blame this one me! I wouldn't have left it behind if I didn't have to kick you out of your bed last morning, you freaking opossum!"

"Wha…? Why 'opossum' of all things!?" Josh objected to the weirdest thing, as usual when it came to these two's arguments, so I decided to summarily disregard them and rest my eyes for a moment. My eyelids felt unusually heavy, and if I didn't know I didn't need it, I would've thought I was being sleep-deprived.

Anyhow, the spat between the childhood friends didn't last long, and once it was concluded that if anything, Josh was a marmot, everyone decided to head home for the day and continue this conversation at a time when I no longer looked like a zombie. I appreciated the gesture, and in the following minutes, one car after the other pulled up to my driveway to ferry my friends and one significant other home. Speaking of which, Sebastian personally came to pick her up, but once he saw my condition, he graciously agreed to strangle me another day. How nice of him.

Anyhow, even though they were the ones who prompted the exodus from my house, somehow Angie and Josh ended up staying the longest. Even Judy left before them, though only after she once again hammered into me that I should rest up and not do any Phasing shenanigans, no matter the circumstances. That was more or less what I expected, but the way Angie subtly nudged her to go almost made me suspicious of her.

"Hey, Josh? Dad is about to arrive, why don't you wait for him outside?"

"Because it's cold out there?" my friend responded with reasonable bafflement, but then his childhood friend all but pushed him out of the room.

"Don't be such a baby! Just go, I'll follow after you in a minute."

My friend didn't even have time to protest before he was mercilessly kicked out of the house, and soon Angie came back while dusting her hands. Okay, scratch it, I was no longer 'almost' suspicious of her.

"Time out," I called out, making her stop in her tracks. "What exactly are you doing?"

"Making sure the others won't overhear what I'm about to tell you," she answered with an unexpectedly serious voice, but just after that she conspicuously glanced around. "Is your sis and the fox still upstairs?"

"Yeah," I said, slightly weirded out by the girl, and she didn't make me feel any better by the way she sidled up to me.

"Good. Listen up, there is something I really need to tell you, but I didn't want to freak everyone else out."

"Is it Celestial related?" I guessed, but she immediately shook her head.

"No, of course not. It's about your hand," she told me while simultaneously pointing at the offending appendage. A moment later her brows knit in frustration and she continued in angry whispers. "Just what the heck did you do to it?"

"I… think I already explained that it happened when I grabbed Onikiri, and Ichiko tried to make me her wielder or somesuch. Weren't you listening?"

"No, of course I wasn't!" She exclaimed, only to tone her voice back down right away. "I was way too busy trying to save your hand, you dunderhead!"

"… Was it that bad?"

"It still is. It's like you lit up a separate blow-torch in every single bone in your hand!"

"That… sounds pretty bad," I uttered in mild alarm and glanced down at the offending limb in question. "I mean… it hurts, but not that much…"

"It's because you also frayed most of your nerves there!" Angie huffed before poking the back of my hand with her index finger. "I did the best that I could, but you really need to have a professional look at it."

"I guess you don't mean a physician."

"No, I'm talking about a magical expert who can heal nerve damage. The longer you wait, the higher the chance that it may never heal properly."

"Oh, great. Another thing to worry about," I grumbled, and my Celestial friend must have taken pity on me, as she stopped scowling and instead put her hands on her hips with an expression that would have been right at home on the face of a put upon mother scolding a rambunctious child.

"For now, don't worry about anything. Just go and have a good rest; it's very important for recovery. I can help you look for someone qualified once you no longer look like you're about to fall asleep at any moment."

"Trust me, I won't," I told her, but she only smiled at me in return. Maybe she thought I was acting tough in front of her? I really wasn't though, and before I could get another word in, Josh yelled in through the door.

"Angie! Your dad says that if you don't hurry up, you won't get any dessert at dinner."

"Aaaaand that is my cue to leave!" she declared with a toothy grin, her previous intensity all but gone, and she pointed a pair of finger-guns at, saying, "See you later, cowboy! And make sure you get your eight hours of beauty sleep!"

"Yeah, sure, whatever," I dismissed her with a wave of my good hand, and a short giggle later she dashed out of the room to join her childhood friend waiting outside.

The moment I heard the front door close, somehow all the tension escaped from my shoulders in the form of an exhausted breath. Maybe Angie was right. Maybe I should really try and rest a bit. With such thoughts in mind, I forced myself off the chair and dragged my legs up the stairs one step at a time. As I passed by her room, I could hear Snowy and Ichiko animatedly discussing something. I could only hear a few snippets through the closed door, but by the sound of it, they were getting along. That was nice.

Once I passed by them, I momentarily vacillated whether I should first wash my face with some cold water, but after a short but kind of blurry amount of time later I simply entered my room and immediately fell onto my bed. I lied on my back while staring at the ceiling for a few minutes, my brain slowly turning into one of those grainy snowstorms you see on TV when there's no broadcast. This was weird, as I actually had a lot of things to think about, including what to do with Labcoat Guy, how to proceed with Lord Grandpa, whether or not I should feel just a tiny bit guilty about misleading my friends today (for the record, I shouldn't, because I technically didn't tell even a single lie), or the apparent fact that my hand needs professional healing. All of these things kind of slipped through the cracks, like dry sand through my fingers, and my eyelids were starting to feel really heavy again.

My eyes must be tired, I concluded, and I saw no reason why I shouldn't close them. Just for a minute, to let them rest. Then I would get up and load in the Hub to see what's going on there. Or at least that was the plan until, against predictions and prior precedent… I fell asleep.

…

The fact that I was still aware and looking at myself lying on the bed probably wasn't a good sign, was it?

Well, under normal circumstances this would've been the point where I felt it was entirely reasonable to contemplate whether I should start panicking or not, but then as time went on, my consciousness slowly dulled as well, and before I knew it, I was… somewhere. It was a… kind of room, except not really? It was also pitch black, yet lit by a distant yet ever-present warm light at the same time. It felt weird, but also strangely safe and comfortable, and before I knew it, I slowly drifted into a state that was both sleeping, and yet not. And that was how I, for the first time since I could remember, dreamed under the light of a red sun.