God damn, I thought upon re-awakening in the meeting room. Xetrathia is hardcore.

She had on an exploding suicide necklace, and if the invasion failed or she got her hands on me, she'd activate it. Best case scenario, they kill one of the other princesses and make a swift retreat. Worst case scenario, Xetrathia sacrifices her life to forcibly break the prophecy. It was an unbeatable plan founded upon heroic degrees of self-sacrifice and determination, and I almost felt bad that the loop completely ruined it. Her sheer resolve all but guaranteed the prophecy would be broken no matter what happened, unless I could travel back in time after the explosion. For all her planning and all her intelligence, she had been kneecapped by a cheat power she had absolutely no way whatsoever of knowing existed at all. I simply could not be beaten. The entire world was against her, and when even time itself was your enemy, there was no hope. Maybe if she had thought to use a soul explosion or something, but even that was suspect; I recovered from Wannabe Sauron's mace, and I would probably recover from anything she did, too.

The question now was how to get the necklace off her and/or convince her not to commit suicide. That seemed like the victory condition for this loop, and after that I could slowly woo her before leaving for Dragonmount, or whatever. Ironically, she seemed like the hardest nut to crack romance-wise; my final boss would be the one woman in the world with possible romantic affections for another dude and an explicit goal not to fall in love with me. Fitting. Or well, maybe Wannabe Sauron would be the final boss, but I didn't really want to think about how many stops I would have to pull out to take that guy down.

I completed the above monologue in 2.5 seconds, then looked around. Medea and Hilda, arguing. The Rose Gang, blinking as they processed their memories. Well, time to gather information before doing another early quickload.

"Medea," I said. She stopped arguing instantly to tilt her head my way with a warm smile.

"Yes?"

"Could you answer some quick questions for me? Ignore the explosions that are about to happen." She blinked in surprise, but nodded. "Perfect. So, simple question: Is the Goddess actually evil or are you just jealous? Why do the demons hate the Goddess?"

Medea lit up, as if this was her second-favorite topic to talk about and she was overjoyed to finally have an opportunity to espouse the glory of the Heir Cult to me. "Ah! Of course, of course. I am the foremost expert on the subject of the Goddess's evil, after all. You have come to the right place."

"Right. So, the answers?"

She nodded. "In my case, I realized the Goddess's evil through the power of my prophetic visions. At all times, I would focus my mental images on capturing more glimpses of you, Heir, and in the distant future you were always wrapped in chains that bound you to her hand. Her evil cackles haunt my dreams to this day."

"Right... Anything else, though? Like her domestic ruling policy? Does she create human farms to minimize effort in maintaining a stable population of believers? Is she omnipotent and omniscient but not omnibenevolent? Basically, does she commit any concrete evils so terrible that I would dare use the O-word and call her Objectively Evil?"

Medea shifted in her seat, ignoring the explosions and shaking palace. "You see, she has you chained. You are bound to her, rather than to me. It is a terrible, terrible future and more than confirms her evil."

I rested a hand on my forehead. I got the feeling the extent of Medea's wrath against the Goddess was literally just her visions of me being metaphorically bound to her by chains, and thereby not bound to her in holy matrimony. "Okay, scratch that. What about the demons? Why do they hate her?"

She smiled. "They are demons. Have you ever heard of a demon that did not rage against the heavens?"

"I mean, surely they have some concrete rationale here. They seem to know a lot about the prophecy, and think it spells the end of the world."

"Do you recall the wording of the prophecy?"

"Vaguely."

Hark, as the legions unending swarm,

So shall come the Heir of the World,

With fire, soul, death, life, and nature at hand,

he shall Unite the Five,

and Inherit the World.

"As your namesake implies, you will Inherit the World upon Uniting the Five. The implications beyond this are more than clear: you will bend demonkind over your knee, and conquer the world in the name of the Goddess. Perhaps you will become a god yourself, or simply supreme emperor. Perhaps it is your fate to become a God-Emperor of sorts, Malcador." She smiled at me. "But regardless, there is no autonomy for demonkind after the prophecy is fulfilled; they will be a part of a greater whole, and they certainly value individuality above all else. They have prized their autonomy from the Church of the Goddess since its inception, and resisted many crusades carried out in the name of the goddess. Nothing would sicken Princess Xetrathia more than living her life in opposition to the goddess, only to be forced to wed her Heir."

"So... Again, nothing really against the Goddess herself?"

Medea shrugged. "The Supreme Goddess has never left the Alpha Heaven. If she is influencing the world in any concrete fashion, it is in ways too subtle for any mortal to know."

"Oh, and one quick obligatory thing."

"Yes?"

"Say 'I join you on your quest, Heir.' real fast."

"I join you on your quest, Heir," she echoed immediately.

...Okay, nothing. Glad we can put that behind us.

I leaned back in my chair. Talking to Medea had been both productive and not productive. In short, it didn't seem like anyone had any actual concrete reason for hating the Goddess, but it was pretty blatantly obvious that I was being railroaded down a path where I fucked the hell out of every princess and united the world beneath me in the name of the Goddess, which demons would understandably not be too happy about. It would be like some foreign country waltzing in and saying they had the Divine Mandate of Cthulhu to fuck the hell out of your supreme leader's daughter. Even without any concrete opposition to Cthulhu's domestic policy, that was pretty clearly not something anyone would be happy about.

The question of whether I was a force of generic evil therefore had no conclusive answer. I liked the thought of me being a God-Emperor, though. If only because it would reinforce an ancient mantra of wisdom: "Through Dick, Unity." My dick would unite the world and bring an era of peace and prosperity. Maybe all I would have to do was talk to Xetra about my domestic policy and she would see the benefit to an empire ruled by a benevolent and startlingly handsome dictator. People liked to value individuality and autonomy until a chad as fuck dictator promised to solve all their problems for them.

With that established, I waved Medea away. She bowed, overjoyed to have served me in any meaningful way. Racism and mass-death aside, she really was the perfect tradwaifu. Almost made me want to not punish her later, but I had principles to adhere to.

Instead, I turned to Rose, Sophia, and Daiya. I had to note and appreciate the fact that Daiya was completely apathetic about the explosions rocking her dwarf hold. This was basically her second time looping back ever, but already she had come to complete emotional terms with the fact that dead loops didn't matter. I had to imagine anyone else in her position would take a lot of time before they were willing to ignore the mass death and suffering of their people, but like she said before sucking me off, the dead loops just didn't matter to her at all. If only I had a fraction of her emotional strength.

"Rose, Sophia. How was the Beastkin kingdom last loop?"

Rose nodded, speaking before Sophia could. "Princess Flare was milling about the teleporters, hunting for someone who we presume to be you. She recalled a human foreigner and visions that told her not to go to her hoard, but could not recall where you came from in particular. We guarded her from the stray demons that came our way and that was that."

"Cool. Sounds like you guys have that in control. Okay, the long and short of it is that the demon princess commits murder-suicide through an explosion if the plan to kill Flare or Sophia fails."

"Me?!" Sophia exclaimed.

"Yeah, they burn down the Eternal Tree in hopes of getting you."

She scowled. "Make them pay."

"Naturally. Point being, I'll go to Koh'rin to try again with her. Maybe I can get the necklace off or something. You guys just stick to the Beastkin Empire or something. It probably doesn't matter, but I don't want Flare dying and forcing an early loop. Oh, and Daiya?" She inclined her head to me slightly. "How does the dwarf hold fare without us?"

"Without your assistance and the early retreat following Princess Flare's death, DirIe Ilirad will fall. They are too numerous for me to defeat alone," she said with no emotion. It was hard to tell if that was just a gem thing or if she didn't care since she knew it would be saved in a theoretical winning loop.

"Alright, well, I guess that means Koh'rin, the Beastkin Empire, and DirIe Ilirad are fucked in this invasion." I trailed off. I could probably save Koh'rin or DirIe Ilirad if I stayed and fought, but the Empire was too vast, and who knew if Penndrack was getting fucked up too. This really was a world-ending invasion; either they killed a princess and forced a reset, or they fucked up every country in the world. This seemed like a pretty hellish situation. There had to be some way out of this that didn't involve mass death and destruction, but it wasn't coming to me immediately. Maybe I would need to spend 100 years training in shadow clone jutsu to get enough coverage to solo an entire invasion.

Anyway, I quickloaded. No point starting 10 minutes late in a loop for no reason. In the blink of an eye, Medea and Hilda was arguing in each other's faces again. I had to say, looping back to a catfight between busty babes leaning over me on either side was slightly less relaxing than waking up to Rose and Sophia sleeping in bed with me. The universe really fucked me over with this save position, but I supposed I could hardly complain.

The Looping Gang all made their moves immediately. Daiya left to put up the empty defense of the dwarf hold, Rose and Sophia left to babysit Flare, and I left to go to Koh'rin while Medea and Hilda balked in confusion

Once in Koh'rin, I firmly adjusted my armor and helmet to leave no open spots on my neck for a knockout dart. I doubted Dakka would be able to surprise me now that I was on guard against her, but better safe than sorry.

I went to a window to peek outside. Things seemed oddly more calm than last time, though there was still fire and chaos. I hunted for the contingent of red I had seen before, but wasn't seeing it; there were just the normal red dots of demon commanders here and there. That was weird. Maybe they just needed more time to get here?

I leaned against the window and waited. Minutes passed, and nothing. I saw a blur of black, but no contingent of red. Very strange.

Dakka shot her dart, but I tilted my head to dodge it. She raced my way, presumably to stab me with a poison-soaked dagger, but I held up a hand. "Stop," I ordered forcefully, and she instantly stopped. A little too instantly. I turned to look at her. She wrote black assassin robes, just like before, but had frozen in a comical mid-throw position with her arm held back and the dagger in her hand. Could it be...?

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"Show me your bare stomach," I ordered, and she instantly tossed off all her clothes. There it was; her Dominate Beast womb tattoo was still emblazoned on her stomach, pulsing with a healthy pink light.

Eeeh. Well, it turned out that Dominate Beast enslaved someone down to their very soul, or something. That made sense, considering one had to submit 'in body and soul' for the spell to work. Really, the implication of Dakka and the others being permanently enslaved to me down to the fabric of their soul would have bothered me more if it wasn't for the fact that the spell would only activate if that's what they wanted more than anything. It was slightly disconcerting, but I wasn't about to deny them their greatest happiness over paltry concerns of morality. Who was I to judge if this made them happier than anything? It would be pretty presumptuous of me to decree myself the arbiter of their happiness and refuse to allow them to follow their hearts.

Also, the womb tattoo was pretty hot.

"Uh, well, as you were. Put your clothes back on if you want, I guess. You can do whatever except knock me out," I ordered half-heartedly, then turned back to the window. She elected to not put her clothes back on and instead peer out the window with me. It was, admittedly, pretty distracting to have such supple dark elf boobs pushing against me as I tried to focus on the outside window, but it was nothing I couldn't handle.

"Looking for something?" she asked.

I shot her a look. "You seem pretty calm about all this. Your city is dying and you have an inexplicable womb tattoo. Shouldn't you be more worried?"

Dakka shrugged, rubbing the tattoo. "It feels right, and looks pretty damn sexy on me. I won't complain. Plus, the military police were hot on my trail before the demons stirred things up. This is more of a lucky break to me than anything."

I lifted an eyebrow. "You think it looks sexy?"

"I mean, yeah." She laughed. "What, do you think girls don't appreciate sexiness? How do you think we know what underwear to pick? I like this thing. Goes well against my brown skin. Don't you think so?"

I admired the pink womb tattoo. It certainly did. "Okay, you win."

"That's what I thought."

"But what about your autonomy? Doesn't the soul enslavement bother you?"

She shrugged. "Can't beat the cock."

"True," I nodded. "Nobody can beat the cock."

I peered back out the window. Yet more minutes passed, and there was still no visible contingent of red. They really should have been here by now. I was pretty sure I had noticed them instantly last loop. Eventually it would be around the time I woke up in Dakka's tree basement, and surely Xetrathia would be burning the tree by then. Things just weren't adding up.

I should have noticed my confusion. I should have acted faster. I should have thought harder.

With this character's death, the thread of prophecy is severed. Restore a saved game to restore the weave of fate, or persist in the doomed world you have created.

The bite into my soul happened instantaneously, and instantly I felt the agonizing pain I felt whenever Sauron hit me with his mace. I staggered backwards, clutching my heart. The pain the pain the pain it hurt so bad so bad so bad SO BAD SO BAD! I fell to my knees, vomiting. The hole in my soul was like a hole in my chest. Like a beam of sheer pain had torn through me, leaving an invisible gaping hole in my chest. I pounded a fist against the ground while screaming.

I knew. I knew. I knew who had died. I knew Sophia had died. She had been there in my soul, all along, and I never knew it. But now she was gone, and I felt it. I vomited more. The screaming stopped; the pain was fading to tolerable levels. But the sickness, the nausea, was still there. I staggered to my feet, my right hand bloody from the pounding. Where? Where had she died? Beastkin Empire? Rose? Rose? ROSE?

I bolted back to the teleporter. Dakka wasn't even on my mind. I had to save Rose. Quickload? No, I had to know. I had to know what happened. Who? Who? Why? They would pay. I would make them pay.

I staggered through the teleporter, and arrived back in the Dwarf Hold. I knew where the teleporter to the empire's capital was. I sprinted down the halls, faster than I had ever sprinted before despite my weak legs and nausea. I had to get there. I had to. Fast. Fast. Faster. FASTER! FASTER!

Rose died just as I reached the door. More pain, more agony. I vomited again, but did not cry. I had shed my last tear. Tears would not make it better. Only the inflicting of pain would.

I kicked the door down, defying the pain through sheer force of will, and went through the teleporter. Almost half my soul was gone, it felt like. Was it permanent? Would it not come back in the loop? No. No. It couldn't be. That would be too cruel. Too evil.

The roads of the Beastkin Empire were made of white ivory, but outside of the teleporter building, they were stained with red. Rose was standing with her back to the door, a blade piercing her heart and pointing straight to me. Prince Aeneas stood on the other side of her, grim determination on his face. He withdrew his sword, and Rose crumpled to the ground. She was already dead, I knew. I looked to the left. Princess Flare, back pressed against the wall to the building, shivering in fear, covered in wounds. Rose had been protecting her; weakening herself for Flare's sake. I looked to the right of Aeneas. There was Princess Xetrathia near Flare, wielding her scythe and curving it around the other's neck. A hostage? Xetra's expression was equally grim.

How? Why? How was she here? Why was she here? What?

"I did not want to do this," Aeneas said to me, looking mournfully upon his bloodied blade. "The prophecy must be broken, for the sake of the world."

It hit me. He had killed Sophia too. He wasn't satisfied with just killing one princess. He wanted to ensure the prophecy was stamped out, no matter how many princesses had to die. They killed all the Beastkin princesses each loop. If they could, they would always kill as many princesses as they could.

"AENEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAS!" I roared. I had never felt so angry in my life. It was pathetic, in a way. He had his reasons. I understood his reasons. I empathized with him and Xetrathia, even. We were all fate's bitches. But this. This was too much. The great tragedy of human empathy was that we lost it all the moment someone close to us was hurt. We transformed into unthinking, unfeeling monsters. Take the most morally upstanding and kind man you know, then beat and torture his wife in front of him. He would be a monster by the end of the day, ready to torture and murder the closest man to him in the name of revenge.

Revenge. Oh, how songs have been sung about the meaning of revenge. There is no topic we are more ready to wax poetic about. We are so eager to fall upon ourselves and point out how revenge is pointless, how it makes no-one happy, how the dead would not ask for you to turn to a life of vengeance, and so on. They all missed the point. Revenge was not something done for concrete benefit. It was not a rational choice founded in logic. It was an ideal.

Non-idealists struggle to empathize with idealism. They see an ideal and argue about the logic behind it. They see an idealist and ask "do you really choose to believe in this despite all its flaws?" They missed the point on such a deep level it was embarrassing. An idealist did not 'choose to believe in' their ideal. Rather, their ideal was so fundamentally true to them, life could not be any other way. There was no choosing. Their ideal was life, and they lived for their ideal.

And at this moment in time, I lived for killing Aeneas.

I punched him in the mouth so hard and fast I felt the bones of his jaw shatter beneath my fist. The force of the blow sent him flying backwards and crashing through walls. He would have been launched out of the city if I didn't Reverse his momentum to bring me right back to me, whereupon I punched him in the face again, and again, and again.

There was no sword fight. There was no playing around to make for a dramatic duel between Heroes. I was not in the mood for playing around. I punched, and punched, and punched until his face was a bloody mess. Then, I threw him into the ground and gathered rock around my fist. A trick of the Elemental Arcana. Demons were shockingly sturdy, it seemed, but this would finish things.

"FIRST, COMES, ROCK!" I roared, then slammed my fist down as hard as I could. Blood splattered everywhere, and he went limp. I stood there for a minute, my hand buried into the rock beneath where his head had been, and then fell to my knees, tears streaming down my cheeks. I hated this. I hated it. I hated it. I didn't want to do that. My soul hurt. My heart hurt. The rage was just too strong. The hole left by Rose and Sophia too gaping. I couldn't have forgiven him.

I stood up and looked down upon my bloody hand. It was the fist that had once thrown a dagger and killed a man. Back then, I didn't care. I kept going. But my heart had grown too much. I closed my eyes. I couldn't go on like this. I had to go back. No matter what, I had to go back.

When I opened my eyes, it occurred to me that nobody had interrupted us. I looked at Flare. Her eyes were wide, and her cheeks flushed. I looked at Xetrathia. She had fallen onto her back, and now she looked up at me with a dropped jaw, her eyes wide with sheer disbelief. She had been paralyzed at the sight of the beatdown; unable to do or say anything to help.

I pointed at her. "Don't hurt the people close to me. Come find me in DirIe Ilirad. I'll beat you there as many times as it takes."

She nodded vigorously, then caught herself and snarled. "You killed Aeneas, monster!"

That gave me pause. It took her that long to say anything? And she hadn't even tried to stop me? It was almost like she didn't really care about Aeneas all that much. Not to mention, how did she even know to come to the Beastkin Empire? So many mysteries.

It took me a second, but I put the dots together. Ah.

"You don't love him, do you?" I asked.

She scowled at me, then stood up on shaky legs. "You'll... You'll pay for this! I'll be back!" she staggered away, distancing herself from the teleporter room. I blinked, not sure what she was planning, but eventually she was out of sight. I had kind of expected her to leap at me and use her suicide explosion to kill me in revenge, but apparently not.

The key to it all, in any case, seemed to be love points. If time travel wasn't her greatest enemy, then it was my overwhelming male perfection. Beating her in Koh'rin earned a love point, and I had mentioned Aeneas couldn't beat Princess Flare alone, so she came with him. Their double firepower took down Sophia, Rose, and almost Flare if I hadn't interrupted. A huge defeat for us this loop, but time travel would undo all wounds, and love points were forever.

The victory condition for this loop was right in front of my eyes. It should have been obvious the moment I learned one of the Five was the mastermind behind the invasion. The solution was so devilishly simple. Xetrathia had revealed her hand too quickly. She should have disguised it through more layers, and maybe it would have taken more time to realize. But she was new to this, and probably didn't even understand the significance of the memories. Maybe she thought they were a prophetic vision, rather than a warning of the past.

But it was too late for that. I knew her secret. If I maxed out her love points, she would stop the invasion before it began and come right to me. I wouldn't have to lift a finger. Aeneas seemed to fulfill the role of a love rival, but despite their betrothal, she hardly seemed to care that much for him. She certainly hadn't shed a tear over his death, and given that me beating her in a fight earned a love point, she valued strength highly—something Aeneas had just shown a distinct lack of. Maybe he wasn't in the running from the start. Her heart was ripe for the taking.

I looked up at the blood-red sky, filled with smoke and hate as the city died. Is that really the solution I wanted to take? It felt dangerously close to brainwashing. Would it be brainwashing? Was love in this world brainwashing? The question had been lingering in the back of my mind ever since love points first presented themselves to me. Girls seemed to fall for me fast, and absurdly hard. Rose and Sophia said they loved me with all their hearts, despite the tsundere act Sophia put up most of the time. Was that fake? Were they lying without realizing it? Were their minds not their own? Was it outright impossible to fall in love with someone so quickly, leaving brainwashing as the only option? Daiya had awoken to feelings thought impossible for gems to have. Her grey, dull world had lit up with fire and life due to me, though almost no effort of my own except existing.

Was that right? Was this right? Was this love? Or was it brainwashing? Was it real, or fake?

This felt like the most important question in my life. It felt like the one thing that decided everything, both in this world and back home. It was impossible for me to read the minds of others. It was impossible for me to measure the purity of love. I had nothing to go off but observation and their word. They say that 'without love, it cannot be seen." One has to hold love in their heart and interpret the world in good faith to see reality. If I called their love fake brainwashing, would I be blinding myself to the good in the world? If I called it true love, would I be blinding myself to the evil in the world?

Which was it? If it was brainwashing, I didn't want to brainwash Xetra. If it was true love, then...

But how could I ever know which? Was it not beyond humanity to know the true nature of love?

"You're so strong," came an awed voice from behind me. I turned, and saw Princess Flare standing up despite all her wounds. She hefted her axe and pointed the sharp tip at me, completely unbothered by its weight. It was like she had forgotten she was wounded to the point of being half-dead. Something drove her to stand, and fight.

I looked around at all the corpses. "Is now really the time?"

She paused, her body taut, then bolted towards me so fast she turned into a blur. Dragons were the strongest of the Beastkin for a reason: They loved strength, and lived for strength. They were the strongest race on the planet, boasting incredible power, speed, and bloodlust. Flare was just a young tomboy, so she lacked the earth-shattering power of a fully grown dragonkin, but she had all their bloodlust. It was impossible for her to contain herself after seeing my fight with Aeneas. She needed to destroy me, or be destroyed. The fire in her blood wouldn't be satisfied until one or the other happened.

But I had beaten her before. I just had to dodg— HOLY SHIT!

I should have known from how she turned into a blur from the dash. She swung her axe far, far faster than she had in the cave. What was it? Did the fire in her blood give her strength? Did she just recognize me as a worthy opponent now? Whatever it was, I couldn't dodge her axe swings. There was a limit to how much I could spam physics distortion, and she was swinging her giant axe far more swiftly than should have been possible. It was all I could do to draw my sword and desperately parry the blows, deflecting them to the side. I felt sonic booms shatter the air behind me with some of her swings.

Flare was up in my face. Her slitted dragons pupils had narrowed to an almost imperceptible line. The gold of her pupils radiated fire, and I felt like I could even see red scales form on her face. She opened her mouth as I parried the flurry of blows to the best of my ability.

Oh no.

Dragonfire, for the record, was very hot. It could melt steel beams without causing any conspiracies, and so I died almost instantly as the white-hot flames rolled over me. I would need to watch out for that next time, I thought, in the moments I had before my body melted away within my plate armor. If only I had worn my leather armor instead of metal armor, that might have made the difference. Maybe. Probably not.