Their carriage moved along the road going south bathed by the rays of the summer sun. Aidan watched as Princess Pearl of House Juvela, heir apparent of the Kingdom of Gohar sighed for the umpteenth time, her sadness at the sight of the devastated villages almost unbearable.

Pearl was short, just a little over a meter-fifty in height and with a slender build. Although her size would make her seem childish, the Princess had all the subtle curves in the right places. Rumor had it that the Earth magic common to the Royal bloodline of Gohar came from a remote dwarven ancestry. She had smooth straight hair that fell around her face like a picture frame. Her eyes were a deep earth brown and made her seem wiser.

The Princess felt responsible for unleashing upon the world the culprit for the mass murder of all these villagers. Hero Kazuya, a Japanese otherworlder she summoned on a whim went insane after Aidan cut off the connection between the Princess' soul and the summoned hero and it turned out to be the source of his sustenance on this realm.

Without the power supply that came from devouring the Princess' soul, the otherworlder went on a murder spree to absorb what he called 'experience points' from the killing and 'level up'. He ended up going after them in the capital of Yutis, the kingdom they were now crossing to take Pearl home. They went to great lengths to stop Kazuya but in the end, the summoned 'hero' kidnapped Pearl, killed the Princess' knight Gurf. In the final fight, they almost lost if it were not for noble sacrifice.

Aidan sight moved from the petite and hot-headed Princess to the elf girl sitting on his left. Cythrel was an elf orphan they rescued in Gohar, running away from slavers. At first, they took her along out of pity but the elf girl could grow on people. During the final fight with Kazuya, she jumped in front of a strike that was meant to kill Aidan but lost both hands, severed below the elbows by the otherworlder's severing technique.

Turned out that any wound made with that technique could not be healed or regenerated. Aidan tried every single magic available to him but all he could do was to close the arm stumps a little down from where the life-draining katana severed them.

Cythrel was not yet a full adult by elven standards even though she was thirty-three years old. Elves stop growing at the age of twelve and spend twenty years in a preteen body. Only after that, they grow for a few more years and then stop aging again for centuries, with the features of a young adult. She was even smaller than Pearl with one meter and forty centimeters - she had grown in this year they spent together - and her hair was flaxen gold although that would change. Elves with magic change hair color with the seasons. Since she'd only gained magic powers recently, the colors of the other three seasons were still a mystery.

He still felt guilty for what happened and his impotence at healing the girl. He even gave her Elder Fairy wings in the hope the fey magic could help but it only awakened her latent magic powers, turning her from an outcast mundane and magic-less elf into a dual-Element Mist mage. Cythrel was resilient and stoic. She didn't let the sadness take her and even used Aidan's own emotional vulnerability to seduce him.

He shook his head. Aidan was not ashamed of what happened between them. The elf girl won his heart fair and square and she became his second wife. They still didn't consummate their marriage because Aidan wanted to wait for her to grow up. Just a few years. Since the elven account of time is somewhat skewed by their long lives, she reluctantly chose to wait.

He met his first wife's gaze and the squirrel-kin girl chuckled, asking with her eyes what he was thinking. Nobody was in the mood to talk given the sorrow for the mass murder Kazuya wrought in these villagers.

Sora was one of his two childhood friends he remembered. Probably the only two anyway, given how recluse Aidan was growing up. She came to him because of an ancient covenant between the original god-slayer and the squirrel-kin tribe of beastkin people, a covenant respected even now five millennia later. For every generation of the god-slayer family, a member of the squirrel-kin tribe volunteers to go and serve the scion. Not in a sexual way and not as a subordinate, but as a lifelong companion and trusted advisor.

But falling in love for one's squirrel-kin companion was not taboo and had happened several times in the past. Why the children of these union were always human was a mystery of their bloodline but after Aidan did the courting rite of tail-grabbing in the middle of a Royal Gala and made Sora his wife, he stopped worrying. He even regretted not doing it sooner but the occasion was a dance to remember. They even stopped an assassination plot against Pearl.

The ball was intended to celebrate the return of Princess Lumina of Yutis back home, with Aidan as the guest of honor for doing the deed. But it was not Lumina that returned with them. Due to another assassination attempt two years ago against Lumina's life where Aidan was caught in as a bystander, he used a spell to keep himself alive despite the deadly wounds he suffered. Being a personal spell, he couldn't save Lumina unless he did the unthinkable.

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The day of the assassination attempt on Lumina, Aidan took the princess' Soul into himself and sheared his own in half, placing one part in the control of her body. From that day onward, he was a person that lived in two bodies. His own and the Princess'.

Everything started because of that. The assassin, a teacher at the magic academy they attended tried to dispel their life-sustaining magic but succeeded only in dispelling the pain resistance that was keeping them awake. Aidan and the part of Aidan running Lumina's body went into a coma for a whole year while the magic that kept their bodies alive devoured their souls.

Being the least damaged portion, the part of him in the Princess' body woke up first, putting the other half into an even deeper coma to supply the moving body with a small amount of magical power. They learned they couldn't be separated by more than a few dozen meters. When Lumina's father threatened to ship the Princess body to the Holy City for healing, they had to flee or die.

So Aidan kidnapped the princess from inside her own body. They traveled to Gohar, met Pearl and Kazuya, rescued Cythrel, developed a plethora of new spells to heal their condition and returned home to Yutis. Back at the academy, Aidan researched a way to bring Lumina back to life, for the lack of a better term. She never died officially.

During their stay they fought Kazuya, Cythrel lost her arms, and a lot of other things happened, including Lumina's fiancé arriving to make the Princess his at any cost. Aidan had to fight to avoid being wed to Prince Brody in Lumina's place. In the end, he defeated Brody in a duel and 'won' Lumina's marital freedom.

He also learned that he couldn't just remove his soul from Lumina's body and place the Princess back in hers. During the year and a half they stayed together, the souls merged into their currently-occupied bodies. They had to clone Lumina's body so they had a spare to put the Princess in. After that equation was solved a separate person came into being.

The third woman sitting on his side of the carriage, Dawn. Or more precisely, Dawn, third Princess of Yutis and Lumina's twin sister. At least officially.

Being in both a male and a female body at the same time was confusing. Too confusing even now after all that. Aidan was slowly losing his sanity and even came close to just killing one of his two personas entirely until he decided to embrace the madness and create a second personality. Dawn the female adventurer and, later on, Princess was the answer he came to. Aidan had a few memories of Lumina back when the two played in the castle gardens in their childhood. Child Lumina was a tomboyish and daring girl. He molded his female half's personality on that and created Dawn.

Dawn was adopted by King Helios of Yutis for their efforts in bringing Lumina back. She was received in the fold of the Royal family with open arms by Helios' three children, Lumina, Claire and Lucien. The official cover story for Dawn's existence was that the late Queen Alina had twin daughters but one of the girls was kidnapped from her crib.

Aidan wondered if it made Dawn the third kidnapped princess but he brushed the thoughts aside. Exchanging a glance with Dawn, both laughed at their folly.

They were the same person inside. Every thought, feeling and sense of them was available to both but they could display a distinct outward demeanor. But at the same time, they weren't. Aidan and Dawn had different magical abilities and they could even cast different spells simultaneously. She was an Emotion mage, a complex four-Element combination of Light, Darkness, Fire, and Earth while he was a Cosmos mage with all six affinities.

It was a little gift for his troubles hosting Lumina's wilful soul inside his body for more than a year. Aidan originally was an Underworld mage, wielding Darkness, Fire, and Earth, while Lumina was a Sky mage. Her Elements were Light, Air, and Water. During their bodily cohabitation, however, their souls mixed. When they separated, Aidan kept the lions' share of the merged portions to himself while Lumina only took some bits and pieces.

The result was that Aidan developed all six affinities after their separation - although his original three are still the strongest of the six - and Lumina got a little bit more powerful with faint traces of his three affinities.

As far as he knows, Aidan is the only mage with six Elements in history. He already did some amazing feats of magic-using these Element combinations but he was so far keeping a low profile. Mages are a jealous and envious bunch, much like how Dragons seek and hoard power and wealth.

Not all dragons though. He glanced up at the luggage shelf of the carriage and found his sleeping familiar, Skippy. Skippy was a hatchling dragon, eleven years old. A baby by dragon standards. He got Skippy's egg from his parents after they failed to find a cure for Lumina's mother and since the little one hatched, they were inseparable. Their relationship was more of two close friends and not one of master and servant.

Pearl sighed again, shaking Aidan from his thoughts. Her personal maids, Deb and Lola tried again to raise the Princess' mood but to no avail.

Aidan's only hope was that her mood would improve once she was back home. Just a few more days to reach the last town near the border with Gohar, then two days in a tunnel under the mountains and Pearl would be home.

The Princess was afraid she would lose her standing as heiress to the throne. Given her blunder with the summoned heroes from Earth, it was possible. But Aidan was sure that coming with them and showing King Jett of House Juvela, sovereign of Gohar that the girl was wiser and had powerful allies like Aidan would make the King reaffirm her as heiress.

He was willing to put all the weight of his bloodline on the line for his friend.