Lia dismissed Ophelia, and was soon left in a room with just herself, Rose, and Amelia.
“So,” Amelia said with barely restrained excitement, “you wanted to talk about us?”
“Well, Rose and I have done some talking, and we’ve decided how we want to proceed.” Lia said slowly. “We’re not opposed to adding you to the relationship, but you’re going to have to meet a few conditions first.”
“I can meet any condition you want.” Amelia said proudly. “Tell me what they are.”
Lia shared a glance with Rose. “While you have made the swarm okay with relationships with more than the normal two people, I’m not interested in a harem. If this is going to be a relationship with three or more people, it needs to be equally polyamorous.”
Amelia frowned. “What’s the difference?” She asked.
“In a harem, it’s one person in a relationship with everyone else.” Lia explained. “Think a king and his concubines. In what I'm proposing, everyone is in a relationship with everyone else, meaning you would need to love Rose enough to want to date her, Rose would need to love you enough to date you, I would need to love you both enough to want to date you both…you get the picture.”
Amelia blinked. “That’s not too bad.” She said. “I can fix that now.” She immediately began to cast a spell, an enormous magic circle appearing beneath her.
“No changing Rose’s mind!” Lia said quickly. “It has to be natural!”
Amelia paused briefly. “Don’t worry, I’m not. I’m just changing my own mind. You’ll still be my number one, but she’ll be juuust below.”
“That’s still not natural!” Lia protested. “It’s not the same!”
The magic circle faded as Amelia frowned. “Why not?”
“Because it’s not real!” Lia said. “It’ll get washed away the moment you get hit with a dispel effect!”
“No, it won’t.” Amelia chuckled. “Even without my Hero power, I can make permanent transformations. And it’s not a mind-altering effect per-se, I’m literally transforming my brain to achieve the same result.”
Lia wasn’t quite sure how to properly articulate what she was getting at, but that, at least, was an easy rebuttal. “That’s not safe! What if you mess up?!”
“I won’t.” Amelia said calmly. “This isn’t my first time doing this; why do you think I’m so in love with you?”
Lia went silent at that bomb. Amelia’s love was…because she had changed her own brain? Why? Did this mean everything was fake? That she really could have been anyone else, and Amelia picked her at random?
“Stop right there.” Amelia said. “I can figure out what you’re thinking. No, it had to be you. When I was younger and first met you, you were the first person to make me feel. And the feeling grew for a while, and then…it started to go away, and that scared me. So, I took matters into my own hands, and made that feeling strong and permanent. It was the best decision I ever made, and if doing it again means getting to be with you, then I’m more than willing to go through with it.”
“B-but,” Lia stammered, “you don’t actually care about her, you just need her to to get what you want.”
“And?” Amelia said, tilting her head to the side. “People want to feel different things or change their behavior all the time. Some people want to feel less angry, some people want to be more generous, some people even want to want something, this is no different. I want to love Rose, and that’s that.
“They say to fake it ‘till you make it, and that acting a way for a long time will change you to be that way, so I’m really just cutting out the middleman. Besides, I’m not changing anyone else, it’s my brain, so it’s my choice, and I’m not hearing any arguments.”
She apparently meant that literally, as a zone of silence expanded outwards, catching Lia and Rose in its effect, followed shortly by a barrier that prevented them from getting closer to Amelia. Amelia turned her focus away from the two, then resumed carefully constructing her spell, the giant magic circle reappearing under her.
Desperately, Lia began working up a counterspell, but even with Amelia’s powers being bound, she was far more capable magically than Lia was, and the spell didn’t work. It wasn’t just that Amelia was able to put more power into her spells, it was that her spells were better constructed; Amelia had a lifetime of tinkering with the very foundation of how the system worked, while Lia really only had system-guided help in using magic for a few months.
Amelia, don’t! Lia cried out telepathically. I don’t want this! As Queen, I command you to stop!
Amelia smiled an infuriating smile, the one she always had when she was pulling something over a person, and Lia pounded against the barrier. Amelia…Amelia wasn’t really aware of what she was doing, it was just twisted and warped values coming –
Rose’s hand fell onto Lia’s shoulder, snapping her out of her daze. Lia looked up at Rose, who just shook her head, a sad smile on her face. D…bot…e…ad…oi
Lia frowned. The mental communication was coming through garbled and unclear, and she was only able to pick out bits and pieces of what Rose was saying. You sound weird. Lia said. I think the silence zone messes with telepathy, too.
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
Rose frowned as Lia’s communication came in, a clear sign that Lia had sounded just as garbled as Rose had. Lia began casting her eyes about the room, looking for a sheet of paper, and then the air changed, sound returning to the room.
Lia immediately rushed over to Amelia, who was patting herself down as if to shake off dust. “Amelia, are you okay?!” Lia asked, carefully looking her up and down. “That was really reckless! Why wouldn’t you just listen to what we had to say?!”
“I’m feeling better than ever.” Amelia said dreamily. “I’d forgotten how good it feels to gain someone else you love. And it wasn’t reckless, it was perfectly safe, I’ve done it way too many times for it to be reckless.”
“Still, why?!” Lia wailed. “It could have just happened naturally!”
Amelia shook her head. “No. You and me aren’t the same, Lia. I don’t have the luxury of being able to fall in love, if I want to feel something like that, I need to make myself feel it.”
“But…I thought they got rid of the Urge.” Lia said. “You should be better now, able to actually feel!”
“I haven’t felt like my feelings have changed.” Amelia said. “All that’s changed is that I don’t feel compelled to not hurt people.”
Hey, it’s your favorite Goddess of Commerce, Connie. We really should have let you in the loop on this before it actually came to a head, but she’s actually right, at least for the time being. We made it so that the whole emotion dampening thing was removed in bits and pieces over time. We didn’t want to suddenly bombard her with a ton of emotions right when she woke up, who knows what would have happened.
But…if you’re looking to get this little oopsie fixed, we can do that for you, for a price. Let’s say an even hundred thousand Blood Money.
Lia sighed. She wasn’t anywhere close to that amount of cash, especially not now that Connie had taken all her Blood Money as payment for the device used to entrap Ira. She’d…she’d just have to wait.
“You could change, after a while.” Lia said softly. “That was supposed to come gradually over time.”
Amelia shrugged. “Well, I would have done this anyway.” She said. “Why bother with that whole intermediary period when I don’t have to? Anyway, you had other conditions?”
Lia looked over to Rose for help, and Rose gave Lia that sad smile again. “She made her choice, Lia. It’s hard to describe what the Urge does to you, how…dull everything is. If I had been in her situation, I probably would have ended up a similar way; I wouldn’t have wanted to let any happy feelings go, because…who knows when I would have felt them again.”
Amelia smiled, walking over to Rose and grabbing her hand. “Thank you.” She said. “And…I’m sorry about our first meeting, I was more inconsiderate than I should have been. Will you forgive me?”
Rose hesitated, then nodded. “For now. But you need to listen to all of our conditions before you do anything else, alright?”
Amelia beamed at Rose, and an odd sort of jealously bubbled up within Lia. Amelia had never shown that face to anyone but her, and it felt…wrong to see her give it to someone else.
That feeling was easily squashed, however; Amelia wasn’t giving that expression to just “someone else”; she was giving it to Rose, and this was, technically, what Lia wanted. She just…hadn’t been expecting it to be so sudden.
“Don’t worry.” Amelia said, walking over and giving Lia a hug. “Even if I love Rose to bits, you’re still just as special to me. No one could replace either of you, not even each other. Now…please, tell me your conditions. I want to be with you two as soon as I can. It’s like…it’s like I wanted this almost twice as much as I did before.”
Lia hesitantly broke away from the hug and motioned for Amelia to sit back down. When Amelia had complied, Lia continued. “The love thing was the big one. And, while your part of that is complete for now, you still need to win Rose and myself over. I love you, yes, but as a friend; if you want me to love you romantically, you’ll need to push yourself a little.”
Amelia grinned. “Seduction? I can get behind that. It’ll make the ultimate prize all the sweeter.”
“As long as no mental manipulation is involved.” Rose reminded her. “We don’t wish for that.”
“Oh, it’ll only be involved temporarily and consensually, for fun times.” Amelia smirked. “There’s all sorts of fun to be had there.”
“R-right.” Lia said. “But that brings us to our other condition. We…we need you to work on being a better person. Now that the Urge is going away, we want you to work on treating others with more respect, like Rose and I do. We know it will be a hard road, but we believe you can do it. And, if you can…well, I think you’ll be someone who we can truly fall in love with.”
Amelia nodded slowly. “I…I will try my best.” She said reluctantly. “But I’ll need your help. I don’t know what treating other people right is like.”
“For now, just copy how me and Lia behave.” Rose said. “I’m sure that, as the urge fades, you’ll be able to pick up on why things are done, and you’ll come to realize that doing nice things not for the sake of acting a part or for a reward is really its own reward. And, if you need help, our door is open at any time.”
Amelia paused. “Do you think you could swing things with Connie so that we can just apply the fixes they were going to put on me before?” She asked. “That should make the process easier for everyone involved. I would do it myself, but…I really don’t know what is expected in that regard, not like how I know love.”
Amelia paused, staring into the space in front of her. After a few moments, she shook her head. “Never mind, it would seem that’s impossible. We made a deal, and they cannot break it, even if I wish to renege. But…they say that if I make progress myself, they will welcome that with open arms. In fact, Connie’s even offering a reward, leveling up your Dimension of Discounts to the point where you can buy facilities, with the benefit of a leisure facility for free.”
“That’s a reward for you?” Lia asked blankly. “Doesn’t that just help me?”
Amelia suddenly teleported over to Lia’s side. “Silly,” she said, leaning down so she was speaking into Lia’s ear, the sudden closeness making Lia blush, “everything I do is for you. And besides, you’ll be able to bring us there, too; I’m sure the three of us can find something to get up to in a place for leisure.”
Amelia backed away, giggling slightly. “I’m going to go put together a plan.” She said. “For both improving myself and seducing you two. Just you wait; you two will be begging for me to join the relationship when I’m done.” She gave them a wink, then turned and sashayed out of the room, leaving Lia and Rose behind.
“Do…do you think everything’s going to turn out alright?” Lia asked.
“I don’t know.” Rose admitted. “But I don’t think it can get any worse than it is now. And, admittedly, I think the two of us, uh, me and Amelia, that is, could bond over the Urge.” Rose got a faraway look as she continued. “I think…I think I would like to see her fixed.” She said. “No one deserves the Urge, and it’s been worse to her than most. I think her true self is more in line with how she acts around you, and…I could fall for that, I think.”
Rose shook her head, smiling faintly. “I think that’s enough of that for now.” She said. “I think it would be prudent to form a plan now that Ira is defeated. The other nations know of our existence, and while we certainly have a bit of time, it’s not infinite. A plan will, at the least, provide structure for us. What do you say?”
“I say you’re right.” Lia said. “Let’s get everyone important together.”