PART 1

"Come inside," Moose told me as he gestured from the living room. "You must be cold after flying here."

"It wasn't that bad," I answered, opting not to correct his misunderstanding.

"Gimme a moment! I'll whip up a warm drink, don't go anywhere!" Mike exclaimed and disappeared through another door.

Sighing, I walked over to Moose's side and took a seat on the cheap couch in the middle of the living room. I glanced over at his corner of the room, where he set up his laptop, along with a couple of extra screens. Combine that with the aesthetics of the rest of the apartment, and it had a slight 'nineties movie hacker den' kind of vibe. To be fair, it was still better than how the place used to look just a couple of days ago.

Before Moose came to hole up with Mike here, the whole place had a bit of a 'bachelor man-cave' vibe to it, but now most of that was isolated in the hapless Celestial's own bedroom. As for why the big guy was staying here, the explanation had multiple layers. For a start, while I did give them operational funds, and I expected them to rent a place for Moose, he went with a different plan. Instead of 'wasting' perfectly good money like that, he moved into Mike's apartment, bought a guest bed, and spent the rest of the funds on networking equipment.

This decision meant that he didn't have to keep the various patrols and surveillance teams of all the different factions clustered in Timaeus in mind, and when combined with his full access to the Celestial Hub, he somehow ended up way more on top of current events in the capital than I was. To be fair though, it might not have been that big of an achievement, considering at this point I was being pulled in so many different directions, the only reason I didn't misplace my head yet was that it was firmly attached to my neck.

"So, Admin?" Moose addressed me the moment he sat down in front of his screens. For the record, we decided to refer to each other by our online handles, because it was more comfortable for both of us. "I suppose you're here for a situation report?"

"Pretty much, yes," I admitted, and the guy gave me a curious look. "What?"

"To be honest, I thought you wouldn't come today, after dueling an arch-mage."

"You already know about that?" I blurted out, and Moose let out a soft chuckle. Despite his rough looks, I quickly learned that he was a surprisingly soft-spoken and reserved individual.

"I think I already told you that we have two agents and four assets in the local School. They were practically stumbling over each other in their rush to be the first one to report what happened." Moose paused and looked me over. "But speaking of which, are you all right?"

"Of course. It was a friendly sparring match involving laser beams, magical railguns, and a fusion bomb."

"… I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not."

"I'm not… At least, I don't think I am. Considering how stupid crazy my life has become as of late, I'm not even sure I'm capable of sarcasm anymore."

Moose was about to respond, but he was beaten by the punch by Mike returning to the room with a plastic tray.

"Sorry for the wait. I only had a few cheap tea bags, so I'm afraid they may not be up to your standards, but—"

"Don't stress over silly things like that."

I gestured for him to hand over the teacup, and he let out an audible gulp.

"O-Okay." He took a seat on the other end of the couch, and glanced at me before mustering up his courage to ask, "So…? Who won?"

"Were you listening?" I asked as I inhaled the scent of the tea. It was… probably Earl Grey, I surmised, though I wouldn't know for sure until I gave it a taste. In any case, Mike nodded, so I responded with a light shrug. "Technically I did, I guess, but neither of us was going all out. As I said, we were just sparring."

"Ah! As expected from the Archon!" Mike exclaimed as if my 'victory' somehow brought him vindication.

Shaking my head, I took a sip from the tea and… Ugh. It was quite plain, and based on the aftertaste, Mike let the tea filter sit in the hot water for too long. Speaking of which, I didn't hear the sound of a water boiler, so… did he just put the whole mug with the filter in it into the microwave? That's so…

"Oh."

"W-What?" the blonde guy stuttered, sounding downright frightened by my reaction.

"Nothing. I just realized I might be becoming a tea snob, and I felt ashamed," I told them, and took another sip from my average mug, like a good guest should. "Anyhow, I'm still waiting for the sit-rep."

"Right, on it," Moose responded and reached for his mouse. After a few clicks, he turned to me again. "So, while I was at first skeptical about this whole 'taking down the Directorate from the inside using the Intelligence Network' plan of yours, it's coming along easily."

"Does it?" I blurted out, unable to hide the pleasant surprise in my voice.

"Frighteningly so," the big guy nodded, and clicked a few more times, probably to bring up a new window or document. "I had no idea there was this much pent-up resentment against the current system, not only amongst the Ishim agents outside of Elysium, but all of their relatives back home. I've already recruited dozens of collaborators, with more on the way. If you give me three… no, just two. Two weeks, and we'll have a faction that can turn the current Orthodox/Unorthodox/Reformist divide on its head."

"I call them Archonists," Mike chimed in, adding nothing to the conversation.

"That's good news, I suppose," I noted, and Moose nodded without any reservations.

"Of course it is. I mean, if you insist on dismantling the Directorate politically, this much is pretty much necessary."

"I don't insist on—"

"Oh, speaking of Archonists," Mike spoke up, only to cover his mouth when he realized he cut me off. When I didn't speak up again though, he let his hand down and awkwardly cleared his throat. "M-My apologies. It's just that, since it came up, I was curious if you knew about your cult yet."

It was a good thing I was very careful about when and how I was drinking my tea, because otherwise, this would've been the most obvious spit-take scene in the history of ever.

"My what?"

"Your cult," Moose affirmed, proving that I didn't hear it wrong. "They are the descendants of the closest followers of yours, from your first incarnation," he explained, completely missing how reluctant I was to hear any of this. "Once Deus was elevated to his, or in this case, her current position, they had to go underground, but they continued to revere the Second True Archon, despite the Polemos of old getting de-emphasized in Elysium's tradition and history books. They were too disorganized to make contact with you while you were still in Elysium, but once they heard we were recruiting sympathizers, they immediately made contact and pledged their—"

"Hold on," I cut Moose off, just as he was getting into it, by raising a palm. "Is this a secret society of some sort?"

"They call themselves the Sons of Polemos," Mike responded, and in his hurry to contribute, it took him a few seconds to realize he was missing the point and hastily add, "A-And yes, I suppose they kind of are, aren't they?"

His eyes were signalling for help, and Moose let out a long breath.

"Ninja got it right. They kind of are a secret society of sorts, but seem to be dedicated to you, so it shouldn’t matter much."

"Bloody hell," I whispered under my breath and took another sip. "A secret society within a secret society. Now I've seen everything."

"Excuse me?" Moose cocked his head to the side, probably because he couldn't hear what I said, but I dismissed him with a wave of my hand.

"Never mind. Anything else to report?"

"A few things," he said and returned to his laptop. "My brother's making some suspicious moves."

He was meaning Director Mensah, and while I was still looking for the right opportunity to ask exactly what their story was, this wasn't it.

"How suspicious?"

"The Unorthodox faction pushed a military readiness bill through the Directorate, and it involves taking the Colossi out of storage for maintenance and readiness testing."

"How many are we talking about?"

"About six," Mike answered in his stead. "It's the biggest mobilization in the past three hundred years, I think."

"More like four hundred, but close enough," Moose noted.

"And the other two let him do that?" I asked with a brow raised, and Moose winced.

"Well, we're not sure what kind of agreement they made under the table, but neither Director Savir nor Tsephanyah objected. My gut tells me it might have had something to do with the other motion that was passed that day."

"Don't keep me in suspense," I said jokingly, but he still took me seriously.

"I wouldn't dare. It was about Director Savir's proposal to relocate an old Book of Hymnos from the archives to the grand vault under Migdál Iodes. It's an odd hill to fight for, but so far, I couldn't figure out why she would make a deal with my brother for this. I'll try to find out by the next time we talk."

"No need. I have a very good idea about what's going on," I noted, wondering if I should do something about it.

"Really? What is it?" Mike pestered me, so I shook my head.

"Sorry. It's personal."

"Oh."

Disregarding the blonde Celestial, Moose typed a few words and then gestured to get my attention.

"Ignoring that, there are a few other collusions in motion. The most relevant ones are the ones that want to remove the Prefect of your Praetorian Guard from his position."

"A conspiracy against Jaakobah?"

He gave me a shallow nod.

"Indeed. There seems to be a widespread sentiment about him being unworthy to serve under the Archon, landing his position entirely because he was at the right place at the right time, and not due to personal merit."

"So, jealousy."

"Pretty much." Moose paused, and then added, "One of these conspiracies is trying to frame him for some crime or another to force him to resign, while the others are just straightforward assassination plots."

"Two of them?" Moose nodded. "By different people." He nodded, again. "Bloody hell."

"Do you want us to do something about it?" Mike asked, looking like a puppy waiting for me to throw the ball, so that he would get praised when he brought it back.

"Can you?"

"Sure," the big guy answered off-handedly and turned to the screen again. "Do you want these plots shut down?"

"Of course I do. An assassination attempt on him is the last thing I need right now."

"Noted." With that cryptic response, Moose started typing. I waited in silence to see what he was up to, and after about a minute of clicking and keyboard-hammering, he turned back to me. "Done."

"… What's done?"

"You said you wanted the plots shut down, so I did," he told me like it was weird I didn't get it the first time.

"… How?"

"Some of the people involved are currently online on the hub. I sent them PMs saying that Archon Polemos wants them to stop scheming against his Prefect. And…" He fell silent as he glanced at the screen again, and his lip bent up into a satisfied smile. "Look. One of them already wrote back, apologizing and asking me not to tell you who he is. I'm sure the rest will get around in a few hours."

"… Okay, no. There's no way in hell it would be this simple."

"It kind of is though," Moose told me, sounding puzzled by my reaction.

"No, I mean, doing this would only make them hunker down, making them and their schemes even harder to track in the future, and you even told them you're affiliated with me."

"Yes. I've been doing that from the beginning. It's why nobody tried to interfere with us so far." Seeing the eminently skeptical look on my face, Moose let out a heavy breath and closed down his laptop, so that he could face me properly. "Admin, or rather, Lord Archon. Can I be brutally honest with you for a moment?"

"When have you ever not been so?"

"… A fair point," he granted me and then linked his fingers in his lap. "Before anything else, I want you to know that even if I disagree with your methods, I'm willing to follow through with your instructions. It's just that I really, really don't understand why you're insisting on doing things this way."

"Please define 'this way'."

My flat response made his eyes shake, but he remained serious and even frowned a little.

"Lord Archon. You are aware that we don't need to be surreptitious about your plans, right? I'm sure you have your reasons for trying to do it this way, but if your goal was only about taking over the Directorate and reforming the government of Elysium, you could do it any time you wanted to. I mean, you do know this, right…?"

"Oh, not this again," I groaned and put the empty tea mug onto the nearby coffee table before using my fingers to massage both my temples. "Listen, Moose. That's just not how politics work, okay?"

"Right, Raz. Don't be silly," Mike hurried to back me up, but if anything, he sounded like he was just playing yes-man without understanding what he was agreeing with.

Disregarding him again, Moose's attention remained on me as he narrowed his eyes in clear displeasure.

"I apologize, but I think you're the one who's not entirely clear on how influential you are in Elysium."

"That means nothing," I argued back. "No man rules alone. Politics is all about holding the keys to power. Military, finance, law, and so on. All of those are under the control of the directors, so it doesn't matter how much influence I have; until I've got those keys, it's worthless."

Once again, Moose looked at me as if worried that I was having a stroke. It irritated me quite a bit, but I remained silent and waited for him to say his piece.

"With all due respect… are you fucking with me right now?" When I continued the silent treatment, he exhaled hard and sat up straight in his seat. "Listen, Ninja here put me in contact with his father, so I think I'm more-or-less up to date about what happened in Elysium during your stay. Consider this: the military departments, including the Seraphic Safeguard, are already on your side."

"Tentatively," I granted.

"I don't see what's tentative about it, but let's look at it objectively: even if they weren't, what could they do? You soloed a Colossus in public, right?"

"Yes?" I nodded, wondering what that had to do with this conversation.

"And you won a duel against an arch-mage of the Assembly, on top of their School. Meaning the ley-line nexus." I was still uncomprehending, so he further stressed, "One of the scariest people on the planet, at the spot that gives them nigh-infinite power and makes them practically undefeatable."

"That's overstating it a little, but—"

"Please, let me finish."

"Hey, Raz. You're being rude," Mike tried to intervene, but the moment the big guy sent him a glare, he shrunk back.

"As I was saying," he continued unabated, "You had already publicly proven that you can take on the biggest guns Elysium and the Assembly have at their disposal, and come out on top. That means you cannot be regulated by the military, and they know it. You already subverted the lion's share of the secret services through the Hub, and as for the directors in charge of law and finances and so on… the truth is, you are their key to power, not the other way around. Deus is currently too inexperienced and something of an airhead, or so I've heard…"

"H-Hey! You promised you wouldn't tell him I said that!" Mike whined, completely missing the point that he just outed himself.

On the other hand, Moose calmly continued his previous thought.

"… while you're an already established leader with a strong grasp on power both amongst the Celestial elite, middle-class, and even the Malakim. And that's not even counting your power-base here on Critias. You have all the necessary qualifications and justifications to take control of Elysium at any moment, and ninety-nine percent of the directors, and the rest of the population for that matter, would cheer you on, because they already consider you the key for staying in power. Do you get what I'm saying?"

"I do, but I call bullshit on that," I answered just a tad dourly. "Yes, the Directorate, and the political culture of Elysium in general, are absolutely messed up, but I refuse to believe it's this infantile and simplistic. It's absolutely, categorically impossible for it to be this easy."

"It is. You need to stop being so pessimistic about this prospect."

"Don't knock pessimism," I warned him with a finger pointed at him. "Pessimism is what carried me so far, so I won't have you badmouth it."

"I still think you're wrong about this…" Moose began but then raised his palms in surrender. "… but as I said, you're my boss in more ways than one, so I'll follow your lead. If you want to subvert the Directorate from the inside because you can't believe Elysium would rally behind you in a heartbeat, so be it. However, I withhold the right to point at you when this is all over, and say 'I told you so'. Deal?"

I eyed the guy for a moment, then let out a long, lung-rattling groan.

"You're sounding just like my assistant."

"… Is that a good thing, or a bad thing?" Mike asked, sounding genuinely baffled by my comment, but I continued the tradition of disregarding him and stood up.

"Fine. For now, just continue as you were. Contact me if there are any new developments or conspiracies afoot, but otherwise, focus on recruitment and organizing."

"If that's what you want, sure," Moose responded tersely before opening up his laptop again and stifling a laugh. "Hey, Admin? Speaking of conspiracies, got another message back from the guys who wanted to frame your Praetorian Prefect. It's like a small essay, but the gist of it is that they only want what's the best for you, weren't entirely serious, and then they ask about when you're returning to take over Elysium. What do I tell them?"

"To mind their own business and behave themselves," I growled as I headed to the balcony.

"Roger. That sounds like something you would say," the big guy concluded and began typing. In the meantime, Mike also rose to his feet and tried to follow after me, but I already reached the balcony door and stepped outside.

"W-Wait! Leonard!"

"Yes?"

"Erm… Have a nice evening, and if you meet Ammy, please tell her I'll call her later."

I wanted to tell him to do it himself, but then I realized that calling the class rep to say he would be calling later would've been pretty silly. As such, I settled on a shallow nod.

"Will do. Anything else."

"That's all, and… uh… next time, you could stay longer? You know? Maybe we could hang out, instead of always talking about politics and work? W-We're friends, after all, right?"

He looked both expectant and scared of my answer, so I rubbed my face and told him, "Sure. Next time."

The guy beamed at me like I just handed him a winning lottery ticket, but I ignored him, put my foot on the handrails, and after miming the act of jumping off, I immediately Phased away and back to the base.

As skeptical as I was about Moose's claims, they did give me something to think about. Before any of that though, I had to check on Ammy and the girls and see how things progressed. Also, I had a meeting with Roland. Plus there was that whole thing about Savir trying to lock away a specific book, which no doubt held the forgotten laws with which she threatened to annoy me. All in all, I had a lot of things to look into, and there were only so many hours in the day, so worrying about whether I could truly become the supreme dictator of the Elysium just by walking into the Directorate's assembly hall and giving them a stern look had to wait.

PART 2

"Just go home, take a nice, warm bath, and rest," Elly instructed the class rep, and she let out an ambivalent noise that could be maybe-kinda-sorta-potentially construed as agreement.

The four of us, including Judy, were standing outside, near the entrance of the base. Since it was no longer strictly 'secret' anymore, after it became the official headquarters and/or fortress of the Ordo Draconis, it naturally meant there was more traffic. First off, we had our Knights moving back and forth daily between the base and the Dracis mansion (or in Duncan's case, the school) to do their jobs. Then there were the Draconic Federation's representatives (mostly meaning Naoren and Odango Girl) visiting the place regularly, plus the Fauns and the Kage Ninjas going on their patrols.

The last two groups didn't use the main entrance anymore though, as Fred dug a special secret exit for them, so that they could move in and out of the complex unseen, but the rest were still using the front entrance. Because of this, a construction project was already underway, one of the first joint finance ventures of the Draconic Federation. It wasn't anything fancy; just a small resort building to serve as the cover for our movements, as well as a proper parking lot, so that my in-laws wouldn't have to get out of their limo at the edge of a dirt road.

Speaking of them, Mom-in-law apparently had some connections with the mayor's office, and the nearby bus stop we first used to get close to the abandoned bomb shelter was moved to said parking lot. Of course, I didn't need it, but it was still very convenient, since it meant I no longer had to ferry everyone in and out all the time.

"I'm not sure I'll be able to sleep," the class rep muttered, sounding more tired than anything. "I have so many things to think about."

"Do it in moderation," I commented as I pocketed my hands. The sun was already down, and early spring or not, the air was getting pretty chilly. "Too much thinking gives you wrinkles."

"That's the least of my problems right now," Ammy grumbled, eliciting a soft chuckle from the princess.

In the meantime, the regularly scheduled bus arrived on the minute, and after bidding our farewells, the class rep boarded it and we headed back inside. It was only when we were already walking down the stairs that Judy spoke up.

"Chief?"

"Yes?"

"Since Amelia is already meta-aware, I think we should involve her in our future discussions."

I turned my head to face her and blurted out an eminently baffled, "Are you serious?"

My dear assistant nodded without any reservations, and my other girlfriend also agreed with her.

"She has some interesting ideas," Elly stated rather diplomatically.

"She certainly had… after you threatened her with a retcon," Judy pointed out, and I reflexively rolled my eyes.

"It was less of a threat and more of an attempt at shock therapy. And hey, it worked, right?"

Judy eyed me skeptically for a while, and when we reached the bottom of the stairs and were about to enter the main hall again, she cut in front of me to halt us.

"For the record, if it didn't work, would you have done it?"

Now it was my turn to stare at her incredulously and shake my head.

"Please, Dormouse. Who do you take me for? Didn't we already discuss that it's ridiculously dangerous? While I admit my on-the-spot judgements aren't always perfect, I'm not nearly frivolous, or mad, enough to cross the Godzilla Threshold for something like this."

Also, there was that whole thing about other me's warnings and the Bone Man with the other star-people and whatnot, but I didn't want to go into extra-Simulacrum details with this.

"Something like this…" the princess echoed me, with a finger on her cheek. "So that means you would do it if the situation is bad enough?"

"Theoretically? Maybe," I answered just a tad ambivalently. "I mean, it could potentially unravel time and the universe itself, but if things get bad enough, I guess uncertain doom is better than certain doom?" My girlfriends were both giving me flat stares, so I hastily added, "Why don't we just drop this line of thought and focus on how to avoid any such situations in the future instead?"

"Sounds more productive," Elly agreed, and Judy shared the sentiment, as she stepped out of the way so that I could open the heavy metal door leading into the base itself. Arnwald insisted that we needed more layered defences and checkpoints, but honestly speaking, opening and closing this one simple door was already quite the hassle. Even though this was a fancy-pants hydraulics-assisted magitech super-door Fred and Galatea made to replace the one Mountain Girl cut apart when she invaded the place that one time.

In any case, the moment we stepped inside, we were welcomed by Roland, standing nearby and waiting for our return.

"Good evening," he greeted us in a neutral voice and focused his attention on me. "I've heard you were looking for me."

"That's right. I'd like to have a tactical meeting about some… delicate matters."

He quickly caught my drift and nodded along.

"Are you joining?"

This time the question was aimed at my girlfriends, and after a short discussion they conducted entirely by glances, Judy shook her head.

"Go ahead without us. We'll discuss what to do with Amelia in the meantime."

I had no reason to stop them, so we parted ways (after the customary kisses, of course), and they went left, while Roland accompanied me as I turned to the right.

"What would you like to discuss?" he asked after just a few steps, but I shook my head and pointed at the reception room.

It was the second time I'd be discussing sensitive matters in there, but to be fair, it was the perfect place for that. Since I was the only one who made use of the teleport closet, nobody else had a reason to wander around there, so it was both private and comfortable. Once inside, I turned the wheel on the door (this was one of the original ones that looked like they belonged on a submarine, complete with the locking wheel and all) and only then did I gesture for Roland to sit down.

"I'm listening," he said once he took a seat on a bench.

I didn't, but instead, I proceeded to walk back and forth in front of him while I started on relaying what I'd just learned from Moose about the internal movements of the Directorate. For context, I also explained Savir's coercion tactics with the old laws, and how it related to that book she was trying to safekeep, followed by the news of Mensah's mobilization efforts.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

I purposefully left out the part where Moose insisted that I should just put my cards on the table and take over the Elysium directly, because I still wasn't convinced by his argument, and I focused on the concrete facts before moving on to the issue of Percival instead. Then I touched on my duel with Lord Ambrose and the Assembly's involvement in all of this in general, and concluded with the topic of Tajana's Fauns and whether we should just throw caution in the wind and hunt them down or not.

He listened attentively, and once I reached the end of my speech, I turned to face him and say, "So, that's the gist of it. What's your opinion?"

"… On what, exactly?" he asked back, sounding rather puzzled by my request.

"About what my next move should be. I can't decide what I should prioritize first, so I'm asking for a second opinion."

"You should've started with that," Roland told me in an even tone and took a deep breath. "Right now, I'd say there are three issues on which I feel the need to advise you."

"Go on."

"As you have noted yourself, you need to deal with Sir Percival." My stomach sank hearing his assessment, but I made sure it didn't show on my face. "We can't keep him locked up forever, especially now that you're already back in Timaeus. Even after all this time, he provided no useful information, and he's too dangerous to keep around. While he's no longer as much of a political liability as he used to be, considering your direct connection to Celestial hierarchy had long since superseded any concerns about their past influence on the Brotherhood, he still poses a liability. His testimony would not only incriminate you by furthering your collusion with Bel of the Abyss, but it would do the same for Neige."

"Ugh… Yeah, that's a problem, but what exactly do I do about him?"

"As much as it pains me to say it, I'm still of the opinion that executing him for his crimes against the Brotherhood, the Ordo Draconis, and you in particular, would be the cleanest way to go about this." Roland's voice didn't even waver as he said that, sounding way too reasonable.

"Any alternatives?"

"None, other than keeping him locked up forever, eating up resources and manpower for the rest of his life, and hoping that he never escapes or gets found by anyone."

Hearing that made me close my eyes to think. As distasteful as it was, Roland wasn't wrong about his assessment, and as he said, we didn't have other options. Well, except maybe for retconning him, I jested… but then my thoughts got caught in a loop and my brows furrowed.

Could that be done? Theoretically, I could've retconned him into not being a traitor, in which case… Wait, no. If I did that, then he would've never set me up, and I wouldn't have ended up in the Elysium, and then the whole Polemos thing and everything related to it would've happened. That's not just a butterfly effect, that's the whole bloody hurricane.

Then what if I made him into a double agent? Someone still loyal, but playing a dangerous game. I could make it so that we planned the whole thing together so that I could infiltrate the Elysium, and… Ugh, no good. Wouldn't doing that still mean that I would erase his current self to replace it with someone else? How was that any better than just killing him? Morally speaking, I mean. And, and…

Seriously, what was even wrong with me? Why was I even seriously considering this as an option? Didn't I just tell the girls that we would need to cross the Godzilla Threshold before I should even entertain the thought? Yet, I would've been lying if I said the idea of doing so wasn't tempting, in a kind of intoxicating, primal way. I couldn't help but wonder; now that I knew that had enough phantom limbs to make the deed non-debilitating, would I have seriously attempted it if not for the warning of other me… and the chilling memory of the Predator Moon's gaze wedged into my subconscious?

Roland must have mistaken my internal turmoil for something else, as he soon cleared his throat and continued in a slightly more considerate tone.

"I know you are averse to this solution, but you are a leader. Sometimes, it means you have to make hard decisions that leave a bad aftertaste, for the sake of the greater good."

"I know, I'm just…" I groaned and massaged my forehead. "I'm wrestling with something bigger as well, and I'm afraid of unforeseen consequences if I get rid of Percival like that."

"Something bigger than the single greatest upheaval in the history of the World of Mystics," he said flatly, and I nodded.

"Yeah. It's hard to explain though."

"Is it destiny?"

"It's—" I almost answered reflexively, but then as the word belatedly settled in my mind, I closed my mouth so hard I nearly bit my tongue. My eyes narrowed on their own and I asked, "Who, when, and how?"

"Angeline, two days ago, I overheard her discussing it with Joshua after leaving Wissenschaftler's workshop."

For the record, that was Fred's surname, and more importantly…

"That girl and her big mouth!" I exclaimed, followed by a long groan. "Okay, listen. Just forget about it. Things are already complicated enough; I don't have the mental capacity to explain this for the second time today."

"The second time?" Roland echoed me, and when I glared at him, he let out a sigh. "If that's an order, I'll forget about it."

"More of a very strong request, but please do. Thank you," I concluded, and then after a beat, I crossed my arms and mused, "What's the second thing?"

Roland seemed rather displeased by the way I moved on from the topic of Percival without reaching a decision, but he played along.

"Personally, I would recommend ignoring the Celestial Directorate for the moment." That was unexpected, and my reaction must have shown on my face, as he subsequently clarified, "While their military buildup is troubling, you have previously explained that the Unorthodox faction's primary concern is the Abyssals, not us. The Draconic Federation is still in its infancy, and while our relationship with the Assembly can be called amicable at the moment, they still represent the status quo of the World of Mystics, and our organization is directly intruding on the domain they held for centuries. I believe that, for the moment, we need to focus on solidifying our internal structure, as well as our relationship with the Magi. Getting involved in the domestic matters of the Celestial realm at this moment is not in our best interest."

"Granted that they leave us alone," I commented, and Roland nodded slightly.

"During the last general briefing, you said the leadership of the Elysium are in soft opposition to you and Angeline."

"Two out of the three of them, yes."

"Meaning," he continued, barely acknowledging my interjection, "they are currently busy solidifying their own political position in preparation for your eventual return to their realm, along with Angeline's. Am I correct?"

"You're not wrong," I answered a tad hesitantly.

"That means they would most likely be bogged down in internal strife, potentially for years to come, meaning they would have less time, manpower, and opportunity to interfere with external affairs. This is, without a doubt, beneficial for the Federation."

"Yes, but if they do solidify their position, then…"

My words trailed off, as I wasn't even sure what I was trying to argue anymore. I promised the girls that I would take care of the whole Celestial situation sooner than later, but I could understand Roland's perspective on this. His main concerns weren't about narratives and route-ending climaxes, but how our actions would affect the Ordo Draconis and the Draconic Federation it was part of. Unlike me, he had his priorities clear and straight. That fact alone made him much more qualified to be a leader than I was, which wasn't surprising, considering everyone was only following me because…

Wait. Now that I thought about it, didn't I gain all three of my official positions by traditions related to sentient magical weapons, instead of any inherent charisma or leadership ability? Did that… did that make me a triple King Arthur expy? Seriously?

This belated recognition made me stumble for a moment, which Roland must've once again mistaken for something else, as he cleared his throat and spoke in a much softer voice.

"Listen, Leonard. I understand why you would want to resolve the Celestial angle as soon as possible, considering their track record with subterfuge and sabotage, but I still have to urge you to act with prudence. If it seems like you can do it without causing political instability, or worse yet, military action, then do so, but remember that you now shoulder not only the Ordo Draconis, but the whole of the Draconic Federation… and in a way, even the lives of the Celestials in the Elysium as well. Don't be hasty."

"Fine, fine. I understand. That said, there was this other thing I mentioned that—"

"It's a trap," Roland cut me off, his tone blunt as a sledgehammer. "You mean the book this Director Savir is trying to lock away, or am I wrong? It's clearly a trap."

"You think so too?" I asked, though in my case, I was only slightly suspicious about it.

"In a way, it's almost too obvious," he mused and dragged a thumb across his moustache. I had no idea why; maybe his nose was itching. In any case, he stressed, "Based on your description, she possesses more than enough authority to do something like this on her own. If it was me, I would've made sure to keep it a secret and move it covertly, instead of openly announcing it for the rest of the Directorate. She most likely wanted it to reach your ears."

"That sounds like a reasonable conclusion," I mused and titled my head to the side. "Do you think I should play along?"

"… You want to walk into an obvious trap?"

"Well, not as myself," I emphasized with the tiniest of smirks, and Roland's shoulders slumped, as if by reflex.

"Bel?"

"I mean, I wanted to use him to make her sweat a little for a while now, and this seems like a great opportunity."

"Didn't we just discuss that we shouldn't stir the Directorate until we are ready to deal with the fallout?"

"Oh, but I wouldn't be doing that. It would be Bel of the Abyss acting up," I stressed with a smirk that was no longer tiny. "And knowing her, she probably wouldn't tell anyone about the encounter either, especially if I dropped a few carefully curated clues to mislead her into a wild goose chase."

"Correct me if I'm wrong, but the last time you did that, you caused an internal witch-hunt within the Directorate, and brought about the political instability that caused you to be… invited to the Elysium, and everything that followed afterwards."

"A fair point, and that's why I'll be very deliberate this time," I said with conviction. Or at least as much of it as I could muster. "Seriously though, if we're going to retire Bel sooner or later, I might as well make use of the identity one last time to squeeze some information out of her."

Seeing that I was adamant about this, Roland quickly gave up.

"Fine. I can only advise you, but if you want to do things your way, then you have to do so with your own judgment and authority. Speaking of which, there's one last issue that has to be considered and resolved as soon as possible."

I waited for him to continue, but he only looked back at me in silence, as if expecting that I would broach the subject on my own. But… what exactly was he hinting at? The subject was prompted by the word 'authority', and it wasn't about the Celestials, then… erm… Tajana's Fauns? No, that made no sense. In that case…

"I'm drawing a blank. What is it?"

"Since you aren't attending the Federation's meetings, you might not be fully aware of this, but there's a growing sentiment that you should be relieved of your duty as the leader of the Ordo Draconis."

Seriously?"

He nodded and uttered, "Conflict of interest."

"Oh. Because I'm also an Archon now." He nodded again. "Well, I can kind of understand their concerns. Do you want the job?"

"Don't even joke about that," Roland chided me with a deep frown. "Before anything else, you are the King of Knights, so the entire conversation is fundamentally pointless. However, since you do not appear enough in public, and don't exercise your authority in favor of the Federation, it's understandable that the representatives would feel insecure about your allegiances."

"So, on top of everything else I'm dealing with, you also want me to attend the meetings and reassure everyone about where I stand?"

"Yes. It's vital for the stability of the Draconic Federation."

Oh, great. I consulted Roland to figure out how to lessen my troubles, and I gained more things to do instead. Why did it always end up like this?

"I don't have much of a choice, do I?" He was looking at me disapprovingly, so I let out a sigh and raised my palms in surrender. "Fine, I hear you. I'm getting pretty used to playing the role of the stern but fair leader, so I'll just attend a few gatherings and wow everyone with my acting skills. That should be enough to keep the naysayers in bay, right?"

"It would be preferable if you didn't act, but took it seriously."

"What are you even talking about?" I blurted out, sounding even more offended than I truly felt at the moment. "I'm acting because I'm serious about this."

Roland eyed me with a look that said he wasn't sure I wasn't pulling his leg, but when I remained silent, he shook his head and gave up trying. With that, I considered the topic concluded, so I nodded to myself and raised a finger.

"All right, now that we agreed on this, let's go back to the previous points and figure out what I should focus on fi—"

Before I could finish that, I was interrupted by a guitar solo. I would've been surprised, but this was becoming a bit of a pattern, and I was catching on to it. Whenever my phone rang in the middle of a conversation like this, it meant either one of three things: something dangerous was about to happen, something stupid was about to happen, or the universe was trying to interrupt me. Also, the three of those weren't mutually exclusive.

"Hold that thought," I said as I took out my phone, and checked the caller ID. It was Snowy, but before picking it up, I faced Roland again and emphasized, "I meant that. Don't forget what we just talked about, because we're going to continue this discussion."

With that, I swept the green button across the screen and raised the phone to my ear.

"Hi, sis."

"Leo, we have trouble," my Abyssal sister opened with a clichéd line, and I couldn't help but sigh.

"Tajana, her Fauns, or someone else making trouble?"

"N-No, it's not them. Or… um… technically it's someone else, but it's not that kind of trouble."

Raising a curious brow, I urged her to continue.

"Exactly what kind of 'trouble' are we talking about?"

"We got a letter in the mail," Snowy explained, sounding unusually panicked. "It's from the Child Protective Services."

…

"…"

…

"What?"

PART 3

Three days. I was forced to waste three whole goddamn days because of this. Needless to say, I wasn't happy about it at all.

"My liege… I'm still not convinced that this is a—"

A single raised finger and a glare were enough to make Arnwald fall silent and let out a dejected sigh. He was sitting on my couch, along with Morgana, and I had the two of them wear casual clothes. In the former's case, that was a white shirt and brown knit vest combo right out of the fashion handbook of Judy's dad, while the latter was in a white turtleneck sweater and jeans. At first glance, they looked like a perfectly ordinary middle-aged couple. It took some effort to get them to this point, especially since Arnwald didn't want to trim his sideburns, but by this point, they looked decently normal enough.

It was Friday, after school, and we were ready to welcome our 'guests' from the National Family Support Services. The very, very conveniently timed visit by them, as it just happened that Director Savir's whole safekeeping-ploy with the old law book and whatnot was on this very day as well. What a koinkydink, am I right?

Ugh. Putting being facetious aside, this whole thing was about to give me stomach ulcers. The entire situation just reeked of Narrative influence, to the point I had no idea where to even begin describing it. The timing itself was just the worst, and not only that, because we were being randomly investigated by the national services instead of the local ones, it was impossible to stop them in their tracks without causing an even bigger mess. Money and influence could make a lot of things happen, but they still had their limits, especially when we only had three days to do something about it.

Not only that, the letter they sent explicitly demanded the presence of the entire Dunning family. Emphasis on the word 'entire', meaning I was required to stick around and not, say, mess around as a certain Abyssal with a nice mask. The question was, why? What was the nebulous Narrative's game?

Was this whole situation created just to inconvenience me? To keep me occupied? To set up another event somewhere else? Or was I supposed to take it prima facie, and conclude that its only goal was to stop me from nabbing the stupid book and rubbing it under Savir's nose? And if so, why? What was the through-line, the end goal?

Did the Narrative set it up because my doing so would interfere with its plot, or was set up like this to keep me busy so that I wouldn't get involved earlier? Or maybe it was reverse-psychology? We recognized that it was an obvious trap, so this whole charade existed just to get me riled up enough to interfere with the Savir-plot just out of spite. But wait! If the Narrative understood me enough to use reverse-psychology on me, it should've known that I would realize that it was using reverse-psychology on me, so maybe it's actually reverse-reverse-psychology, where it was trying to make me doubt my initial conclusion, and…

"Ugh," I groaned, and my sisters walked over to my side.

"Brother? Are you all right?" Penny asked with a concerned look, and I tried to flash a reassuring smile.

"It's nothing, kiddo. I'm just tired."

They weren't convinced.

"You could take a nap," Snowy proposed and patted me on the back. "We'll call you when they get here."

"No, that's not it," I said with a shake of my head. "Thanks for the concern, but knowing how things work around here, they would show up the moment I walked up the stairs."

Not to mention, I was physically unable to take naps, so the whole suggestion was moot, to begin with.

"Hey, L-Leonard?" another voice called out to me, this time from the direction of the guest room.

"Yes?"

Tajana poked her head out and gestured for me to come closer. She was wearing casual clothes and bunny slippers, and I had her wear a blonde wig, just in case this was one of those multi-layered plots where the child protective services were used by a third party (say, some Abyssals) to case out our home looking for her. If nothing else, it would at least sow some confusion.

In any case, she glanced at the senior Knights sitting on the couch and she lowered her voice

"Uuu… So, I just need to stay in my room, right?"

"The guest room, but yes," I confirmed.

"And if I don't make a noise, I get my own TV?"

"Yes."

"And… and if they somehow know about me and they want to see me, I tell them I'm a family friend staying over, and if I don't raise any suspicion, I still get my own TV, right?"

"Yes, that was the deal."

"I-I know, I'm just making sure," she huffed and puffed, then muttered, "Why am I only a family friend?"

"Because, as I've already told you, I'm not adopting you."

"That's not what I meant!" she complained, but when Arnwald looked over to see what the commotion was about, she froze up and then sputtered, "I-I'll be g-good!" and shut the door.

…

Seriously, how did this scaredy-cat of a woman end up as a spymaster again?

For the record, that was a rhetorical question. The answer was nepotism. In cases like this, the answer was always nepotism, and in a society still running on pseudo-feudalist aesthetics, it was doubly so.

Anyhow, since they were looking at me already, I made my way over to the couch, with my sisters in tow. Unfortunately, looking at Arnwald and Morgana sitting side by side like that once again reminded me of all the… well, I wouldn't necessarily call it hardship. Annoyance? No, that's too weak. Absolute pain-in-the-assitude? Yeah, that sounded about right. So yes, I was definitely reminded of the pain-in-the-assitude I suffered over the past three days.

"My liege…" Arnwald began, but when I glared at him, he hastily backpedalled. "I mean… Leonard? I'm still not sure we're the right people for this job."

Exhibit A: one of the main sources of my problems. This man and his constant complaints.

"I told you, we don't have any alternatives, and even if we did, it's too late to back out now," I responded with words I felt like I'd spoken about a thousand times in the last seventy-two hours.

Since this development required a full family to be present, for fear that it would lead to even more investigations and more PITAssitude in the future, it meant I needed someone to play the parents, and these two fit the bill to a tee. They were the right age, knew each other well enough to seem natural, and most importantly, they were knowledgeable enough about me and my family life to play the role well.

"I understand, it's just that…" Arnwald griped and glanced at the woman sitting by his side. "I don't want to make sis—, I mean, Morgana uncomfortable by doing this."

"I'm not uncomfortable," she stated without any reservations. "Not to mention, it's a request from His Maj— I mean, from Leonard, so we must do our best to comply."

"Naturally, but playing a married couple is…" the grown man muttered like an awkward teen, and I could once again feel my stomach cramps.

Why was it that even the most competent people around me had the weirdest hangups?

"As far the world is concerned, you are married right now, so put up with it," I said sternly, and it made Arnwald exhale a defeated breath. "Speaking of which, you've got the IDs on you, right?"

"Of course," Morgana answered pronto and presented an old-school paper ID. Mine was plastic, but apparently, these were more 'authentic' for these two's age group. At least according to the guys that forged these, and since they were the experts, I had to rely on them. Considering how real and worn they looked, at least I could be sure it was professional work.

Since things were much more involved this time, bearing in mind these documents weren't supposed to fool a casual ID check but government workers who dealt with these every day, I didn't rely on the same black-market guy I used to make Snowy's and Penny's papers. Instead, I outsourced the problem to Moose. Since the Celestial Intelligence Network was already full of experts on espionage, skullduggery, and fake identities (considering they had an entire pipeline for adopting out Celestial kids to assets), I figured they would do a better job… and I was unfortunately very right about that.

I say 'unfortunately' because, once they got wind of the news that Archon Polemon himself was calling upon them, the whole Celestial Hub lit up like a Christmas tree, and they overcompensated by crafting a watertight cover for our Dunning family, including IDs, marriage- and birth-certificates, inserting all of those into the national databases, as well as a full-on cover story for everyone, including employment-history and backstories… all of which I had to individually review, sign, transport, rehearse, and so on. Hell, between school, attending the Draconic Federation meetings Roland insisted upon, and all of these, I barely even had the time to do my daily Far Sight roll-calls, and I was getting seriously worried about losing the drift of the current events.

That was all the more reason to make sure we could assuage any concerns these civil servants may have had about the Dunning household, so that I could finally start crossing things off my bloody priority list again.

"Morgana Dunning," the knightess spoke as she looked at her ID, and then she snatched the other one out of her temporary husband's hand. "And Arnwald Dunning. They don't have a bad ring to them, do they?"

"They sound…" Arnwald tried to formulate an answer, but the words were stuck in his throat, so Morgana let out a modest chuckle, her eyes clearly showing her amusement.

"I could get used to them."

"Sister Morgana. Please don't tease me," the man grumbled but then clicked his tongue. "I called her 'sister' again, didn't I? This is hard."

"Just relax," Morgana told him as she handed his ID back to him, and then squeezed his hand. "Just pretend we're still trainee Squires, and it's going to be all right."

"I'll try," the man declared with an altogether too serious look on his face, and I was just about to get annoyed again when Penny's voice made everyone tense up.

"Brother! There's a car in the driveway! They're here!"

"You're being too loud," I said and gestured for her to get away from the window. "All right, everyone. Stick to the script, mind your words, and everything will be fine."

The people in the room nodded, some more confidently than others, and after taking a deep breath, I headed over to the front door. I waited for them to ring the doorbell once, but only opened the door after the second time. I figured this would make it more natural.

On the other side, I found a pair dressed in business casual; a tall and lanky man in his late twenties, and a slightly overweight woman in her mid-to-late forties, by eye. They looked fairly unremarkable, but the look in their eyes said that they weren't just basic placeholders either.

"Good afternoon," the woman greeted me in a brisk and authoritative tone and offered a hand. "Rebecca Servause, from the Department of Family, Youth, and Children of the National Family Support Services."

"Faron Deacon, pleased to meet you," the man spoke in a softer voice and didn't offer his hand, probably because it was full of binders and other papers. "May we come in?"

"Leonard Dunning, and sure," I answered and stepped aside. "We've been expecting you."

The pair of civil servants came inside and I directed them on where to put their shoes and coats before we entered the living room. They seemed to be surprised by the number of people present, but after everyone introduced themselves, we all sat down.

"Since I presume you've read the letter my office sent to your residence, I think we can skip the preamble," the woman stated, and her colleague handed her a clipboard. "We'd like to ask you a few questions if it's all right with you."

"Excuse me," Morgana cut in, raising her hand. "The letter didn't include the reason why you would want to visit us."

"It is standard procedure, Mrs. Dunning."

"Just Morgana will do," she cut in again with a friendly smile. "No need to be so formal."

"Yes. Morgana," the woman muttered while she was looking for a pen. "The truth of the matter is, our office received multiple reports about three underaged youth living alone on this lot, without parental supervision." She paused when the male office worker handed her his own pen, and she impatiently tapped it against the clipboard. "I see that's not the case right now."

"It's an easy mistake to make," Morgana continued with a warm smile and glanced at Arnwald. It was his turn to speak up, but the man was too busy staring at her, so she had to elbow him in the side to get him moving.

"Ah, yes," he blurted out, followed by a soft harrumph. "Due to our line of work, we are rarely at home."

"Your line of work," the woman repeated and turned the pages on her clipboard. "Since it came up in conversation, can I ask you about your professional history?"

"Until recently, we both worked in the military," Arnwald explained, and while his voice was a little wooden, he was doing well enough. I gave him a secret thumbs up as encouragement.

"Both of you?" the younger man spoke up for the first time since we sat down.

"Indeed," Morgana confirmed.

"Is that where you met?"

"We…" Arnwald began, but then he faltered, so Morgana picked up the conversation where he dropped it with an amused chuckle.

"I met Arnwald when we were still kids," she explained.

"Really?" the woman asked half-heartedly as she jotted down a few things. "And you enlisted together."

"At the same time," our Sir Eagle emphasized. "We were serving under the same… erm… officer."

"Didn't that get in the way of your relationship?" the male civil servant pressed on, though he sounded more curious than skeptical of their claim. "I thought the military forbade relationships between people in active service."

"We ended up in different units," Morgana explained hastily.

"We could rarely meet each other," Arnwald followed her up, sounding genuinely pensive. "Deployed to different parts of the world."

"It was impossible to consider a relationship under those circumstances," Morgana sighed. "We were in danger every day, and couldn't be sure we could ever meet again."

"But you did," the woman stated in a phlegmatic voice, trying to make it sound better by forcing a smile. "And you even had children."

"It just worked out in the long run," Morgana answered, this time a bit more uncertainly. I couldn't blame her; since these were child protective services by any other name, I was expecting them to ask about us, not to get bogged down in these two's backstory.

"It was hard back then," Sir Eagle reminisced with a forlorn expression. "If only I was bolder…"

"It's all right, Arnwald," Dame Gorgon whispered and held his hand. "The past is in the past, not worth dwelling upon."

"I know, I know," he answered, and they stared into each other's eyes with gazes full of warmth and longing and regret and what hell was I even looking at?

I blinked first and then narrowed my eyes. What was the deal with the atmosphere between these two? I mean, I knew they had some latent UST, potentially pent-up for decades, but this really wasn't the time or place for that.

The government workers also shared my sentiment, as the woman loudly cleared her throat.

"Yes, I understand now. You also said you are no longer working in the military-industrial complex?"

"Erm, no…" Arnwald responded a bit too slowly, hesitant to look away. "We are now working with Constable LLC."

"We're founders," Morgana corrected him.

"Yes, founders," he repeated with a nod. "It's a security company. We're employing ex-soldiers and veterans."

"Really. Fascinating," the female civil servant commented without meaning it and wrote down a few more lines and crossed a few check-boxes. "Did you switch careers for the sake of your family?"

"You could say that," Arnwald answered awkwardly.

"The truth is, even before this, our posts and superiors didn't pose any obstacle to a… relationship."

"Yes. There really isn't… I mean, wasn't any reason why we couldn't…"

"Excuse me," I cut in with a hand raised, drawing the attention of our guests. "Are these details really important? I'm sure you're busy, and we also have places to be, so can we discuss that thing you mentioned at the beginning? About the reports and us?"

"Yes, yes," the man of the duo nodded along and produced another piece of paper from his binders before handing it over to his colleague.

"You're Leonard Dunning, if I remember right," she noted, and when I nodded, she moved on to the girls. "Penelope Dunning, and…" she paused, and then levelled a gaze at snowy, "Neige Inanna-Dunning, right?"

"Y-Yes ma'am," my Abyssal sister responded politely.

"Indeed. This was another thing I wished to inquire about," the woman said and reorganized her papers. "According to internal documentations, despite already having two children attending high-school, you adopted another, similarly aged child. This is… highly unusual."

A-ha! Gotcha! We were already expecting this, and prepared accordingly!

"We knew Neige's family from our military days," Morgana explained, sticking to the script almost verbatim. "She used to play with Leonard and Penelope since they were young, but unfortunately her birth parents died in a tragic accident."

"She lived with her brother until recently, but then Leonard learned that he abused her as her guardian, and so we did our best to separate them," Arnwald followed her up, though his recounting of the draft we prepared was a tad more wooden. "After the court judged in our favor, we immediately appealed to adopt her, and we were granted custody."

"We have the court papers, if you'd like to see. Do you need a copy?" I proposed, and I wasn't lying. When I said the guys on the Celestial Hub were overcompensating, I meant it.

"No need. We can procure the relevant documents ourselves," the man declined our offer, though the woman apparently found this annoying, and sent him a disparaging glance before turning to Snowy.

"Neige? Can I call you Neige?"

"Y-Yes ma'am," she answered a little stiffly.

"Are you treated well here?"

"Of course she is!" Penny answered in her stead, and suddenly hugged her. "She's my sister!"

"I understand, but I was talking to Neige."

Snowy hesitated for a moment, then flashed a genuine smile.

"Yes. I'm happy here."

"Don't you miss your family?"

"I… miss some of the people I used to know, but this is my family," she emphasized. "Even if we aren't related by blood."

"That's good to hear," the woman noted flatly, and after organizing her papers, she moved on. "We should've asked some more basic questions first, but we got sidetracked, so let's start from the top this time."

What followed were a solid thirty minutes of taking all our identifying information (name, birth date, mother's name, et cetera), common daily stuff (where we attend school, our attendance record, and so on), and even some small talk.

Luckily, we were prepared for everything, including their questions about my latest absence from school, complete with fake hospital records and everything. Once again, the guys at the Hub were frighteningly good at this, but that was kind of expected.

On the other hand, the longer things stretched on, the more restless my temporary 'parents' became. Luckily, it seemed to escape the notice of our guests, or at least so I thought. Things remained more or less as we predicted until the point when Snowy's adoption came up again, and they took our copy of the totally legit and not-at-all freshly printed court documents about it.

"Since we're on the topic of adoption, I can't help but wonder," the man cut in, sounding unsure if he should ask, but when I raised a brow, he said, "What about the two of you?"

"You mean, Brother and I?" Penny blurted out, sounding alarmed.

"I don't wish to offend anyone here, but you don't look much alike, or resemble your parents much, so I couldn't help but wonder if there was something more to your family."

"What are you insinuating, young man?" Arnwald interrupted, sounding unusually impatient.

"It was just an honest question," the office worker said in a hurry with his palm raised. "You said your work in the military got in the way of raising a family until recently, and you seemed to be willing to adopt another child when the opportunity presented itself, so I was wondering if maybe…?"

"You're asking if we're adopted?" I asked, barely stopping myself from laughing out loud. "In front of us? Just like that? Are you the worst social worker or what?"

"There's no need to be rude," the woman spoke up next, between huffs. "We have to document these things for the case files. Not to mention, a lack of family resemblance can be due to other reasons as well."

"Such as?" Morgana asked, sounding genuinely baffled.

"Well, you did talk about how you were deployed separately and rarely met during your military career. Considering your oldest child's age, I presume he was conceived during that time, which means the identity of the father could be brought into question basen on—"

"You!" Arnwald suddenly erupted and rose to his feet. "How dare you! We welcome you into this house, and you dare slander her like that in front of my face! My Morgana is no loose woman!"

"Sir, please…" the man tried to get a word in, but our Sir Eagle had none of it.

"And you! I had enough with your disrespect! Get out of my sight, this instant!"

"Yeah! Get out!" Penny backed him up, at once, startling the duo even further.

What followed was a short yet rather chaotic argument where I could barely get a word in, but considering that they managed to piss off both Arnwald and Penny (by insinuating that we weren't 'proper' siblings), I had no choice but to watch the whole situation devolve in record time.

"Easy there, easy," I said as I stood between the two groups, but by then, the civil servants already got the memo and got ready to leave. In the meantime, Morgana did her best to calm down the furious Arnwald, and once our guests put on their shoes and stepped through the door, I flagged them down and told them, "Sorry about that. Father had to fly home in a hurry, and he's a bit touchy at the moment."

"It's… okay," the man answered tentatively. "We've seen worse."

"I can imagine," I responded softly, and after a beat, I also added, "By the way, sorry about what I said earlier. You're obviously not the worst social worker ever." I paused for another beat and then pointed at his colleague. "It's you."

"What?" she blurted out, nostrils flaring.

"Oh, and one last thing," I continued while ignoring her reaction. "This is my personal advice, but you miiight just want to drop this whole case. You see, we happen to have some pretty good lawyers, and what you just said a minute ago could sorta potentially totally get you sued for libel. You know? I'm just saying."

And with that, I waved my goodbyes and closed the door behind me, followed by a groan and an immediate switch to Far Sight.

"… told you this would be a waste of time," the guy stated as he stepped into the car and threw his binders onto the dashboard. "The adoption looked odd on paper, but it makes sense in person. A well-maintained home, healthy kids, overworked parents, no police record, all documents in order. Anonymous tips are always like this."

"It's still our job to look into them," the woman answered and fastened her seatbelt.

"Case closed?"

"Let's schedule another surprise visit in two or three weeks," she said as she scribbled something at the bottom of the questionnaire on her clipboard. "Just for calling us bad at our job."

"To be fair, what you said was uncalled for."

"I just wanted to see how they'd react. I didn't expect to be kicked out," the woman fumed and put her clipboard down, then handed the man's pen back to him.

"What did you expect? It's a military family! I'm surprised they put up with us for as long as they did."

"Fair enough," she answered just as they left our neighbourhood, and I figured that was good enough.

Sighing, I exited Far Sight and returned to the living room, where Arnwald was sitting on the couch again, his face buried in his hands.

"I made a mistake."

"No! You were cool!" Penny insisted, shaking the man's shoulder. "Right? Right?"

She was clearly looking for Snowy's assistance but got it from Morgana instead.

"Indeed, he was." She let out a thoughtful hum, and whispered, "My Morgana?"

The man on the couch shuddered and looked up at her.

"I'm sorry, Sister Morgana! I was worked up, and it slipped out because… because we were talking about our youth…"

Dame Gorgon let out a low, throaty, but altogether pleasant chuckle, covering her mouth with her fingers.

"Yes, I do remember you used to call me like that when we were young."

"I'm sorry. It was terribly disrespectful."

She paused and crouched down next to Arnwald.

"I didn't hate it back then… and I didn't hate it now either."

"Morgana…" the grown man stared at him with confused yet elated eyes, and in this situation, all I could say was…

"Get a room, you two!" I grumbled as I walked over to them, and they snapped out of it at once and stood at attention.

"My apologies, my liege! Because of my temper, we failed the mission…"

"Nah, it worked out mostly fine," I told him, and absently patted Snowy's head to recharge my energy levels. "I'll have to ask you to play the role again in a couple of weeks though."

"As you command," Morgana declared and saluted, closely followed by Sir Eagle. Then, timed perfectly to break the moment, the door of the guest room in the back opened.

"Can I come out now?" Tajana asked, poking her head out, and seeing us all still clustered around the couch, she asked, "D-Did I miss anything?"

"You wouldn't believe how rude those people were!" Penny fumed as she walked over to her side, closely followed by my other sister.

"Very rude," Snowy agreed, and the three of them entered the guest room together. I figured they did so to give these two some breathing room, and I followed suit.

"We don't have alcohol, but we've got some root beer and snacks in the kitchen. Feel free to help yourself to them, and relax a bit."

The senior Knights acknowledged me with shallow nods, and I left them to whatever spring-is-in-the-air-isms they were up to and headed upstairs. Once there, I closed the door of my room behind me, walked into the middle of the room, and allowed myself three deep breaths.

While things ended up a little shaky by the end, this stupid side-track was successfully resolved, the public services were none the wiser about our fake backgrounds, and it even did something to the UST between those two downstairs. It still annoyed me to no end that we had to waste three whole days on this, but it was done, so I adopted a zen mindset and shook off all my world troubles like water off the duck's back.

…

It didn't work.

"Oh well," I whispered after the third breath, and activated my Leoformer, donning a familiar white tailcoat, black gloves, and yet another version of my mask. I limbered up my arms and legs, used my fingers to comb my hair back, and then exhaled hard. "All right. Time to work off some stress."

And then, I disappeared from my room, without anyone being the wiser. As usual.