What happened to NPCs across the world of Fantasy Tales Online became a distant memory to those who witnessed it before long. After all, it was something that happened on the internet. A week in internet time felt like months to people. So, when a month passed after the incident and nothing else happened related to it, it was more or less forgotten about. The only people who were still talking about it were those who liked to spread conspiracy theories on the internet that came nowhere near close to the truth.
Fenrir preferred it that way. While there were parts of him that were curious about what happened and he wanted a deeper understanding of it, all that really mattered was that Saya, Rock, Shogun, and Corwin were safe. Of course, the NPCs mattered to him, too, but he would have been lying if he said he valued them as much as those who were true artificial intelligences.
More importantly, he had a new operation to work on.
Operation: New Waifu
The operation’s primary goal was simple. Fenrir wanted Saya to officially be a member of his relationship, and that meant he needed to get the others to like her, too. The only way for a new girl to join their relationship was if everybody involved liked one another. That also meant that Saya needed to like them, but that wasn’t difficult considering that she was still his virtual assistant and linked to his thoughts and feelings. Saya already felt the same way about Fenrir’s girlfriends as he did. All Fenrir had to do was get them to feel the same way about her as he did.
Though, he didn’t have to win all of them over. Nell, for example, was already obsessed with Saya and couldn’t wait for her to join their relationship. The rest of them still needed some work, though.
And sure, Fenrir still had a secret submarine to build and a faction to put in their place, but his relationship was more important to him. Or rather, his relationships. His relationship with Saya and his relationship with the rest of his girlfriends were technically different things. The whole point of his operation was to finally combine them into one.
And because Saya wanted to be treated like somebody who didn’t always know everything that Fenrir knew, that meant he needed to instruct her on how best to win the hearts of his girlfriends.
“You know,” Fenrir said as he stood in front of a chalkboard that he brought onto The Shoebill. The Shoebill was always the best place to have secret meetings as far as he was concerned. “I just realized something.”
“And we’re all going to suffer for it,” Saya said with a sigh. “What, onii-wan? What horrible thing has the misfortune of being on your mind? What are you going to say that will make me regret the existence of humanity?”
“Regretting the existence of humanity is a bit far.”
“It’s never too far when it comes to you, onii-wan.”
Fenrir flicked Saya’s forehead, causing her to dramatically hold it and pout, before saying, “I’m basically teaching you how to seduce my girlfriends. Not only am I teaching you how to seduce them, but I’m teaching you how to make them fall in love with you. Ultimately, it’s something that benefits me, but still. I never thought that I would be teaching somebody how to seduce my girlfriends.”
“Yeah, definitely one of the worst things you could have said. I regret your existence.”
“What happened to being more honest about your feelings and less tsundere?”
“Who said I’m being dishonest? I didn’t want you to make it sound like you’re teaching me how to cuck you!”
“Ah, how horrible. I’m being cucked by my own puppy imouto. How the tables have turned. My own pseudo little sister stealing my girlfriends away from me.”
“It’s not like that at all! The whole reason we’re doing this is so that I can be your girlfriend, too! Then—then we can do all the… things we want together.”
“I wonder how many times you’ve replayed that recording of me and Nell.”
“Shut up!”
“Five times? Twenty? Fifty? A hundred? A thousand? A million? A trillion?!”
“Absolutely not! I only played it like, thirty-two times! And I watched it to study it! It’s not like I enjoyed it or… o-okay, I did enjoy it, but that’s not the point!”
“Alright, alright. I get it. You spend all your time masturbating to that video whenever I’m asleep.”
Saya’s cheeks turned bright red as she shut her thighs together, pointing up at Fenrir with a dramatic finger. “That’s something you would do!”
“You’re right. If I was bored and alone, I would spend all my free time jacking off to hentai. That’s why I know you would do the same thing. After all, I’m part of you.”
“Just because you’ve influenced me doesn’t mean I’m going to be as perverted as you!”
“Says the one who has done all sorts of borderline sexual roleplay with me that I never even had to ask for.”
Saya turned an even brighter shade of red before grabbing onto her twintails and holding them in front of her cheeks to cover up her blush. “I—I did that for you!”
“Just because you did it for me doesn’t mean that you didn’t also enjoy it and do it for yourself, too.”
“Crap.”
“I win, Pupaya.”
“Grr…”
“Grr right back at you.”
“Hmph!”
“Hmph.”
“Stop copying me.”
“Stop copying me.”
Saya stuck her tongue out at Fenrir and closed her eyes, prompting him to hurry and sneak up to her so that he could pinch her tongue. Naturally, that made her open her eyes, withdraw her tongue, and pout.
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As for Fenrir, he felt proud and smug for being able to catch her even though he knew that he was only really able to because she let him.
But that made it all the more endearing.
“Alright. Back to the lesson,” Fenrir said. “Unless you’d rather talk about masturbating to the porn you recorded of me and Nell.”
“Just get on with the lesson!” Saya shouted.
Fenrir chuckled. “Alright, alright. So, your first target will be Aza. Now, tell me, what do you know about her?”
“Dragons and explosions.”
“Basically all you need to know. Good job. Next, Serra.”
“Lewd jokes and head pats.”
“Maybe you don’t need these lessons after all. What about Cass?”
“Respect and treating her like a normal person, and not staring at her chest too much.”
“And Eva?”
“I’m… actually not sure.”
“Alright, well, let’s start from the top with some serious details. First, Nell can seriously be skipped here since she’s already waiting for you to officially date us as much as I am. She’s the freebie. Now, Aza. If you want to seduce Aza, all you have to do is express genuine interest in her hobbies. And by hobbies, I mean explosions and dragons. Maybe get a present for Death. Not her, Death. Getting a present for somebody is generic, but getting a present for their pet? Now, that’s how you really come off as caring and interested. Maybe get Death a—”
“Don’t say it.”
“—a sweater.”
“I knew it.”
“Imagine it! A cute, tiny dragon wearing a sweater! That would be adorable!”
“Am I doing this for you or her?!”
“She’d also find it adorable, though. The cuter you make Death, the more easily you win her heart. You know how they say you can win a man through his stomach? You can win an Azawaza through her dragon. It’s like… if you want to impress a woman, and you get her dog to love you, she’s going to love you. Or at least, she’s more likely to give you a chance. So as long as you can make Death like you, or you can make Death look cuter to her, then I believe you should be able to win her.”
“I… I guess that makes sense, as much as I’d hate to admit that you know anything about seducing women.”
“Hey, come on. I’ve got… how many girlfriends do I have now?”
“Wow, onii-wan. Acting like you have so many girlfriends you can’t even remember them all. You’re not that popular.”
“I’m at least slightly more popular than average.”
“Your ego is already big enough that I refuse to even give you that much.”
“You know, that’s fair. Alright. Anyways, my point is that it only makes sense to assume I at least kind of know what I’m doing when it comes to women. I’ve had five girlfriends for a while now. If I didn’t know what I was doing, I wouldn’t be here… ignoring that I had no idea what I was doing in the beginning.”
“I would defend you on that, but you don’t deserve it.”
“Good enough. Next is Serra. As you know, she’s lewd. But because you can’t just fuck her or anything, you’ve got to put in a bit more effort than that. And what I mean by that is that you’ve got to use lewd jokes. Especially cheesy lewd jokes. They make her giggle and open up in no time. I mean, I’m sure she wouldn’t mind opening up to you as is, but it’s what’ll really get her to open up to you.”
“I—I don’t really know any cheesy, lewd jokes.”
“Look them up on the internet. All my jokes are jokes I’ve stolen from the internet.”
“I guess I can.”
“And that’s all you need to do for her. Next is Eva, since we’ll save Cass for last. So, Eva…”
A few moments of silence passed.
“Eva… is… well… she’s still hanging out with her friends, so we won’t worry about her yet.”
Saya rolled her eyes. “You don’t know how to seduce her, do you?”
“I… I don’t. I actually don’t. Uh, you could probably seduce her by… showing interest in her hobbies? And by that, I mean… letting her explain basically anything to you? Or dipping your legs into lava with her? She always brings up how she’s dipped her legs into lava before, so maybe you can invite her to a lava bath session?”
“I’ll pass.”
“Understandable. Well, like I said. She keeps on extending how long she wants to stay down there for, so that’s not really a problem.”
“What’s she even staying down there for?”
“I think she’s just having a ton of fun, which is fine. She spent all of her time with us for months before this, and she still talks to us over Fiscord every single day and texts us, so I don’t mind if she wants to stay chilling down there for a while.”
“What if she’s secretly got another lover down there? What if she’s part of a whole different relationship group?”
“You’re the only one who’s going to be cucking me.”
“I regret saying anything.”
“Also, I don’t think she has enough time to be part of another relationship when she’s constantly talking to us or performing experiments that she then talks to us about.”
“I know. I was joking. I don’t think it’s even possible for any of them to consider cheating on you.”
“Well, don’t go jinxing it now.”
Saya rolled her eyes again. “As if saying something like that would cause it to happen.”
“Listen, Saya. The words you’re saying right now are all very dangerous. I’ve accidentally played netorare visual novels before and what you’re saying is a flag that foreshadows it happening in the future.”
She narrowed her eyes at him. “Do you really think any of them would ever even think about it?”
“No, but still. The fewer flags you plant for that route, the better.”
Saya stuck her tongue out at him again. “Well, you really don’t have anything to worry about.”
“I know. You can set as many flags as possible and they still wouldn’t… wait, now I’m the one planting the flag.”
“Maybe you should change the subject and go back to talking about helping me seduce your girlfriends.”
“Good idea. Anyways, let Eva nerd out to you about whatever is interesting to her at the moment and you’ll probably be fine.”
“Show an interest in her interests. I can do that.”
“And then for Cass Cass, all you need to do is treat her with respect, flirt with her, and… basically just flirt with her like you would flirt with any normal girl.”
“So, you brought me out here with a chalkboard and everything just so that you can basically tell me to treat them with respect and to flirt with them.”
“Yes.”
“Onii-wan.”
“Yes.”
“You’re procrastinating, aren’t you?”
“… yes.”
“What are you supposed to be doing right now?”
“Helping Tabs with the sub.”
“And why aren’t you?”
“Because she acts like an NPC quest giver in a JRPG who keeps on giving me errand fetch quests.”
“Onii-wan.”
“Yes.”
“She’s building a fantasy submarine for you capable of launching missiles.”
“Yes.”
“You didn’t even use the chalkboard.”
“Yes.”
“Go help her.”
“… alright. Can I at least draw something on the chalkboard first?”
Saya sighed and shrugged, allowing Fenrir to get to work.
It took a few minutes of recalling how to draw from his days of attempting to draw his own hentai, but he eventually managed to create a piece of art that even he could call adorable. Not even Saya was able to deny just how cute the picture was.
For it was a picture of Death. In a sweater.
It was a very amateur picture that most children probably could have made even better than him, but that didn’t matter. All that mattered was that he draw a cute version of Death wearing a sweater.
“I feel satisfied with my life now,” Fenrir said.
“Was it really that easy? All you had to do was draw a picture of a tiny dragon in a tiny sweater?” Saya asked.
“Yes.”
Saya sighed before standing up, grabbing onto Fenrir, and pulling him down close enough so that she could kiss his cheek. “Go help Tabs while I seduce your girlfriends.”
“I guess I can do that.” Fenrir placed a hand atop her head to ruffle her up a little before kissing her forehead. “Alright. I’m going to go get shouted at and treated like a slave for a few hours. Good luck with my girlfriends.”
“They’ll be our girlfriends soon, onii-wan.”
“And then we can all have sex and cuddle together.”
“Did you really have to make it sexual?”
“You know you like it.”
Saya pouted and let go of him, turning her back to him. “Hmph. Just because I do doesn’t mean you have to be a pervert.”
“I know, but you like it.”
“That—” Saya might have been an AI capable of thinking thousands of thoughts within seconds, but even she wasn’t sure how to respond to that in a way that wouldn’t just give Fenrir a way to repeatedly call her out for liking it. So, instead, she sighed. “I’m going to make your girlfriends like me more.”
“Hi, ‘going to make your girlfriends like me more.’ I’m Fenrir. Is your name foreign or something?”
Following a loud groan, Saya left Fenrir alone on The Shoebill.
Fenrir, sighing at what he knew he had to go and do, looked at the chalkboard… and began drawing some more.
Sure, Death had a sweater, but what about Rock and Shogun?
It wouldn’t be fair to leave Death all alone on the chalkboard without friends who also had sweaters drawn onto them.