The weekend had arrived.
Matthew, Alan, and Blair had expected a grand, elegant reception at the Wilderwood Capital Mansion, courtesy of the illustrious and enchanting Sator family. They could not have been more mistaken.
“Why does it keep chasing me?!” whimpered the madam of the Sator household, curled into a miserable ball on the sofa. Her laughter was enchantingly maniacal, her face a tear-soaked, blotchy mess of red from sheer humor. She cried and laughed in turns, a woman on the brink.
On the table was a slithering light animation that looked almost too realistic as it kept chasing a small figure of a character.
The marquis, a pillar of composure himself, pressed on. “The giant octopus wriggled and writhed, its tentacle—the peculiar one, shaped almost familiarly—spouted not ink, not black, but white, someth—”
“I rolled a natural twenty,” interrupted the head of the Sator family, seething with a righteous, barely-contained rage. “I punched it away from Momo. How many tickles does it take to make an octopus laugh? Ten tickle—”
“Ah, you punched its peculiar tentacle!”
Burn burst out in anger, his fist to the table—“I said ten tickles, not testicles!”
Finn shook his head, “It’s the ninth tentacle. Not tenth.”
The madam, for her part, spiraled deeper into her delirium, her laugh a wail that tickled the air. She melodically shrieked, her body convulsing into a shapeless heap of black hair and soft flesh. “Bunny ha—WASH YOUR HAND!”
The head of the Sator family turned an unnatural shade of green, laced with flickering black undertones. His eyes burned with a void-like glint as he stared into the abyss of his life choices. Gloomily, he said, “I can’t wash my hands yet, it’s not my turn to play!”
“BWHAHAHAHAH!”
“The monster is slain,” Finn coughed-laughed-choked, declared with somber gravity, “but at great cost. You’ve been cursed. The Curse of the Perpetual Sneeze. You shall forever teeter on the edge of sneezing, yet never find relief.”
Madam Bunny Fay, the devastatingly beautiful goddess of the Sator family, died in that instant. She simply couldn’t. She could not laugh anymore. “That…ha—was…—the curse… I… recommended—”
Morgante, however, seemed strangely revitalized. With an air of tragic sincerity—no, of eternal love—he scooted closer to her on the sofa, his voice as smooth as molten honey, his expression as solemn as death itself. “Madam… are you alright? Haa… haa… ha-ha…” His breath hitched in maddening increments, the looming sneeze always a moment away but never arriving. “I just saved you… from th—haa… haa… HACHH… ha…”
The madam screeched like a boiling bedazzled kettle, liquefying into a formless cosmic puddle on the sofa, her laughter now a haunting memory of its former self. “Stop… stop! Papa, I— I can’t…YOU HAVEN'T WASHED YOUR HAND! ROLL THE DICE TO WASH YOUR HAND WITH HOLY WATER!”
Even the marquis, the so-called master of this doomed campaign, lay sprawled across the floor. He snorted, unceremoniously resembling a pig. “I can’t DM anymore,” he groaned, tears streaking his face. “The two of you… you’re too good at this. It’s too much. It’s too funny…”
The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.
Alan, Matthew, and Blair turned toward Evan. Their faces in silent disbelief.
The Marquis of Wilderwood, commander of ten thousands… the terrifying Morgante Sator, leader of the second richest merchant family in the continent… the devastatingly beautiful goddess Madame Bunny Fay—
Evan chuckled, “You guys wanna come join?”
“No!” Morgante and Bunny immediately said.
Finn slowly rose from the floor. “This is an adult campaign. Young Master Evan, you can prepare a separate campaign with your friends later. I will help you DM.”
Bunny, still caught in the chaotic aftermath of the ridiculous play, made a feeble attempt to wipe her tears—though whether they were from laughter, despair, or both was anyone’s guess. Her efforts were as effective as using a sieve to scoop water, leaving streaks of moisture shimmering on her porcelain cheeks.
She laughed, or maybe she cried—really, it was impossible to distinguish anymore. The sound that escaped her lips was a blend of mirth and misery, as though the universe itself couldn’t decide whether to gift her joy or torment.
And somehow, somehow, this unholy combination only made her look more devastatingly beautiful. Her disheveled hair framed her flushed face with the precision of a Renaissance painting, while her smudged mascara lent her the tragic elegance of a doomed heroine from a gothic novel.
Even her hiccuping breaths seemed to harmonize with the very fabric of existence, as though the cosmos itself had arranged this moment purely to mock everyone else in the room with her unattainable perfection.
It was, frankly, infuriating.
Morgante’s deep golden eyes, rich and mesmerizing like molten amber, stayed fixed on Bunny with an intensity that could have melted steel—or at least weakened someone’s resolve to remain annoyed.
Ever the chivalrous tormentor, he even produced an additional handkerchief, offering it with the kind of smug grace that only he could manage.
His expression was a masterpiece of layered emotions: the quiet satisfaction of a man who had achieved his goal of making his wife laugh and the barely-contained mischief of someone who knew he’d pushed her to the brink of madness in the process.
It was a look that said, Yes, I’m proud of myself, and no, I don’t regret a thing.
The handkerchief itself was almost an insult, a token of faux-repentance that did nothing to mask the glint in his eyes. He was clearly enjoying the sight of her half-laughing, half-crying, all while she tried—and failed—to maintain a shred of dignity.
The man was a paradox in action: charming, infuriating, and undeniably effective at weaponizing both.
Morgante, ever the gentleman (and occasional menace), took her hand and helped her to her feet. Bunny, for her part, looked effortlessly radiant in a white silk summer dress that clung with just the right amount of delicacy, held up by twin, laughably flimsy straps.
A trace of amusement still lingered in her glittering eyes, and her velvety lips quivered slightly as she greeted them with the poise of a queen, “My lady and gentlemen, I’m glad you came early. Where’s His Highness Prince Locan and Her Highness Princess Nahwu?”
Matthew and Alan turned redder than ripe tomatoes, while Blair forgot how to function altogether. As certified 12-year-olds, none of them had encountered someone as absurdly beautiful and animated as Evan’s mom.
It was so unfair it bordered on criminal. The very concept of a “your mom” joke with her as the subject felt like an automatic self-burn to whoever dared attempt it.
“They said they’d come at lunchtime,” Blair managed to choke out, her voice wobbling as if fighting gravity. Her blush deepened under the madam’s kind, utterly disarming smile, which seemed designed to reduce children to babbling wrecks.
Morgante, meanwhile, seemed less enthused but didn’t appear entirely opposed to hosting royalty. Finn, on the other hand, was an entirely different story. He gasped dramatically, his face the perfect picture of betrayed disbelief. “What?! Who?! No one told me about this!”
Without waiting for an answer, the man shot off like a maniac, frantically preparing for the arrival of not one but two more royals to his already chaotic mansion. He moved with the energy of someone hosting a surprise dinner party they’d only just heard about.
And that was the moment they heard it—a small, cheerful voice echoing from the second floor:
“Evan Bro! Evan Bro!”