Part 1

"I refuse to accept this," I declared with all the vehemence of a wounded animal, yet my girlfriends only looked at me like I was some kind of oddball.

"Chief, please don't make a scene," Judy casually scolded me, sounding completely nonchalant as she proceeded to present me with a thermos. "Tea?"

"Yes, thank you very much," I offered my cup, and after quickly filling and then just as swiftly emptying it, I let out a satisfied sigh. Then raised a brow at her. "I can't make a scene. It's literally just the three of us here."

When I said 'literally', I didn't mean it in the newfangled, counter-intuitive way, but in the actual literal sense of the word. Despite the fantastic spring weather actively calling out to the youth, the roof of the school was as empty as it could be, with only the three of us sitting on the usual bench facing the roof access door. There were normally at least a few placeholders idling here during lunch break, but they collectively decided to eat somewhere else today.

"Aren't Josh and Angie coming too?" Elly voiced a rhetorical question, since we agreed on that in the classroom just ten minutes ago, but I nodded along anyway.

"Yes, but they aren't here yet," I pointed out, and then after taking a bite out of one of Judy's artisanal homemade sandwiches, I swallowed hard and continued on the track of my previous complaints. "No, I still refuse to accept this, and I mean it!"

"Calm down. Remember what we practiced?" the princess warned me and demonstrated it by closing her eyes and taking a deep breath. "Peace is fine. Nothing special happening is fine. Everything is fine."

"Right, and that's the problem!" I burst out a touch indignantly. "It's been two weeks! More than two weeks, actually, and nothing even remotely dramatic or interesting happened!"

"That just means the self-suggestion is working!" Elly declared with an ear-to-ear grin.

"I was under the impression that you wanted to have a break from the dramatics," Judy pointed out, and while I wanted to refute her on the spot, all I could manage at the moment was an angry grunt and a grimace.

"I mean… yes, I did say that I would've preferred if the Simulacrum would give me a break, but not like this! I put up with a whole lot of bloody crap coming from this dumb world, between placeholders and tropes and narrative influences, but I categorically refuse to accept that something as silly as self-hypnosis could have this profound of an effect on our lives!"

"Silly?" Elly echoed me, and I stopped mid-motion, just about to bite into my sandwich, to raise my hands.

"I strictly meant that in a scientific sense. I'm more than happy that you came up with the idea, and it's great for relaxation, but I'm much less happy about the fact that it actually works."

"Just ignore the Chief. He'll get over it," my dear assistant told my other girlfriend and offered her a cup as well.

Meanwhile I resumed my grumpy consumption of my lunch, feeling more than a little wronged. Not by my girlfriend, but by the world itself.

I mean, I knew that by effectively usurping the role of Narrative-me, my thoughts and expectations gained a profound effect on the world. Even more so than before, I mean, as my expectations dragging the Simulacrum into the Information Age already professed. No, the part that outraged me was just how stupidly easy it was to manipulate that effect!

Over the last two weeks, Elly and I had been regularly doing those self-suggestion-cum-meditation sessions, with Judy occasionally joining us as well, and their results were as profound as they were baffling. In short, nothing happened. Or at the very least nothing that even remotely involved or interested me.

Until recently, the civil war in the Abyss was at a standstill due to a combination of Crowy recuperating from his failed attempt to snatch another Mana Well and the Draconic Federation officially offering humanitarian aid for the alliance of Noble Houses. Speaking of which, those negotiations also proceeded like a well-oiled machine, and I didn't even have to do anything about them. Or at least nothing more than signing a few papers and giving a small speech in front of the Draconic Council about how this was not only the right thing to do, but it also screwed over Bel of the Abyss, all of which somehow earned me standing ovation.

Oh, and speaking of him, I'd yet to run into future-me either. I occasionally visited little OIlie at the bottom of the Inannas' dungeon, just to see how he was doing, but I was always just barely missing my 'good friend Uncle Antonio', to the point I was convinced he was dodging me on purpose. By the by, the kid was fine. If anything, he was acting like he was taking an early summer vacation, lazing around in his pyjamas and watching cartoons all day long. He even put on some weight from all the snacks, but that was beside the point.

In short, our main plot was on hold, and nothing even remotely relevant happened on the island, in the Abyss, or even in Elysium. Was this the 'slow life' all those isekai stories aimed at an older audience were always waxing lyrical about? Because if it was, I had to say, slow life was boring as f—

"Hey guys! Sorry, we're late!"

My thoughts were interrupted by Angie exploding into the scene, her boyfriend lagging a few steps behind her and carrying a bundle of food boxes from the cafeteria.

"There's no rush." Judy made a welcoming gesture towards the empty bench next to ours. "Lunch break's far from over."

"True," Josh noted absently, but then his steps slowed down and he frowned at me. "Why the long face, buddy?"

"Don't mind the Chief. He's just frustrated about silly things right now. He'll get over it before you know it."

"Hey! Don't just dismiss my concerns about the structural integrity of the universe like that!"

"The structural what of the what?" My friend blurted out in mild alarm, but before we could get anywhere with that, Angie took one of his food boxes.

"It must be some 'destiny thing' again. I'm sure Leo will figure it out, whatever it is, and…" Without warning, her eyes opened wide and she hurriedly placed the box onto the bench, just so that she could do that thing where she hammered her open palm with her other fist. "That reminds me! Ammy made me promise to call her! She's getting stir-crazy after being stuck at home for so long!"

She turned away and started messing with her phone. On a side note, she upgraded her phone a while back (probably on Josh's tournament money) and so everyone had smartphones now. Yay for technological leapfrogging.

Josh also put down his food in the meantime and turned to us again, still looking for an explanation.

"Seriously, is there an actual problem? With universal integrity and stuff?"

"Leo's just being a bit dramatic," my draconic girlfriend answered between giggles and lightly pinched my cheek.

"He thinks things are being too quiet and it's making him antsy," Judy responded with a more digestible answer, not that it helped Josh's understanding much.

I added a huff to that, and concluded with, "That's not really the core of the problem, but it indeed annoys me that nothing's going on."

"What do you mean 'nothing'?" my friend burst out and folded his arms to further accentuate his disapproval. "You arranged a whole-ass historical treaty between the Abyss and the rest of the world, Ms Yamako and Mr Feilong are now officially engaged, and I won my exhibition match, and it was awesome." He raised a critical brow at me in particular. "Which you should've known, but you didn't attend."

"But I congratulated you afterwards, didn't I? I was confident you had it in the bag, so there was no need to loiter around. Good job, good job."

"The Chief is bad with tournaments," Judy noted in a low voice, only paying half-attention while trying to decide which sandwich she should eat next. She made like ten different varieties, and she ultimately settled on the bacon and cheese one before turning back to Josh. "It's one of his less-amazing qualities, but nobody's perfect."

"Hey!"

My protest was drowned out by Elly's giggling, and I soon dropped the issue. Lately, I had a feeling my Dormouse was taking advantage of the fact that she knew I couldn't stay mad at her.

"Hi, everyone," a distorted voice interjected into our conversation, and when I glanced over, I was met with the class rep's face on a small screen. She was wearing a light blue hoodie and had the two magical orbs, the culprits behind her extended school leave, lazily circling around her head, but otherwise, she seemed as hale and hearty as ever. "How's everyone doing?"

"Nothing special."

Hearing my reflexive response made Angie stifle a chuckle and she turned her phone to face herself.

"Leo's grumpy because he's bored."

"Bored?" Ammy asked back incredulously. "He's running multiple organizations and attending school on top of that! If he's bored, then what am I supposed to be!?"

"It's some destiny thing, I think," our friendly neighbourhood Celestial told her, and the girl on the phone let out a pensive hum, as if what she just heard somehow explained everything.

"He's just mad because nothing world-shaking happened for two weeks!" Josh commented on the side with (what I hoped was) mock outrage. "Can you believe the gall of this guy?"

"We all have our own troubles," Ammy moderated as soon as Angie turned the phone to face us again. "What have you been up to lately? It's been a while since you last visited."

"It hasn't been that long." Elly put a finger on her lips and muttered, "Or was it? When was the last time we met up?"

"Last Friday, at the base," I provided the answer, and my draconic girlfriend resolutely raised her fist.

"Then it's time for a proper visit at Ammy's house!"

"Only if the class rep is free in the afternoon," I said and pointedly glanced at the girl on the screen.

"Of course I'm free. Until these…" She poked at the marbles circling her head, yet they continued their orbit with lazy indifference. "So long as this isn't resolved, I can't do anything but sit here and twiddle my thumbs! Ever since Leo told Grandfather not to burden me with the School's documentation, I can't even do that anymore!"

"Oh. She's at the point where she's missing the paperwork." Judy turned to me and continued in an extra-deadpan manner. "Chief, I think it's serious. We really need to visit her."

"I thought that was already decided with her answer, and…" I rubbed my temple and muttered, "We wouldn't be having this conversation if things didn't stall in Ottawa."

Contrary to my initial expectations, Lord Ambrose not only didn't kick down the gates of the local School, but he spent the last two weeks hanging out in Canada, meeting up with old friends, and delivering a polite official request to see the last Grimoire Key and discuss its fate with the local arch-mage. That last bit was still going through the 'normal' bureaucratic channels, and they were taking their sweet time with it.

As for whether this development happened because of Watsonian (read: Lord Gulliver managing to reach the bearded arch-mage on the phone and making him promise not to cause a scene) or Doylist (read: my clumsy self-suggestion sessions with Elly) reasons were up for interpretations.

"If that's decided, then I'll start!" the princess declared, and it took until she began her explanation for me to realize she was answering Ammy's question from like two tangents ago. "We've been experimenting with meditation and mental discipline, and it's actually a lot of fun!"

"Seconded." I turned to Judy, not expecting her to say that. The glint in her eye told me she was probably referring to how our self-suggestion sessions, taking place in private, often developed into a different kind of session, but the people present here didn't need to hear about our sex life. Meanwhile, my dear assistant's eyes remained on Angie's phone. "I was also promoted Demarchos, and I've been given full rein over the Celestial Intelligence Network, so that kept me busy over the past couple of days."

"Oh, I've heard about that from Mike," Ammy nodded on the screen, but then a second later she let out a soft groan. "I can't believe just how used I got to you guys and your outrageous antics. I'm shocked that I'm not shocked by how you just casually took over the Celestial's infamous spy network."

"Humans are very adaptable," I spoke sagely, but nobody paid me attention, so I shrugged and picked up another sandwich.

"For me," Josh started, and Angie automatically turned the phone screen his way. "Since I won the exhibition match, Zihao's been pestering me to train together again. He says I'm his rival now, or something. I dunno, he's kinda high maintenance…" He suddenly snapped his fingers and added, "Oh, and I've also been sparring with the Ordo Draconis Knights lately. It's good training, and since now I use a sword, I've been even asked to give pointers to the new recruits. Most of them recognized my face right off the bat, you know?"

He bashfully rubbed his nose, but to be fair, it would've been weirder if they didn't recognize him at this point. He was a VIP, and winning a tournament and another high-profile match in front of everyone would've made him memorable even if it wasn't the rambunctious, duel-loving Draconians we're talking about here.

"That's really impressive. I'm happy for you," Ammy told him, and despite the stock choice of words, sounded like she meant it.

"Hehe. Thanks."

"My turn!" Angie declared and faced the phone herself. "Guess what? I've been training too, and I developed a completely unique aria!"

"Oh?"

The class rep wasn't the only one who was surprised by that, as this was the first time I've heard about that too.

"Lemme show you!"

I was expecting her to start singing, or something, but instead she just blinked, and a moment later a deep frown settled on her face.

"Girl. I told you not to wake me up just to demonstrate this—" There was a momentary break, and then her lips parted into a grin. "Did you see it?"

"See what?" Ammy asked, and so she brought the camera closer to her face.

"It's like this…!" Short pause. "Girl! What did I just…!?" Another short pause. "And back!"

"Eye color," Judy noted, and I had to admit, I didn't catch it.

"Exactly!" the hyper Celestial laughed and pointed at her face. "Josh complained that sometimes it was hard to recognize when Grandpa Deus was speaking, so we made this continuous aria!"

"And it turns your eyes golden when you trade control," Judy said as it if was self-evident, but again, I didn't even notice the difference, let alone the actual colour.

"Is that a trope?" Elly whispered into my ear, and after some thinking, I nodded in the affirmative.

"Yes. I didn't expect that we'd get a Watsonian justification for it though."

Normally this kind of thing was just a given. I imagined it was so that the audience could tell who was in the pilot seat at a glance, yet Angie's appearance didn't change when Deus was in control. Actually, on second thought, maybe we got this development only now because the two of them were never supposed to 'share' her body in the original scenario, and the Simulacrum was matching up the necessary secondary tropes during the downtime.

"Making notes, we'll discuss this later," Judy added to our whispered discussion, then raised her voice so the others could hear her too. "You see, Chief? There is always something novel happening. We don't need something big to occur every week."

"We do have something big this week though," Josh interjected, drawing everyone's attention to him. "You know? The sports festival. It's on Friday."

"Oh, that's right!" Angie waved her phone around frantically, which I imagined wasn't riveting to see on the class rep's end. "Ammy's gonna miss it!"

"Yeah. It's a shame," Josh agreed, yet the subject of their conversation sounded rather blasé about it.

"I don't mind. The sports days have never been my thing, and I would've probably been helping Pascal and the student council with organizing things anyway."

"But you're still missing out! It's, like, a precious memory of our youth and stuff!"

That… sounded suspiciously like something Sahi would've said. Was Angie hanging out with her lately, or was I just getting paranoid?

"Guys, guys. Before we get into the whole sports festival thing, can we first sit down and start eating?" Josh proposed, one hand overly tapping his stomach. "I'm kinda starving."

And with that one comment, everyone switched into 'lunch mode' and the discussion moved onto more light-hearted topics, and… maybe Judy was right. Maybe I was overthinking this. Being able to calm the waves of the Simulacrum by keeping myself under control was… Well, I still didn't make my peace with that idea, but it wasn't necessarily a bad thing. It wasn't like every sub-plot came to a halt; things were still happening to Josh and Angie and the others. Maybe it was fine to let them have their own spotlight, and considering how ubiquitous sports festivals were in all kinds of high-school adjacent genres, I was sure it would let the Simulacrum have its fill with common tropes. Not to mention, so long as nothing unexpected or subversive happened, it might be fun too.

Wait. Crap, I just jinxed it, didn't I? Bloody hell! You'd think I'd learn by this point…

…

Oh well. Let's just meditate on this with the girls, then secretly make some contingency plans. Just in case.

Part 2

The last few days disappeared into the past like a whirlwind of normalcy, and before I knew it, the Blue Cherry High Athletics Festival was upon us.

I'm not going to lie, the distinct lack of anything significant happening was still rubbing me the wrong way. Maybe I was just overly cautious, or maybe the Simulacrum had done too good a job instilling the idea that a 'calm before the storm' explicitly implied that a storm was on the way, but I just couldn't stop being antsy.

There was also the issue of the 'rescue operation' still hanging in the air. My deal with Fidèle Shamash somehow turned into one of those historical milestone treaties between the Abyss and the rest of the World of Mystics, and while we mutually agreed that I would rescue Ollie, it was technically a different arrangement than the one Tracas Ashur tried to make with me, to the point it came off as me doing a deal behind his back. Because of that, the Ashur envoys have been quietly passive-aggressive in their diplomatic correspondence.

The Nergals, represented by the weird cat-burglar lady, were oddly silent on the matter, though that part made some sense. From what I could gather, their primary goal was to somehow drag me (and by extension, everyone involved with me) into the Abyssal civil war, and since I officially threw my lot in with them, they were probably already satisfied with this outcome. Their diplomatic messages were more well-mannered and only politely asked me to mount the rescue mission at my earliest convenience. No pressure.

By the way, how weird was it that I somehow graduated from 'clandestine meetings' to 'responding to consular correspondence'? I was truly becoming another cog in the machine, wasn't I? I didn't like that. Not one bit.

Not that I could do much about it at this point, so I continued to do the bare minimum, and at least in the case of said Abyssals and their messages, I have so far managed to deflect them by saying that an exfiltration job like this required lots of pre-planning, and they grudgingly accepted my word on it. It didn't stop the Ashurs from sending me even more mail every other day, but it was pointless, because the whole operation was out of my hands. Figuratively speaking.

The person holding the reins was future-me, and he still staunchly refused to provide me with a proper timetable, so I couldn't carelessly move either. In particular, rescuing the kid at the bottom of the dungeon was crucial in kicking off the grand finale of our scenario, so I didn't dare to start it until I got the green light from him. The last thing I needed right now was a time paradox to deal with on top of all the other organic pains-in-the-neck the Simulacrum loved to home-grow at my expense.

"…"

Inhaling deeply, I closed my eyes and temporarily put all of those concerns out of my mind. When I opened them again, the glare of the sun made me squint.

In one word, the weather was perfect. Sunny and warm, yet with a pleasantly cool breeze. In front of me, rows of canopy tents with colourful party flags attached to the thin ropes stretched between them. Under those, a veritable crowd idling, chatting, and having a merry time in general. The whole place was teeming with people, both Blue Cherry High students in their PE shirts and shorts, and just as many parents and Timaeus residents from the neighbourhood. The area around the tents was cordoned off so that nobody could wander off and accidentally interrupt a race on the field, and that's where most of the guests were congregating, while the various classes were clustered together on the turf inside the ring of the running tracks.

I was part of the latter group, though at the moment I was at the far end of the track field and standing on the freshly assembled portable stage. It was the same one we borrowed from the concert department of the Dracis's record business during the cultural festival, though this time there was no need for the pyrotechnics and the lighting, so there was no scaffolding involved. There was music though, and the large speakers that came with the set were now playing an old pop song with a catchy beat and a refrain talking about winning a battle of love with pincer manoeuvres. It made sense in context.

"Is it done?" a strained voice inquired from below, trying to be heard over the loud music.

Lord Taika was standing next to the stage on the ground, her expectant eyes glued to me. I skipped over to the edge and hopped off so that I would be standing next to her and we wouldn't need to yell.

"Everything's in order," I told her with a slightly raised voice, and she exhaled with visible relief.

"Thank you, Leonard. I know I shouldn't have bothered you with something minuscule like this, but I'm sincere when I say that you're a lifesaver."

"Don't even mention it. I already had experience with assembling these things," I responded glibly and used a thumb over my shoulder to point at the stage. "It was no big deal."

"Thank you anyway." She gestured towards the crowd. "Don't let me hold you up. Please, go and enjoy the rest of the festival with your class."

"That's the plan."

I waved her goodbye with a smirk in tow and headed towards the center of the track field, only to come to a stop after just a couple of steps. My gaze landed on the scoreboard set up at the edge of the tracks; a relatively large construction made of wooden beams and plywood. It was supposed to be old and battered after years of reuse, but as with everything else, it was actually in pristine condition. More importantly, its painted white surface was used as an enormous pinboard, where the students in charge would pin up the current scores of each class.

While there were no prizes, the sports festival had an underlying competitive element to it, where all the classes would earn points based on their performance during the day. First, we had the individual athletics tests, where students from each class would do high jumps, javelin throwing, sprint races, hammer throwing, and all the rest of the comparatively more 'boring' competitions. Most of those were already done, and everyone was waiting for the quirkier contests, like the tug-of-war, the three-legged race, and the mock cavalry battle.

The majority of them (especially the last one) required the venue to be prepared first, something the sports clubs would take care of, and by the state of the scoreboard, I could tell that they weren't ready yet. As such, I decided to take a little detour to pass the time and aimed at the rows of tents nearby.

Maybe it was because of the competitive spirit in the air, or maybe it was just the music, but everyone present was unusually lively. The students idling in the crowd were a given, but the same applied to the average placeholder as well. Everyone was chatting and goofing around and eating street food, and…

"Howdy! I figured you'd show up sooner or later!"

It took me a second to realize that I was the one being addressed, but then I felt silly for not noticing the familiar scent in the air right away.

"Pipe down, Jones!" a certain ex-delinquent grumbled and turned to face me as well.

The leader of the good ol' Goldfish Poop Gang underwent an astonishing change since the last time I'd seen him. Well, fine; he was still heavy-set, and his face was as thuggish as ever, but he ditched the pompadour! It was his main character trait, and it was gone, replaced by a tidy, short-cropped hairdo!

In retrospect, that made a lot of sense; I was pretty sure his previous haircut wasn't appropriate for handling fresh street food. Speaking of which, they had the whole portable gyros setup from the Valentine's fair, and the shortest of the trio was blissfully turning the skewer and cutting the meat even as we spoke. He was even humming along with the background music.

"We keep running into each other," the big guy, 'Tony' if my memory served right, crossed his arms and locked eyes with me, and he might've even looked surface-level intimidating if not for the salad tongs sticking out from under his armpit and the apron saying 'Kiss the chef' over his gut. "So? What can I get you this time?"

"I wasn't planning to eat anything, thank you."

I didn't say that just out of modesty. We still had the team competitions ahead of us in the afternoon, and as much as I wanted to let Josh flex his protagonist chops and collect some accolades, he wasn't going to let me slack off. While I admit that I did feel a little peckish at the moment, I imagined that eating a gyros would be just asking to get an upset stomach.

This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road. If you spot it on Amazon, please report it.

"Oh, come on! Don't be like that!" the tall guy behind the counter whined.

"No, I'm serious. I was just passing by. Also…" I paused to gesture at my PE outfit. "I don't have my wallet on me."

"In that case…" The big dude searched his pockets, and after finding a few crumpled notes and a couple of coins, he threw them next to the cash register and then immediately tossed a can of coke my way. "Here. It's on the house."

I caught the beverage, and after a long beat, responded with a slightly sheepish, "Thanks?"

"You're welcome!"

"Aye, boss? Are ya gonna ask him 'bout tha' thin' now?" the short guy asked on the side, belatedly realizing my presence.

"What thing?" the tall one blurted out even as he was stuffing the spare change into the till machine, and the other guy rolled his eyes.

"Ya know? 'e's with hot chicks all th' time, so th' boss said 'e should introduce us to—"

"Ignore him!" Tony bellowed and grabbed the small guy in a chokehold before looking at me. "He's just joking! Go and enjoy the sports day!"

"… Your friend is turning purple."

"It's just a trick of the light! Have fun! Please?"

I was kind of curious how this skit would end, but the short member of the trio looked really uncomfortable with his mouth covered up, so I nodded along.

"All right then. You have fun too, and thanks for the drink."

With that, I turned on my heel and started wandering among the various tents. Most of them were just places where people could sit and chat, but some of them had other purposes, such as the one erected by a local retirement club attending the event, or the one by the city's 'traditionalist society' (read: a bunch of medieval reenactors) displaying curios and talking about local folk customs. Those tents were relatively calm, while a little further down the line…

"Kyaa! Let me take a photo with them too!"

There was a veritable throng of people, almost entirely girls and young women, clustered around the first aid tent set up by Jaakobah. It was meant as a place where students could rest in case they got dizzy or injured during the competition, but thanks to a pair of Celestial children, I wasn't sure the people in need of care could even fit in the tent at this point.

"Don't shove! Don't shove! Everyone will get the chance to take a picture!"

I was just about to move along, but the unexpected voice made me pause and take a second look. Inside the tent, I found Ichiko and Xiao ordering people around, making them form an orderly line so that they could take photos. Last I checked, only the two Celestial kids in their little nurse outfits were in the center of attention, but now that the little miko and Odango Girl were here as well (in their shrine maiden outfit a Chinese qipao respectively), I could see why so many girls would gather here. Everyone liked cute things, but girls were allowed to freely express it like this without coming off as creeps.

There was something profound about societal views on what different sexes could and ought to get away with in public, but before I could touch on it…

"Right now, I'd say she's an eight," a different familiar voice drew my attention, and when I looked to my left, I found the four amigos standing there, posing like art critics as they observed the children from a distance. "Once she grows up, she'll undoubtedly become a goddess, but as of now, only an eight."

"What about the other one?" the bed-haired amigo questioned his bowl-cut fellow.

After a series of thoughtful hums, the guy pretended to push his nonexistent glasses up the bridge of his nose, struck an over-the-top pose, and declared, "I have observed them closely, and I have to disappoint you: he's a boy!"

"No way!" the spiky-haired guy in the back exclaimed in horror. "That can't be! It's impossible!"

"Sorry, comrade, but it's the truth!"

"I don't see the problem," the Mr Crew Cut stated blandly, and when the rest turned questioning gazes at him, he laconically declared, "Looks female enough."

"Oh, for the love of…!" I burst out, and the four amigos all turned to me in unison, visibly startled by my presence. "Can't you guys do something normal for a change? Get a different bloody hobby!"

"How dare you, Leonard S. Dunning?" Mr Bowl Cut scoffed, and he struck another weird pose, with one hand over his head and the other sticking out at ninety degrees. "This is no mere hobby, but our solemn duty as the foremost followers of the goddesses!"

"Yeah!" the rest of them agreed and joined him in his posturing, and now they looked like some kind of budget sentai team posing for the camera.

I would've liked to kick their asses just for that alone, but before I could get to it, I was intercepted by a certain foxy miko weaving through the crowd.

"Ue-sama! Welcome!" She came to a stop in front of me and beamed at me with sparkly eyes. "Is Ue-sama also here to take photos with Kóre-chan and Pais-kun?"

"No, I was just passing by, and…" In the meantime, the four annoying amigos chose this opportunity to slink away from the argument, so I stifled a shallow groan and shook my head. "Never mind. What are you doing here?"

Ichiko put her hands on her hips, puffed up her chest, and exclaimed, "Our best!"

That cheeky answer would've normally deserved a light forehead-poke, but her performance drew a lot of chuckles and affectionate noises from the girls behind her, so I let it slide this time.

"I see that Xiao is here. Does that mean Naoren came to visit?"

"Yes! He's being lovey-dovey with Rinne-san over there!" She pointed at the other end of the row of tents, and it made me raise a brow.

"Really?"

The little miko nodded, and after a long beat, I rubbed her head and gently pushed her back towards the tent.

"I'll go say hi to them. Don't cause too much of a ruckus, you hear?"

"Haaai!"

She weaved between the legs of the crowd and soon reappeared next to the Celestial twins, much to everyone's delight. Or at least mostly everyone's. I could see Jaakobah sitting at a makeshift desk in the back and looking particularly unenthused by the situation, yet he didn't try to put a stop to it and let the kids play around while looking over them from a distance. I had my initial reservations about this arrangement, but maybe he actually made a good dad?

He gave me a deferential nod when our eyes met, which I returned with a wave of my hand before turning on my heels and taking a swig from my drink, then I leisurely headed towards the spot Ichiko indicated. On the way, I encountered a few more curious signs. Sahi and Pascal, both wearing the disciplinary committee armbands, were giving out directions to the guests. The rejuvenated arch-mage in particular was really popular with the elderly. Go figure.

A bit further back, I caught a glimpse of Abram, Arnwald, and Clarke hanging out. Ever since the fishing trips in the Elysium, the 'dad group' had more or less solidified, and they'd been occasionally hanging out together in their free time. If the three of them were here though, it also meant the moms had to be nearby as well, but I couldn't find them in the crowd. Far Sight was an option, but that was tricky to use in this situation, and it wasn't important enough to risk bumping into someone and wasting my free coke.

At last, I discovered Naoren amongst the sea of guests and students, and in the middle of a small cluster not dissimilar to the one at the medical tent.

"Mr Feilong, Mr Feilong! How did you meet teacher?"

"It was during a… business meeting," the young patriarch responded as smoothly as he could.

"Since when are you dating?" a different girl asked in high spirits.

"Who confessed first?" another girl chimed in, shouting over the previous one.

"Please, one question at a…" It was at this moment that he noticed me and he looked at me like a man in a desert who just stumbled upon an oasis. It only lasted for a split second before he cleared his throat and flashed an amicable smile at the girls surrounding him. "Ah, please excuse me, everyone, but I have an important matter to attend to. Let's continue this conversation later." He didn't wait for their response, raised a hand over his head, and broke his encirclement by briskly walking towards me. "Leonard! Can I have your attention for a moment?"

"You already have it," I told him flippantly and gestured for him to follow after me. Like that, the two of us started walking away from the group of curious girls, much to their disappointment. "So? What was that about?"

Naoren let out a shallow sigh.

"You're my saviour, Brother Leonard. I came to visit Lady Rinne, but we could only talk briefly before her duties called her away." That part made sense. Mountain Girl was our only PE teacher, and since this was an athletics festival, she would be about as busy as it would get. "Right after that, I was accosted by a group of students curious about our relationship. I felt no ill intent from them, so I got careless, and before I knew it, I was surrounded and bombarded with personal questions from all angles."

"Yeah, schoolgirls can be insistent like that, and you two make good gossip."

"I can see that now," he admitted and looked around. "I can see Zihao from here, but where's Xiao Xiao?"

"She's at the medical tent with Ichiko," I told him absently while trying to figure out where his younger brother was. It was only after a few seconds that I realized an answer like that might've made him worried, so I hastily added, "They're helping the nurse and his… kids, I guess?"

"Oh, that's good." He heaved a sigh of relief. "I told her not to go far. I know the venue should be secure, but you can never know what could happen."

To be fair, this place was about as safe as it would get. Not only did the Magi deploy all kinds of surveillance and boundary spells around the school as a precaution, but we had all of the Praetorian Guards, as well as the Squires (under their Constable LLC cover identity) patrolling the place in an official capacity.

"We have Entitled Knights, Draconian patriarchs, Celestial honour guards, and something like half a dozen arch-mages here. A tiny dragon barely even makes a difference at this point, so nobody would be stupid enough to make a move here."

"You know, normally having all of these factions in one place would've been the cause for concern," he pointed out, and I could only shrug and take another sip from my drink.

"True, but that was in the past."

"I can't argue with that…"

In the meantime, I also found Zihao in the crowd, and…

"Whoa? Is your brother actually popular with the ladies?"

Naoren followed my gaze and looked back at his brother again, then exhaled sharply in disapproval. As I just said, the younger Feilong brother was currently surrounded by five or six girls. It wasn't a group comparable to the ones crowded around the four children, or even the one that encircled Naoren until recently, but unlike those, this one had a distinctly different vibe to it.

While he was too far away and the music too loud to hear the conversation, it was clear to see from just their expressions that the girls, mostly first and second years, were interested in the exotic redhead with the traditional Chinese martial arts outfit. He, on the other hand, only looked mildly irritated by their questions.

"He would be, if he had a better attitude," the bespectacled patriarch spoke in a low voice that sounded unusually exasperated. "The way my brother pursues the matters of the heart is wholly counter-productive, approaching aggressively when a lady isn't interested, and turning cold and standoffish when she is. I sometimes fear that I've failed his education as an upright gentleman."

"I don't know. Girls like the bad boy archetype too," I pointed out, and he looked at me like I spoke complete nonsense just now.

"I'm not sure what you mean by that, but—"

"Ah, here you are!"

Naoren didn't have the opportunity to finish his response because of a loud cry near us, followed by my hand getting grabbed.

"Whoa there!" I stood my ground at first, but then I recognized that it was Angie, and my initial resistance turned into confusion. "What's the matter?"

"The matter?!" she thundered at me with a glare that was simultaneously cutting and yet hard to take seriously. "You completely missed the tug-of-war, and we lost it because you weren't there to act at the anchor!"

"Wait, it's that time already?" I glanced at the scoreboard and let out and soft hum. "Huh. Sorry, I just got distracted, and—"

"No time for this!" She didn't wait for me to finish and started pulling me again. "Josh needs you for the three-legged race! You're our golden team; if we lose another match when we have both of you in our class, we'll never gonna live it down!"

"I get it, but… wait just a…!" In the end, I gave up and sent an apologetic glance at the young patriarch. "Sorry about this. Let's continue this later."

He didn't complain, and so I let myself be dragged to the track field, where Josh and the girls were already waiting for me. Oh well. Let's go ahead and put some sports into this festival, shall we?

Part 3

School athletics days like this had their own set of tropes. They were kind of like hot springs and beach episodes in a way, with their own conventions and expectations. In more down-to-earth slice-of-life or school-life comedy settings, they were often focused on the camaraderie within the classes and silly shenanigans.

In more action-oriented ones, like most shounen battle series, the competition itself would take center stage, with its ups and downs providing an opportunity for the main characters to come out victorious through skill and quick thinking, or to lose in a low-stakes environment for the sake of character growth and whatnot.

And of course, there were also the more suggestive kind of settings, such as most school life harem stories, where the focus was entirely on the girls and their bouncy bits obeying the laws of gravity and momentum. Occasionally in slow-motion.

If we considered things under that lens, we were in a weird position, with the Simulacrum's original scenario existing somewhere in the cross-section of those three genre-pie-charts. The fact that said scenario was also irrecoverably twisted by a certain someone didn't make it any more straightforward either, but at the very least I was pretty sure the harem-type no longer applied to us. Not just because the 'harem' stage of the plot was effectively dismantled by Josh picking Angie to be his main heroine, but also due to Blue Cherry High's PE uniforms not being very flattering.

Both the boys and girls around me were wearing the same type of loose white T-shirts along with plain, unisex dark blue shorts. Not 'bloomers', those old school Japanese short shorts that somehow became fetish paraphernalia over time, but proper ones. Also, on second thought, there was a vague memory in the back of my mind saying that at one point I thought that the shirts of the girls were a size too small and hugging their bodies a bit too much, but that was no longer the case.

So, was my initial thought wrong, did the shirts change because of the gradual genre shift taking us further and further away from the Japanese 'ecchi' tropes, or did they just get stretched in the wash over time? We may never know…

"All right! We're at neck and neck now!" a certain Celestial girl exclaimed in excitement, her fingers balled up into fists and her eyes ablaze with fighting spirit.

Metaphorically ablaze. I felt it important to point it out, because we lived in a world where that wasn't at all obvious. We were sitting on a blanket laid out on the turf of the track field, not far from where the next race was unfolding.

"Go, Judy, go!" Elly cheered on my side and I watched as my other girlfriend dashed down the tracks towards a series of flimsy scaffolds.

They were made of PVC tubing arranged like free-standing arches over the paths, and there were a bunch of doughnut-sized pastries hanging from them on fishing lines. It was for a kind of relay race called the 'bread eating contest', where the students would have to run in and eat the hanging 'bread' without using their hands, then run back and switch to the next guy in line. They would do the same, with each subsequent pastry getting bigger and more exotically flavoured.

Once a team finished all their bread, the contest was over, and then the score was tallied. Each finished bread was one point, any dropped or half-finished bread would result in a demerit, and the first team to complete the track got bonus points. It was a bit silly and overcomplicated, but then again, this wasn't a serious competition, and wacky stuff like this was more fun than just a boring, normal relay race.

"Look, Leo! She already finished the bread with the chili filling!" Angie exclaimed while practically hopping in place. "We've got it in the bag now!"

"That's our Judy for you!" the princess, just as hyped by the atmosphere, joined in and excitedly hugged me.

"Don't count our chickens until they hatch," Josh warned, sounding unusually stern, especially considering the circumstances. "We don't want a repeat of the cavalry battle."

"Mou! Stop bringing that up!" the Celestial girl griped and tried to poke the guy with her elbow, but he was faster and dodged out of the way.

The reason why we were sitting out this one wasn't just because we trusted in Judy's pastry-eating skills, but due to the rules. To allow everyone an opportunity to have fun, students couldn't compete consecutively. We had another one of the sports festival staples just before this bread-eating race thing in the form of the 'mock cavalry battle'. It required four people from each class; three of them served as the horse, holding up the last student as the rider. Each rider had a headband, and if it was taken, the team would be eliminated from the battle.

From the start, Angie one-sidedly took charge of the class and decided that, since we were the 'golden team', the four of us would be reserved for this contest, with me, Josh, and Elly serving as the horse and Angie as the rider. Considering our individual specs, it was a solid plan, and we completely dominated the contest… until our Celestial leader got cocky, and Penny, leading their class, managed to snatch her headband in a daring manoeuvre.

It was all very dramatic and stuff, but I personally wasn't too involved, as my whole contribution could be boiled down to carrying Angie around and trying to make sure we didn't bump into others too hard. Since we eliminated so many other teams, we still got second place, but it made Angie double down on her competitive streak, and Josh did little to keep her in check.

Anyhow, the bread contest thingie was almost over, and it was Judy's turn again, so I did a bit of cheering on principle. I was sure this situation was supposed to be all kinds of tense and filled with the spirit of youth and whatnot, but to me, watching Judy do her chipmunk impression was just too hilarious to take any of this in any way seriously.

"Great work, guys! We're back in the lead again!" Angie welcomed the team back and gave each of them a high-five. "I tell you; we've totally got this in the bag!"

"Chief. You're a bad influence on Angeline," my dear assistant told me the moment she got within earshot.

"Because she's jinxing it?" I asked innocently, and she nodded with undue solemnity.

"Here, have some caramel milk," the princess cut in and handed her a small brown carton box with a straw already sticking out of it. "I've heard that milk helps the burning go away after eating spicy foods."

"Thanks, I appreciate it." Judy accepted the beverage, yet at the same time she already had her phone in her hand.

"Are you going to document whether Elly's folk remedy works?" I teased her a bit, but she gave me a flat look and, after taking a gulp, showed the screen to me.

"I'm looking at reports on the Hub. Since you've been so worried about it, I had the CIN agents stationed in the Ottawa School of Restoration keep an ear out for any news, and the latest intel says that Lord Ambrose finally got an appointment with the local arch-mage."

"It's about damn time," I grumbled. "Maybe I should keep an eye on him now."

"Don't bother. The appointment is two weeks from now."

"… You have to be joking."

"No, see?" she showed her phone screen to me. "The middle of May. They even got a photo of the official correspondence."

"Dammit, are we seriously going to have two more weeks of downtime before that whole sub-plot would advance again? That's just nuts."

"You say that, but if I had to choose between things happening at unpredictable intervals or there being a clear time-table, I'll pick the latter," Judy argued back, and as much as I would've liked to object to that, this hill wasn't worth dying for, so I threw my hands into the air and gave up.

"Fair point. I just hope we aren't simply bottling things up by my self-suggestion and cause an even bigger—"

"Leo! Stop flirting and come quick!" Angie barrelled into our conversation and grabbed my arm. "It's time for the fetch race, and we need you!"

"Do you really?" I grumbled on principle, but got up all the same.

"Yes! You're our secret weapon!" she declared proudly.

"I agree with her on this one," Josh joined us and gave me a sagely look. "The fetch race list always has at least a few weird and embarrassing things on it, but since you have no sense of shame, it's gonna be a piece of cake for you!"

"… Dude, do you want me to punch you?"

"No. That's why I'm standing all the way over here," he shot back with a smirk.

"Guys, guys! Fight after we win the competition, okay?" Angie scolded us, and we both fell in line.

"Fine. What are the rules?" My inquiry made them look at me funny. "You know that this is my first-ever sports festival, right?"

"But you knew about the cavalry battle," Josh pointed out, but I dismissed him with a huff.

"Because that's a common tro— I mean, knowledge."

"And the fetch race isn't?" he asked back, and when I gave him a flat look, he quickly surrendered. "Fine. I'll explain on the way to the judges."

"So it has judges," I echoed him, and the Celestial girl at our side hummed in the affirmative as we started walking.

"Yep! It's kinda like a scavenger hunt with extra rules."

"Three-man teams, each gets a list of items," Josh continued where she left off, sounding unusually serious and matter-of-factly. "It's gonna have all kinds of stuff on it. Some are easy to find, some are difficult, and some are gonna be just weird and vague. The goal is to bring them back to the judges, and they will vote on whether it's acceptable or not. The first team who crosses off all the items on the list wins."

"Sounds simple enough."

"It's never simple," Angie spoke with gravitas, followed by a sigh. "Last year, we had to fetch stuff like fresh lichen and eggs."

"… Where did you even get those?"

"The roof and the kitchen," Josh answered nonchalantly. "We also had to fetch a 'funny person'. That was more of a hassle."

"If Leo didn't transfer just after the last sports festival, we could've picked him," his girlfriend commented with a grin aimed at me.

I got it. It's because I used to be the idiot friend (or at least playing that role) at the time. Funny.

"Let's hope this year we won't get any esoteric requests like that," the guy concluded, right as we reached the table where the judges were sitting.

In order, from left to right, we had Taika, Barnabas, Mrs Applebottom, Jaakobah, and Rinne of all people. That was the majority of the faculty, wasn't it? I was almost surprised that Lord Grandpa wasn't here.

"So we meet again!" a spirited voice called out to us from our left, and I soon found Penny in the company of two placeholder students. She was pretty hyped up by the contest, and she pointed at me in particular. "Be prepared, Brother! I won't take it easy on you just because you're family!"

"Sure, Kiddo, sure," I responded with an easy-going smile and left it at that.

She was clearly a bit drunk on the atmosphere, and her class coming out on top during the cavalry battle only made it worse, but I let it slide. Little sisters were best when they were energetic, and she even had a smug little smirk, the kind Elly occasionally showed, and Penny's was almost half as adorable as my girlfriend's version, so it was fine. I was just happy that she was having fun.

"Oh, now you've done it!" Angie clearly didn't share my sentiment, because she pointed right back at her. "Just. You. Wait! We'll avenge our previous humiliation, and wipe that smirk off your face!"

"Yeah!" Josh cried out and stepped up to his girlfriend before dramatically crossing his arms, and I could practically see the sparks flying between them and my sister.

…

Oh well. So long as everyone was having fun.

In the meantime, Mrs Applebottom picked up a microphone and, after quickly explaining the same rules that Josh just outlined to me, she raised her hand over her head.

"Now, children! Please come over and pick up the envelopes. And remember: no peeking!"

Angie responded first and dashed over to the table, returning with a sealed manila envelope in a matter of seconds. We had to wait for all the classes to pick up their own lists and the cue to start, but before that…

"Okay, here's the plan," Josh whispered, as if afraid that the other teams would overhear us. "We divide the list into three parts and act independently. Leo's in charge of the weird and embarrassing stuff, we take care of all the others, as we agreed."

"Hold on. I don't remember agreeing to that."

My protests fell on deaf ears, and before I knew it, there was a loud beep coming from the speakers, and the Celestial girl practically tore the envelope apart to get to the list inside.

"Lemme see, lemme see… Okay, we don't have that many bad ones this year."

"Let's start with Leo's share, and then we divide the rest," Josh proposed, and after a few short seconds, he declared, "You take care of the 'cutest girl' and the 'mahogany chair' ones."

"Wow. That second one is oddly specific," Angie muttered, but then she squinted. "But that way we have an odd number of items between the two of us. How about you also take care of…" Her eyes scanned the list and then poked the paper. "Glasses. Sounds easy enough."

I wanted to yell 'Don't I get a say in this?', but being a crotchety and difficult in this situation would've been lame, so I swallowed my objections and nodded along.

"Fine, I'm on it."

With that, I turned around and dashed back the way we came, where the rest of our classmates were idling on the grass, and they parted to give me way.

"Back already?" Judy asked a touch incredulously, but instead of answering, I simply picked her up and carefully slung her over my shoulder.

"Sorry girls, I need to borrow you for a second," I apologized in a hurry, making Elly's eyes open wide.

"Wait, you mean me toooo—?"

Her surprised yelp turned into a tinkling giggle, which itself was replaced by a surprised yelp as soon as I turned around and jogged back the way I came, this time with two girls on my shoulders.

"We could've walked, you know?" Judy pointed out around the halfway point, and I would've shrugged if I wasn't afraid that I could hurt them by doing so.

"Where's the fun in that?"

"… You make a fair point," my dear assistant relented surprisingly fast and wiggled her butt to get into a more comfortable position. "Carry on."

She didn't need to say that twice, and we reached the judges' table in record time. Unfortunately, I wasn't the quickest, as I was beaten to the punch by Penny, holding a blushing Snowy's hand in front of the five faculty members.

"We have our second item delivered, just in the nick of time!" Mrs Applebottom narrated through the speakers, sounding unusually fired up. Everyone was affected by the atmosphere, it seemed. Meanwhile, I put the girls down, and she addressed me directly. "So? Which one of the lucky girls is the cutest?"

"That's not my job to figure out," I answered flippantly, earning me a couple of chuckles (and some boos) from the crowd.

"Approved!" Lord Taika raised a hand right away, signalling that she accepted my 'item', and the rest soon followed suit.

"Rinne approves!"

"I more or less expected you to do this," Lord Barnabas noted, and also raised a hand. "Approved."

"Approved. Naturally."

With Jaakobah's vote, I could already cross off the first article from the list. Now, it was time for the second one.

"Now, where to find a mahogany chair around here?" I mused aloud, and it took my dear assistant to realize what I was doing.

"Library, ground floor, the ones around the long table in the back," she told me in a deadpan voice.

"Thanks, Dormouse. I love you."

"I know."

I sent my girlfriends a wave and then immediately dashed off towards the detached building next to the school. Luckily, the library was open despite the sports day. Or maybe it was left open on purpose, to give access to the specified scavenger hunt item. Though again, I was pretty sure the faculty office also had wooden chairs, but I trusted Judy on this one.

The school's unnecessarily big library had an unnecessarily large number of reading tables in tow, but I sought out the ones in the back in particular. Picking out the slightly differently coloured wooden chairs wasn't too hard once I got there. What I wasn't expecting was to find someone else already idling there.

"Oh, Leonard? Perfect timing!" Lord Gulliver smiled at me from under his red mop of a hairdo, his voice a mix of surprise and relief.

"I'm a bit busy right now, but can I help you with something?" I asked while simultaneously inspecting the chairs.

He walked over to my side and awkwardly cleared his throat.

"You see, Ambrose sent me a cryptic message about an hour ago, and I can't reach him."

"Cryptic message," I echoed him absent-mindedly and picked up a chair. "About his appointment?"

"You already know?" I didn't get the opportunity to answer, because he shook his head and continued with, "Of course you do. I'm just a little worried about him. He wrote very angrily. He was using all caps and lots of exclamation marks."

"I can sympathize. I would be pretty mad if I was stalled for another two weeks," I told him offhandedly and raised the chair over my head. "I'm a bit busy with this scavenger hunt right now, but if it'll give you some peace of mind, I'll figure out what he's up to as soon as I'm done."

"Thank you, I would appreciate that."

"Don't even mention it."

I left the library with those parting words and rushed back to the judges' table. All of this would've been so much quicker if I could just teleport over, but I obviously couldn't do that. I was spoiled by my Phasing ability, wasn't I?

In any case, I delivered the second item on our list, just in time to see Angie return from the direction of the cafeteria with a handful of bright orange carrots. Since she still had two items on her list, I let her go first, and once we were both approved, I headed out once more. This time I was pretty clear on my target. Except…

"The early bird gets the worm, Brother!" Penny told me with a shit-eating grin and ran away, leaving me in the company of a slightly confoundedly and prominently glassesless Naoren.

"Please accept my apologies, Brother Leonard," he told me, but I dismissed him with a wave of my hand.

"It's fine. It's just a game."

Penny beat me to the punch here and borrowed Naoren's spectacles first, leaving me empty handed. That's just how the cookie crumbled sometimes, and I absolutely wasn't going to be holding a grudge over this. I might have been tempted to give her a looot of head pats after this was all over though, but that was something entirely unrelated.

More importantly, what was I supposed to do? When the subject of glasses came up, I just automatically considered it a done deal, because I knew that Naoren was here, but now that he was out of the equation, I was drawing a blank. Some of our classmates had glasses, but nobody was wearing those right now, because of safety and whatnot. Even if I got one of them to let me borrow theirs, it would've meant we would've had to go back to the classroom together, and then back here, and that was guaranteed to eat up too much time. Not that I was all that invested in this competition or anything, but come on; if I was doing this, I might as well do it properly.

But what alternatives did I have? Maybe I could try to rules-lawyer this and borrow a pair of glass cups from the cafeteria? That would've technically fulfilled the letter of the challenge, but… Nah. While I was pretty sure Jaakobah and Rinne would've accepted that, relying on them doing that just because it was me doing the bit would've felt like cheating. But if not that, then…

"Time for a Plan C," I muttered under my breath and bid farewell to the currently not-bespectacled patriarch before rushing over to the main building. My destination was the ground floor restroom, and as soon as I was inside an empty stall, I Phased away.

"Class rep!"

"Eeep!" My sudden appearance in her room was met with a suitably shocked yelp, followed by a scalding, "Leo! What are you doing here?!"

"Listen, I need to borrow your glasses for a bit. Or if you have spares, I'm good with those as well." I only received a long and withering glare in return. "By the way, cute room you've got here. Very girly."

"I don't have the patience for this right now!" she exploded at me, holding her temples. "My head feels like it's about to explode!"

"What? Why?"

"How should I know?" she griped and pointed at magical marbles floating around her head. "These guys are also driving me crazy! I thought I finally had a little bit of control over them, but they don't listen anymore and they keep sending out mana waves and giving me this ominous feeling, and are you even listening to me?"

"Of course I do," I responded, though I admit that my expression might've been blank for a moment there. "When did it start?"

"I don't know… About ten minutes ago? A quarter of an hour, maybe? I already called Grandfather, but I don't know what's happening." Without warning, the two magic marbles came to a halt and started violently vibrating. Looking at them closely, I could see the faint colourless light surrounding them undulate. I had a hunch that those were the 'mana waves' Ammy just mentioned, but then they stopped when she slapped the left orb, and they both started circling her head again. "Quit it! I can't understand you!"

"Do you think they're trying to communicate with you?" I asked the obvious question, and after a long beat, she let out an ambivalent noise.

"Maybe? I'm not sure. It's hard to explain how it feels without experiencing it yourself, and…" She abruptly stopped and squinted at me. "You showed up here out of the blue and have been asking a lot of questions. Do you know something? Is what's happening related to 'destiny'?"

"Let's not jump to conclusions like that. For now, let me just borrow this, and…" Before she could react, I deftly snatched the glasses right off her nose. "Thank you! I'll look into this, I promise, but I gotta go!"

"Wait, Leo! You can't just—!"

Except I could, and a moment later I was back in the toilet stall. Not for long, as I practically exploded out of the restroom and rushed towards the judges' table for the last time. While it wasn't exactly 'destiny' in the way the class rep meant it, encountering the 'rule of three' so blatantly was the next closest thing I could think of, and I would've bet my left foot that something was up with Lord Ambrose and the third Grimoire Key. But first, I had to complete my previous obligations by delivering the third item on our list.

As soon as I got close, Judy tried to flag me down by subtly gesturing at her phone, but I quickly passed by her and slapped the glasses onto the table first. Gently, of course. The class rep was going to be mad at me already; I didn't need to add to it by accidentally breaking them.

"Chief?" Judy followed after me and tried to get my attention by holding onto my hand, but I slipped out of her grasp and planted a quick peck on her forehead instead.

"Something's going pear-shaped in Ottawa. I'm already on it. Excuse me in front of the others until I'm back, please?"

My dear assistant was clearly none too pleased by the way I brushed her off, but she patiently nodded along all the same. Elly was about to come over too, but by then I dashed off again. I couldn't remember the last time I was running this much on the school grounds. Maybe during the Chimera incident? Except back then I was running all over the place, but just springing back and forth like this. Case in point: in just half a minute, I was back in the exact same stall of the exact same restroom again.

"I knew that this would happen…" I muttered under my breath as I plunged a phantom limb into my outfit, and the Leoformer switched into the usual school uniform. "I knew that whole 'self-suggestion' stuff was too good to be true."

I was wearing it pretty much twenty-four-seven at this point, even when I wasn't actively using it, because taking it off for PE classes or this sports day was just asking for trouble. It was much easier to just make another outfit slot for my PE uniform than to risk my belt, along with my Leoformer, Cal and Teeny in its storage, and future-me's notes getting displaced.

Inhaling deeply, I cast my point of view at Lord Ambrose's location, and after just a few short seconds, I exhaled hard.

"I sure hope someone picks up that phone…" I uttered morosely, and then with another flick of my phantom limbs, all the physical enchantments and defensive wards were pushed to their redline just before I disappeared with an equally glum, "… because I called it."

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