"Take care, Chief. Be sure to rest well."

While saying so, Judy straightened my collar. It was already about as dark as it gets outside, and we both stood under the eaves of my house while she kept fiddling with my clothes, obviously reluctant to leave.

"Don't worry, Dormouse; I'll be fine," I told her as I cupped her outstretched hand in mine and gently squeezed it. "I already took some painkillers, and I don't have a fever yet, so I'll probably live."

"Nevertheless, make sure you take a hot shower once everyone leaves. Also, no more playing with enchantments for the day."

"Yes, yes. I promise."

My other girlfriend looked just a tad impatient behind her, probably because her limo was already parked in front of my driveway, so I told the both of them, "Take care on your way home, and please tell Emese I'm sorry I couldn't join her for dinner." My dear assistant only clicked her tongue in response, so I also added, "Speaking of which, have a fun evening."

"It's not going to be that," Judy grumbled under her breath, earning her a curious glance from the princess.

"Why? I thought you got along with mom."

"It's not that," she denied with a shake of her head. "Because the Chief isn't going to be there with us, she's going to ask all kinds of 'mom' questions. It's going to be embarrassing."

When I've heard that, I unconsciously raised a brow as high as those things could go. Unfortunately my assistant didn't get the message, so I had to grudgingly speak up anyway.

"Okay, I bite. What are these 'mom' questions you are talking about?"

She responded with a long stare that said she wasn't entirely sure if I was serious, but then she ultimately explained herself all the same.

"Questions about how far our relationship progressed." She paused for another long moment, and then used her chin to point at the blonde girl at her side and added, "With her."

"Oooooh, now I get it," I noted with a knowing smile, only to get gently kicked in the shin for my trouble.

"Don't laugh. It's your fault," my sulky assistant declared between two small kicks.

"What's my fault?"

"This whole misunderstanding about how our relationship works," she clarified as she finally ceased her futile, if somewhat adorable, attempts at inflicting physical violence on my poor legs. "That's why Elly's mother believes we are also going out with each other."

"We aren't?" Elly cut in with a baffled expression, so I explained:

"What Judy means is that while we are all going out, you two, in particular, are not romantically involved."

"Oooooh, I see."

The princess nodded to herself with an enlightened expression, which made my other girlfriend direct an annoyed frown at me.

"Why can't you explain things to Emese like that?"

"You could do it too," I proposed, only to be dismissed by a shake of her head.

"I tried, but ever since you healed her injury, she became much harder to handle. I believe she thinks I'm just shy and she dismisses all my objections because of that."

"Wait… are you trying to tell me that Emese thinks that you're a tsundere?"

My dear assistant's eyes opened ever so slightly wider, only to then go to the other extreme and narrow into dangerous squints. By Judy standards, I mean.

"Chief, this isn't funny."

"I know. Do I look like I'm laughing to you?"

"Not on the surface, but I know that you do it on the inside."

"Since when can you read my mind?"

"I could always do that." After that flat response, her face finally slackened a little and she tagged on an uncertain, "What?"

"Nothing. I was just kind of expecting a Judy-bot gag right around now."

"Please, Chief. We must avoid overusing the same skit, or it will become stale."

"True, I suppose. By the way, what were we talking about? Before we established that I don't find this incredibly amusing in any shape or form, I mean. "

"Something about mom thinking that Judy is something called a tsun-something or something," my other girlfriend provided the answer, and my assistant responded with an appreciative grunt.

"That was one 'something' too many, but you're right. The point is, we really need you to be there to clear this up; being blunt and impudent with your elders is your specialty."

"How unusually cheeky of you to say that." I punctuated my words with an irreverent shrug and then added, "Either way, you know I can't go with you guys today. I'm terribly sorry."

"No, you are not," Judy noted with a voice about as dry as the salt flats.

"... Yeah, you are right. I'm not." The roguish smile accompanying that admission only made both of my girlfriends flare up with mild disapproval, so I hastily switched over to my Charming Boyfriend Smile™ ver. 0.12.1, and added, "Anyhow, I wish you the best of luck, and if things really get out of hand, you can always just call me and I'll try to smooth things over through the phone."

"That would presume you'd pick it up in the first place," came the next verbal jab my way, and I couldn't help but shake my head.

"I told you already; I didn't pick up my phone because I put it on mute, and I did that because the last time I forgot to do it before fighting a Chimera, it nearly got me killed. Multiple times, if I may add."

"I know," Judy admitted, albeit grudgingly and with another lovetap on my shin.

She was obviously on the threshold to enter into a full-blown sulking mode. As a responsible boyfriend, it was my duty to prevent that from coming to pass, which I did so by swiftly putting my arms around her and pulling her into a good old-fashioned bear hug.

"Hey! No fair!" my other girlfriend called foul right away, so I opened one arm to make space for her, which she immediately took with her usual gusto. We stayed like this for a few seconds, but then I remembered something.

"Hey, princess?"

"Yes?" she responded by glancing up at me from my chest.

"Don't forget about the charm."

For a moment her brows twisted into a confused frown, but then her expression lit up as she finally realized what I was talking about, and she gave me a confident nod and an enthusiastic, "Sure!" Said nod of course ended up with her headbutting my ribs, but I was getting used to that by this point.

With that done, I said my goodbyes to my girlfriends, including multiple farewell kisses, another hug or five, and a grudging promise about talking to Emese at the earliest convenient occasion, and only then did they finally get into the limo and leave. I stayed outside and waved after them until they rounded the corner, and waited till they were completely out of sight before I headed back into the house.

"What took you this long?" came the immediate, and palpably prickly, question from the girl with the glasses still sitting on my couch. Snowy was already upstairs, based on the sound of the hair-drier coming from there, and the childhood friend duo left a while ago, so it was only the two of us left in the living room.

I gave the impatient class rep a subtle smile and told her, "Sorry, but my girlfriends can be a little high maintenance from time to time. It's what makes them fun to be around."

"How gratuitously wholesome," was what she said, with an implied eye-roll in tow. It was completely uncalled for, as I wasn't even bragging, but she moved on before I could call her out on it. "Now then, could you please tell me why you asked me to stay behind?"

"I'm fairly certain that I already did that."

"No," she rebuffed me with a temperamental huff. "You only told me you are going to show me something neat, and then winked at me."

"Did I?" I mused aloud while absently stroking my nonexistent nefarious goatee. "Oh well, it's easier to show you than to explain. But before that, give me a minute." Saying so, I walked over to the stairs, and called out, "Sis!"

After a moment I could hear a door opening on the first floor, and soon Snowy's platinum head came to view. She had her hair down, and by the looks of it, she recently had a quick shower.

"Yes? Is there a problem?" she inquired as she quickly made her way down the stairs and stood in front of me.

"Nah, I just wanted to tell you that Ammy and I are going over to the secret base. That said, since you already came over to my side..."

She stiffened for a moment as I raised a hand, and she let out a baffled 'Hup?' sound as placed it on the top of her head and began to vigorously rub it. Also, for the record, her hair was indeed a little damp.

"Uuuu... Why are you petting me?"

"Just for being a good girl in general," I told her as I continued ruffling her hair.

"Thank you?" Her response was a tad uncertain, but she didn't shy away from my touch, so I continued to spoil her right until her eyes suddenly lit up with realization and she asked, "You said you're going to the hideout, right?"

"Yes."

"Can you take a package with you?"

"So long as it's not too big, I suppose I could"

My tentative confirmation made her flash a delighted smile at me and she ducked out of under my palm and rushed into the kitchen.

"I'll be right back, give me a minute."

I couldn't help but smile at her as she disappeared from sight, but my expression soon turned upside down when I noted the weird look the class rep was giving me.

"What? Is there something on my face?"

She looked me over, and then one dramatic glasses-tweak later she told me, with the utmost seriousness, "Seeing you two acting like that, I can't help but wonder if you really have no intention of adding Neige to your harem."

"No, and I don't have a harem," I responded just a touch indignantly. "It's a semi-platonic subtype of the polyamorous Type 8 triangular relationship."

"Don't play with semantics," Ammy told me, this time changing things up a little by pushing up her glasses on the bridge of her nose instead of fiddling with the temples. "If it walks like a duck, floats like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then—"

"It must be a mallard," I cut in with my sageliest of nods.

"That's also a kind of duck," she responded with her Judyest of looks in return.

I shrugged my shoulder and told her, "Now look who's playing with semantics?"

"It's not semantics; it's literally the same thing."

"Yeah, right. Next time you're going to tell me witches are also literally ducks because they weigh the same."

My verbal sparring partner gave me a long, critical look, and then stated, "I get the reference, but that was still silly."

"Maybe, but not as silly as calling my relationship a duck," I countered, but before she could counter-counter my counter, Snowy came back with a small package wrapped in napkins in her hands.

"Here," she handed me the package, and only then did she realize the lingering tension in the air and murmured, "D-Did I miss something?"

"Nah, just a couple of confusing, waterfowl-based analogies," I answered off-handedly as I hefted the small pack in my hand. "On a different note, what's this?"

"Spices," she answered matter-of-factly. I wiggled my eyebrows at her to urge her to elaborate, and she did so with surprising zest. "Uncle Brang asked me to bring him some seasonings because the last time I stayed over, they couldn't make anything special for me and I had to eat the same thing they had for dinner."

"I should've known it was something like that," I muttered under my breath before I used my free hand to ruffle her hair one more time and told her, "I'll deliver this. We won't be over for long, but just in case: don't open the door to strangers, don't forget to do your homework, and be in bed before ten."

"Understood!" Snowy actively rubbed her head against my palm for a moment, and then she turned on her heels and walked up the stairs again, only stopping once she reached the first floor, at which point she gave us a small wave. I returned the gesture, which made her giggle, and only then did she head back to her room.

With that sidetrack over, I gestured for Ammy to follow me (all the while pointedly ignoring the persistent suspicious looks she was giving me) and we headed to my one and only secret teleportation closet. The gently glowing runic circle on the inside was the same as usual, and after making some space, I stood in the middle and called my passenger over to me.

This wasn't her first rodeo, so she took up her position in front of me with practiced steps, and before you could say 'Llanfair­pwllgwyngyll­gogery­chwyrn­drobwll­llan­tysilio­gogo­goch', we quickly Phased over to our destination without any complications. When we arrived, I knocked on the metal door and Rabom, serving as my anchor on the other side, quickly opened it up.

"I still can't get used to this," Ammy noted as she followed after me, no doubt referring to our reception. I didn't pay her much heed, as I was focused on the saluting Faun by the door, and after a few grunts, I managed to pawn my delivery off to him and handed over the package in my hands. The class rep waited for me to finish, and when she saw that my attention was back on her, she immediately added, "Also, on a second look, I'm now absolutely positive that your magic circle is complete gibberish."

"Yeah, sure, whatever," I grumbled just a touch half-heartedly whilst massaging my aching temple, and then I turned around and gestured for her to follow me.

I braced myself for it ahead of time, and it wasn't the first occasion I had to transfer with someone while already suffering from enchantment-backlash, but the combination of the pounding headache and the violent nausea wasn't something one could simply get used to. I also had a feeling I was going to get a nasty fever rather sooner than later, but at the moment I was still reasonably fine on that front, so I reckoned I should get everything done before my condition inevitably turned for the worse.

While I was considering all that, we exited the reception room of the base, and upon coming into the main hall, we were greeted by a line of stiffly saluting Fauns, with a grinning Brang at the head.

"Erm? Leo? What's going on with your Fauns?" Ammy inquired in a reserved voice reminiscent of the way she used to talk all the time when I first met her. Those were the times! No monsters, no battles, no menacing tweaking of one's glasses... It all felt like it was such a long time ago.

Anyhow, I glanced at the Faunish parade line with undisguised disapproval and uttered, "Just follow my lead and ignore them with extreme prejudice."

Subsequently, I walked past the whole group, and I made sure to extra-ignore the frantic Rabom trying to sneakily circle around us to get in line. The class rep followed after me, and it didn't take long to find our ultimate target. It wasn't a particularly hard feat though, considering it was limply sprawled out in the middle of the training field, right where I last saw it when I checked on the Fauns.

"Is that what I think it is?" came the tentative question from Ammy the moment she laid her eyes on the body, and I couldn't help but direct a toothy grin at her.

"Only if you think it's a Chimera."

She didn't acknowledge my answer; instead she moved over and began to cautiously examine the beast, her eyes burning with unabashed curiosity, no doubt thrilled by the novelty of the situation. She wasn't alone in this regard, as the sight was new even for me. After all, this was the first time I got to see a Chimera under proper lighting conditions, and let's just say that the better visibility didn't do it any favors.

The motionless creature was about as ugly as I remembered, but with several nasty cuts and gashes on its body adding a gory edge to its already overwhelming natural 'charms'. None of them were bleeding at the moment, but they weren't healing either, which was probably a side-effect of my meddling with its operating system or what have you. Bearing those wounds in mind, combined with the way it was sprawled across the floor and had its long tongue lolling out of its mouth, even I would've thought that it was deader than Hitler's painting career.

"Was it this corpse that you wanted to show me?" the class rep inquired a little uncertainly as she crouched down to gingerly poke the hairy shoulder of the creature.

"Among other things," I confirmed with a nod. "Oh, and for the record, it's not actually dead."

Ammy's hand, which was just about to touch one of the fangs of the Chimera, froze mid-motion as she slowly, borderline mechanically, turned her head to look at me over her shoulder.

"That's not funny."

"Of course it's not, because I'm serious. I only immobilized it."

There was one hell of a tense beat hanging in the air for several seconds as her eyes opened wider than I thought was humanly possible, but then she abruptly jumped to her feet with an unexpectedly girlish "Eeep!" and she frantically scampered over and hid behind my back.

"Leo! What were you thinking!?"

"What? It's just a mostly dead Chimera," I teased her a little, just on principle.

"Only mostly!? That's the problem!"

Her high-pitched voice didn't quite echo in the hall, but it was still loud enough to make the Faun honor guard wordlessly following behind us flinch, so I decided to tone things back a little.

"Easy there, class rep. Easy. Listen, this Chimera is one hundred percent dead. It's not going to get up. Well, technically it could, because it's something like a zombie, but it won't, because it can't. Do you get what I'm trying to say?"

"Zombie?" she repeated after me with a 40/60 mix of incredulity and apprehension.

"Yep," I reaffirmed with an assertive smile. "Now then, since this I a perfect segue, I might as well ask this now: do we have necromancy?"

The sudden ninety-degree turn in the conversation obviously threw Ammy on a loop, as for a while she could only blink at me while her brows had a hard time deciding whether they want to go up or down.

"You mean… right now?"

"No, just in general," I clarified while making sure I was keeping up my confident smile to reassure her. "Is necromancy a thing among the magical folk?"

"Yes..." she answered a little uncertainly while still making sure that I was standing between her and the body on the ground.

"Would you care to elaborate?" I innocently asked back while making sure that keeping me between her and the Chimera was as hard as possible. Ammy glared at me, but it didn't interfere with her ability to explain things, so I let her.

"Necromancy is the mystic art of binding souls, ghosts, and wraiths."

"Aren't those three the same thing?"

"No, of course not."

"Then please define your terms," I requested, and she gave me a 'What are you, my teacher?' kind of look, but at the end of the day she diligently did so anyway.

"Souls are the thing every living being has, and it disappears when you die. Ghosts are the negative imprints left on the world after a traumatic death, retaining some of the deceased's memories and personality, but they would not know they are dead. Ghosts can't retain any memories and would fade out with time. Wraiths are powerful ghosts that actually understand that they are dead, shed the identity of the deceased, and steal mana from living beings to keep themselves alive, in a sense."

"Oh, I see," I nodded along. Halfway through I realized I already read most of this in one of Judy's reports, but since I already asked, cutting her explanation short would've been just rude. "So necromancers use those to take people and make them into the undead?"

"No, of course not," Ammy scoffed as if I just said something stupid. "If you're dead, then you're dead. End of story. It's one of the core tenets of magic."

"Ooookay, then what do they actually do?"

"Magically binding contracts, most of the time. They can also heal the damage done to the soul, or they can bind ghosts and wraiths so that they don't cause any havoc."

"That's… considerably more anti-climactic than I expected," I grumbled, though I was secretly a little bit relieved that I wouldn't have to worry about a crazy necromancer starting a genre shift into a stereotypical zombie apocalypse scenario.

"It's a respectable job," the class rep responded to my comment, completely unaware of my inner turmoil. But then again, by this point I was already thinking about something else.

"So, for the record, necromancers cannot take a dead body and make it into a semi-independent puppet."

"I don't think so, no," Ammy answered a little warily.

"In that case, who could do that?"

She thought for a few long seconds, and I patiently waited for her to collect her thoughts.

"It could be done. The efficiency would be really bad, as a dead body without a soul in it couldn't heal and would slowly decompose over time without constant maintenance, but a good conjurer could certainly do it."

"I presume that would involve putting some kind of complex enchantment into the corpse to emulate the soul," I continued to lead her on, and she nodded in confirmation, none the wiser.

"Yes. It would be something like a golem core, like the one I have in Petra."

"I figured as much. Now, here comes the million-dollar question: could anyone install such a core into the body of a dead Chimera?"

For a moment or five Ammy obviously couldn't fathom my question, but then she glanced over to the body behind me and a shocked gasp escaped her mouth.

"Wait a moment! So when you said the Chimera was mostly dead…?"

"I meant that it was a dead body controlled by magic," I completed her revelation. "Since it was technically an enchantment, I used my trick to disable a few crucial parts, and the Chimera with it. Well, that, and all the tracking and surveillance markers, but that goes without saying."

"But… But I thought this would be impossible." While murmuring so, Ammy finally overcame her fear of the not-quite-dead beast and once again walked up to it. "A Chimera is naturally resistant to the mystic arts of all but the Abyssals."

"But not immune," I noted on the side as I followed after her. "So, just to reiterate: since we already know it can be done, just who would be capable of performing such a feat on this island? He must be some kind of expert conjurer, maybe even a master of it! And he would have to have the tools and resources required to reconstruct the body and install the fake core into it. Just who could it be…?"

"I get it," Ammy griped and sent me an irritated glance over her shoulder. "You think it was my grandfather."

"Yep," I nodded without a hint of reservation. "The real question is whether we can prove it. What do you think?"

"I… honestly don't know. I might be able to find something, but not without any tools." She fell silent for a while as she observed the creature's head, and then she finally stated, "I could try and borrow some from the Artificer's Lodge. There is going to be a symposium soon, so there should be a lot of spares lying around in preparation."

"Good. Until then, what should we do with the body? Do you think we should refrigerate it?"

"I don't think that's necessary." She shook her head and gingerly placed her hand onto the Chimera's forehead. "It has no heartbeat, but it's still warm. That means it must already be in some form of stasis. Maybe a form of temporal lock, or maybe an engraved restoration circuit set on a stable loop within the core?"

"That's something I'll let you figure out." I took a step back and was about to leave her to her examination, but then I had a sudden idea and asked her, "Once you 'borrow' those tools, do you need a separate space to do your tests? I'm asking because we still have a couple of empty nooks and crannies in the base."

"It certainly wouldn't hurt," Ammy responded without looking up.

"In that case, how about you take Brang with you, pick a room, and tell him how you want it to be furnished?"

"I don't know. It doesn't sound like a bad idea, but…" She stood up and stepped away from the body, and then she finally whispered. "No offense, but I would prefer if you were there too."

"Why? He doesn't bite."

"Because they acknowledge you as the one in charge," she countered. "For anyone else, they are still really scary."

"Oh, please! You guys are just prejudiced. Brang is like a giant teddy bear."

"A muscular teddy bear armed to the teeth."

The subject of our conversation let out an embarrassed cough, which I still ignored with extreme prejudice, but when all was said and done, I had no choice but to relent.

"Fine, whatever. I'll go with you."

With that, I gestured for her to follow, and the Faun fell in line behind us without any further ado. This of course meant that playing around with the enchanted core of the not-quite-undead Chimera had to wait till another day, but considering how my forehead was getting a little too warm for my liking, maybe that was for the best. After all, I still had to take the class rep back, and then… well, let's just say I also had other places to visit today.