"O-ho-ho? So this is the 'secret base' Friedrich had told me so much about? Very impressive!" a certain portly nurse exclaimed as we stepped out of the designated 'teleport closet'. His reaction was a little overblown, considering it was only the reception area.

Frankly, I was too mentally exhausted to point that out to him, so I gestured for him to follow after me instead. It's been three days since the good 'Uncle Percy' graced us with his presence, and it had been the bane of my existence. He was still living in my guest room, so I couldn't avoid him, and carrying Cal around with me everywhere in the house was not a feasible solution either. Worse yet, I couldn't just ignore him either, because the whole reason I kept him close was to keep a vigilant eye on him.

"Ki-hi-hi! Welcome, uncle! Come in, let me show you around!" Fred exploded onto the scene the moment we opened the door leading into the central hall and took our guest under his wings right away, more or less ignoring me in the process. I didn't mind.

"Oh. You weren't kidding about the Fauns," Peabody noted a tad awkwardly when he noticed Rabom and Pip carrying a couple of steel beams on their wide shoulders in the background. They must have overheard him, as they stopped in their tracks, but when I waved to them to carry on, they returned the gesture and continued on their merry way. "They seem… surprisingly amicable."

"The Fauns are an exemplary workforce," the newly arrived Galatea commented on the side, currently wearing a dungaree with a matching shirt. "I told grandmaster to hire more of them, but he's resistant to the idea."

"I'm not 'resistant', I literally can't do that. Do you think Fauns grow on trees?" I grumbled back, and after ignoring her click of the tongue, I turned back to the mad scientist and the… well, I still wasn't sure what Peabody's designation was, considering he was an ex-mad-scientist, but for me, he was probably going to stay 'the school nurse' for a while longer. Anyhow, I stepped closer to them. "For now, Fred will give you a tour of the facilities. Familiarize yourself with the layout and the staff, and if you need anything, don't be too shy to ask."

"O-ho-ho. Thank you for the hospitality," the portly nurse answered with a genial smile, and the three of them soon headed off towards the canteen of all places. I imagined that they would want to start with the workshops right away, but what did I know?

In any case, I remained near the entrance to the central hall for a while longer, lost in thought, until I finally resolved myself to head to the training area first. Though it was probably obvious by now (and a bit of a foregone conclusion, really), after some nominal negotiations, Peabody officially joined our research divisions… as a part-timer. After all, he was still the official school nurse, and couldn't just quit his job in the middle of the school year, so that was the compromise we reached.

However, that was none of my business. Or rather, it was in the sense that I would be the one who would need to pay his wages and provide him with resources and equipment, but that was par for the course, and so I left him in Fred's care for the time being. I had more important things to worry about.

Meanwhile, I reached the training area of the main hall, currently rather deserted save for a few stragglers, yet my presence was immediately acknowledged by Roland with a laconic, "Leonard."

"Good afternoon," I responded as I walked over to his side. He was sitting on a bench by the side of the sparring ring, clad in his Uniformer outfit, and with a clipboard and a pen in hand. He was observing the squire and the Kage ninja sparring in the middle of the ring, surrounded by their peers, though it was hard to tell if he was acting as a referee, or doing some kind of test.

I didn't mean to interfere, but after a long beat, he stood up and waved at the trainees, "We'll have a short break. Good work."

The two in the middle stopped at once and saluted to each other, during which Roland turned to me with a questioning look in his eyes.

"I'm not here for any particular reason," I told him a touch flatly, then amended, "I was just on my way to the workshops and figured I'd see how you are doing."

"Everything's in order," he told me, followed by a long and somewhat awkward pause. At last, he couldn't hold himself back any longer, and after glancing around to make sure nobody was listening in on us, he lowered his voice. "Have you still not changed your mind about Sir Percival?"

"I can't say I have."

My answer obviously didn't please him, but for the time being, he deferred to me and simply said, "I still think that the way you are handling the situation will only raise more suspicion, but if that's how you want to do things, I'll cooperate."

"And I appreciate that."

To give some context to our exchange, after the first impromptu emergency meeting about my alleged mentor and kinda-sorta parental figure concluded in my girlfriend's bedroom, the only conclusion we reached was that we needed to have a second emergency meeting, this time with Roland and the science duo in tow. In the end, we decided, mostly due to my insistence, to keep Sir Percival away from the base, not reveal the fact that I'm actually Bel of the Abyss, and to keep him under close surveillance until we could be sure about his allegiances and whether or not he was dangerous.

It said something about the old man's acting skills that Roland still wasn't entirely convinced about my claims about him, but since he was the cautious sort, he still played along with my plans. As such, for the time being, Sir Percival would stay at my house, he was excluded from the inner workings of the Ordo Draconis by telling him that his 'office' was still under construction in the Dracis mansion, and everyone was told to be wary of what they talk about in front of him.

Unfortunately, this was far from foolproof. For a start, I couldn't do much about Penny, and she had already given her own take on the events that transpired in the past couple of months to him. I also couldn't keep the other Knights away from him, especially since they decided to throw a welcome party for him two days ago. In my living room. It was quite a mess, and I still gave daily thanks to the unyielding work ethic of the invisible ninja maids.

On a more serious note, watching the old man during the party only further solidified my opinion of him being a two-faced snake. The ease with which he held up his congenial image was startling, and when I watched him interact with the others, I couldn't blame them for falling hook, line, and sinker for his act. He was not only good at it, but he was also incredibly consistent and didn't show any of the cynical, calculating side I'd come across when we were alone.

Worse yet, while I was covertly observing him, he did the same to me, and I didn't know how to feel about the occasional respectful glances and nods he sent my way whenever I was talking with Duncan or Morgana. I wondered, was he convinced I was putting up an act in front of them? Kind of like what he did? Was he impressed by that, or was there another meaning behind his expressions? Unfortunately, as much as I would've liked to objectively analyze everything about him, the way just the memory of his face made my blood pressure rise a notch didn't exactly let me.

As such, I also asked Judy and Roland to act as my unbiased, third-party observers. Elly also applied for the role, but she wasn't quite subtle enough to pull it off. For now, Sir Percival mistook her behavior for being awkward around a Knight she just met for the first time, or at least that was what he told me, but I had a hard time trusting any word that came out of his mouth. Conversely, he seemed to take a strong liking to Judy, and I also didn't know how to feel about that.

Anyhow, the long and the short of it was that Uncle Percy was still under surveillance, and I doubted that would change any time soon. Case in point, I Far Glanced over to him, and true to form, he was snooping inside the teleport closet back home, despite my explicit warning. That wasn't the first time something like this happened, and I had already caught him red-handed while poking around in my room. Of course, I did that through Far Sight, so I couldn't use it as evidence in front of others, but it certainly made me feel vindicated in a sense.

Back in the present, Roland had a pensive expression, and when I raised a brow at him, he took that as a prompt to launch into a new topic.

"Putting your suspicions about Sir Percival aside for the moment, I would like to request some advice from you."

"I'm listening," I answered on autopilot, and he flashed the clipboard in his hands to me.

"Lately, there had been some debate within the Ordo Draconis about how to integrate the Kage clan into our hierarchy. Some think that they should be put merged into the Ordo Draconis, but there's a sizable opposition that wants to put them directly under the jurisdiction of the Draconic Federation."

"Huh. Okay, before I say anything else, what does that have to do with those guys sparring and you taking notes?"

"One of the chief arguments relies on the notion that the Kage ninjas are a reconnaissance force not fit for direct combat, and as such, they should have their bureau separate from the Ordo Draconis. We're currently doing organized sparring to determine if this argument has any merits."

"And who pushes this argument?"

"Mainly the Albions," Roland told me with just a hint of exasperation.

"I see." Nodding, I pinched the clipboard between my fingers and gently pulled it out of his hands. He didn't give any resistance, though he did look rather surprised when I tossed it aside. "Listen up. The next time they bring this up, tell them that the Kage Clan has absolutely nothing to do with either the Ordo Draconis or the Draconic Federation. They swore loyalty to me, despite my best efforts, so they are my responsibility. I'm already interfering with their traditional mission, and I'm not going to strain our relationship any further by trying to integrate them into anything. They are with me, only I'm telling them what to do and not to do, and if the Albions have a problem with that, tell them to take it up with me personally. If they dare."

"I'll… do that." Roland looked me over from head to toe. "Are you feeling unwell? You sound more aggressive than usual."

"Well, excuse me for being a bit on edge after having to be constantly vigilant in my own bloody house, all the while the Assembly is just around the corner trying to pick a fight with me in particular, and then on top of that, my head hurts like a bitch," I griped maybe a bit too hard, but Roland didn't seem to take it to heart.

"Maybe you should take a break."

"We just came home from a break, remember?" A long beat later, I exhaled a shallow sigh and added, "I appreciate the sentiment, but this really isn't the time for that."

"You should take care of yourself all the same. Maybe I should mention this to Judy?"

"… Why do people keep threatening me with my girlfriends lately? Is there something I'm unaware of?" He remained silent, so I let out a soft 'Bah!' and turned on my heel. "If there's nothing else, I'll get going. Take care."

"You too," Roland answered and walked over to pick up the discarded clipboard. Knowing him, he was going to finish the sparring sessions anyway, just to be thorough, but that was none of my business.

Moving on, I passed by the empty lounge area and then headed straight to Fred's workshop. It was as chaotic as always, but it was also the reason why it was the perfect place to hide my own side projects. I liked to call it the needle-in-the-needlestack tactic.

Jokes aside, my destination was the same corner where we built the fake Ascalon. After the original was successfully destroyed (if in an infinitely more grandiose fashion than I originally planned), the fake was successfully 'returned' to Sebastian, and it was once again displayed in the old lizard's office. By now, most of the equipment used in the process was either moved or repurposed for my current job and the source of my persistent headaches.

On the middle of the mostly clean and orderly workbench sat a metal plate, held in place by three metal prongs and surrounded by a couple of tools and gadgets I borrowed from Fred, as well as a custom-made leather belt. The plaque itself was shining with invisible magical light, dominating the entire corner with its presence, and it was the result of what is colloquially known as 'feature creep'.

For context, the Magiformers the guys were using to this day were akin to souped-up street cars; a simple and efficient chassis made stronger, faster, and fancier by after-market modifications. The Knights' Uniformers, on the other hand, were more like high-end supercars, custom-made to be as streamlined and powerful as possible. What I was making was… well, the car analogy kind of breaks down, but the idea was to make it simultaneously robust, powerful, and something I could easily customize after the fact with my phantom limbs. The goal was to have a formula one racer, a rally car, a drag racer, and a monster truck in a single package.

Needless to say, for a good while it felt like I bit off way more than I could chew with this project, but after my impromptu duel with Lord Grandpa, I returned to it with renewed determination, and I had spent that past couple of nights working on it, and I was finally able to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

While my phantom limb poked the plaque, to make sure things were still stable, I picked up the belt. It was Galatea's handiwork, and once I was done with the enchantment, the idea was that the plate could be housed inside the hollow belt buckle at the front. When I was making the Uniformers, I was pressed for time and didn't bother to think outside the box, so I'd made them into watches to follow the trend set by the Unifomers, but for my personal equipment, I decided to go fancy.

First and foremost, unlike with the Knights, I didn't need physical contact to activate it. By incorporating a small battery- and kickstarter-array that I could trigger with my phantom limb, I could switch it on even while my hands were otherwise occupied. Furthermore, by expanding the enchantments storage memory, I could save multiple, customizable outfits and gear inside it, and I even managed to copy over the inventory-enchantment from Raven Boy's little baggie.

As of right now, the only outfits stored in the enchantment were a school uniform modeled after Josh's, and a military uniform based on Roland's, just to test the Oath connectors. Once the underlying framework was completed, I was going to add more of them, including a full copy of my Bel outfit, anti-dragon gloves and all, but that was for later. Modifying an already 'saved' outfit was laughably easy, so it was fairly low on my priority list.

Speaking of priorities, I put the belt down and faced the metal plate again. My preliminary inspection told me the arrays were stable and everything was working fine. In theory, I should've been able to completely finish by the next morning, barring any interruptions. However, did I want to do that to myself?

I must've looked pretty out of it if even Roland told me I should take a break, and even though I only did some cursory inspection on the enchantments, my head was once again throbbing like it would explode at any second. Should I finish it another day, and focus on other things for the day, I wondered? Maybe I should check on how Peabody was doing, or maybe it would've been best to keep a close look on Sir Percival to see if he was up to something nefarious, or maybe…

"Nah. Procrastination is for optimists," I muttered under my breath and picked up one of the tools from the workbench, and immersed myself in the task, headaches be damned.

In retrospect, this was definitely one of the best on-the-spot decisions I had made in a while, but that was a story for another occasion.

Egathentale

Hello, Dear Readers.

Here's a small reminder that I'm currently living off my Patreon income (plus royalties), and I just finished paying my taxes, so every penny you could throw my way would be much appreciated.

As of the writing of this author's note, Patreon gets one guaranteed update on every Monday and Friday (read: one Simulacrum chapter part), with occasional extra updates on top of that, plus early access to my secondary project in progress called Fantasy Economics 101.

Once I'll have enough of a buffer to be worth "locking behind" tiers, I'm planning to revamp the pledges, but right now, just $5 gives you access to everything up to Chapter 111 Part 1.

No pressure though; this is just a small reminder that, contrary to popular belief, writers need to eat too. :P

Anyhow, I wish you all a very nice day, a great weekend, and I'll see you all next time.

Yours,

Egathentale