I had many hectic days in the past, but this one was easily in the top three. I had to fight a stupid off-brand Chimera, rescue Josh and Angie, the latter turned out to be the reincarnation of the Celestials' long-deceased cult leader, and I even had to participate in a parade! All in all, I was feeling sick and tired, so I felt like I entirely deserved a bit of downtime.

Case in point, a pleased breath escaped my mouth, entirely involuntarily, as I was lying on the princess's bed without my shirt on.

"Can you go a bit lower?" I asked, and my draconic girlfriend let out a high-spirited grunt.

"On it!" There was a moment of silence as I felt her hands move, and then she exclaimed, "Wow! You're really stiff down here!"

"I can't exactly help it," I grumbled and moved my hips a bit to give her better access. "Can you do something about it?"

"Of course I can!" she exclaimed and flexed her fingers. "A good squeeze should do the trick!"

"Are you doing that on purpose?" came a deadpan question from our left, and I raised my upper body off the bed so I could face Judy.

"The easily misunderstood innuendos? Yeah."

"It's fun!" the princess backed me up and then resumed her massage. She was straddling me, and currently working on my lower back. As for my dear assistant, she just came back from taking a quick shower. She said it helped her think, and who was I to question her methods?

In any case, she walked over to the side of the bed and sat down. Like the princess, she was wearing her pyjamas, and her hair was still visibly damp. She was conspicuously staring at my bare back, and I was just about to think of another weird innuendo-laden comment when I was knocked out of my thoughts by a sharp spike of pain.

"Ow-ow-ow! Easy there, princess!"

"Hm? Was I too rough?" She removed her elbow from the small of my back and rubbed the spot with her fingers. "This is how I always massaged this part for Dad when I was little."

"I'm not exactly as firmly built as your father," I grumbled, and my words drew a strange sound out of Judy.

"Don't sell yourself short, Chief. You are hard in all the right places."

That made me raise my head from the bed again and squint at her.

"Are you serious, or were you just joining our game?"

She answered with a flat, "Yes," without missing a beat, and after a long pause, she graciously explained, "I was half-serious. You have gained a not-insignificant amount of muscle definition since you entered the Elysium."

"Ah! So it wasn't just my imagination!" Elly exclaimed on my back and slid her hands across the skin over my shoulder blades. "Look at these!"

"The trapezius?"

"Isn't that a little higher? Somewhere over here?" the girl on my back muttered a touch uncertainly and massaged my shoulders.

"Then the rhomboids," Judy concluded, and she also poked my back.

I tried to ignore them for the moment and considered their words. While it was true that I wasn't lazing about in the past couple of weeks, I wasn't exactly doing any hard bodybuilding routine either. Sure, I trained with the Praetorian Guards from time to time, but that barely worked up a sweat. Alternatively, it could've been the influence of having two magical swords pumping me full of mana day in and out, but I didn't think that was the right explanation either.

If I had to bet my money on it, I would've said it was yet another side-effect of absorbing a portion of Polemos's records. While I called it a 'soul' for ease of understanding, the rainbow-coloured yarn ball at the core of every person wasn't as simple as a seat of consciousness. It held records of a person's entire existence beyond their thoughts and memories, including their entire history, their connections to others in a web of cause and effect, and as I'd discovered when I 'healed' mom-in-law, even their physical body.

Could it be that taking a few stray fragments of Polemos into me affected my physique? And if so, how would housing all of Deus affect Angie? Granted, her situation was subtly different from mine, but it was something worth looking into.

In any case, my lack of reaction emboldened the girls, and the way they were poking my torso was steadily getting out of hand.

"Since Judy's here, should we get started?" I asked as I turned around, causing the princess to tumble to the side and land on her many pillows with a soft 'poof' sound.

"Let's," my dear assistant agreed with me and reached for her phone.

In the meantime, Elly sat back up and looked me over.

"Did I help?"

"Yeah, it's a bit better," I told her and circled my shoulder for show. It hurt quite a bit, but I didn't want to disappoint her, and she flashed a satisfied smile at me.

To be blunt, while her massage was pleasant, it did little to alleviate the muscle pain all over my body. It was the (in retrospect obvious) result of overexerting myself to cut down the Colossus, and my ever-chatty weapons have already chewed me out for it. By their accounts, I had to look forward to a few days of intense muscle fever, and Cal insisted that I should not tweak the output of my Leoformer so impertinently in the future, lest I wanted to end up crippled in the long run. I didn't think it was that bad, but I promised them all the same if only to make them stop nagging me.

Anyhow, once I sat up, the girls took their usual spots next to me.

"Breaktime's over. Let's get started."

"A moment," Judy interrupted me just as I was about to get going, and reached over to the other side of the bed. She grabbed my discarded shirt and handed it over to me. "Please put this on first."

"Why?"

"You're distracting."

She answered without hesitation, and after subtly rolling my eyes, I accepted the shirt.

"Oh, fine."

My response apparently displeased her, as she let out a nasal huff.

"Would you be able to have a serious discussion if I was naked from the waist up?"

I wanted to point out that it wasn't exactly the same, but I didn't want to get bogged down in a quarrel over something so silly, so I hummed along and buttoned up, ignoring the sickeningly sweet smile Elly was giving us.

"All right then. I think we can get started now, right?"

"That's right!" the princess nodded with unbridled enthusiasm, while my dearest assistant only raised her phone and undid the screen lock.

"Just to summarize the current situation at face value," she began without looking up, her fingers casually tapping on the device. "Contrary to our expectations, Angeline is the reincarnation of Deus, but Joshua absorbed some of her powers, and now they are both stuck in the Elysium with you."

"That's the gist of it."

My agreement drew a thoughtful hum from her, and after a few seconds of typing, she finally looked me in the eye again.

"With this new development, I believe we have a much clearer picture of the Angeline Route's structure."

"Can I say it?" Elly cut in, and she didn't even wait for Judy to nod. "So, we already knew that Polemos had a crush on Deus, right? But Angie is Deus, and she's Josh's girlfriend, which means that since you're Polemos, it's a love triangle!"

"Precisely," my other girlfriend agreed with a belated nod. "If we presume that the Angline Route's core was the love triangle, everything falls in place relatively neatly. The Narrative tried to force you into the role of Polemos, because without him, there's no third corner."

"I think that was abundantly clear, yes." I might've sounded a little impatient, and Judy even even-so-slightly raised a disapproving brow at me. "I mean, I think we should focus on the more important details."

"Such as?" Elly inquired, and I only just noticed that she moved behind me on the bed and started massaging my shoulders again.

"Such as whether Josh absorbing some of her Deus-ness was intended by the Narrative or an unforeseen complication."

"You also have to consider the possibility of whether it wasn't the other way around," Judy pointed out, making me contemplate the option for a moment.

"I don't think so. I checked her soul, and Deus's records seem to be an integral part of her."

"In that case, we have to consider two things," Judy spoke absently, her fingertips once again dancing on the screen of her phone. "First, let's figure out if this outcome was the result of Narrative influence. You said that your theory was that Joshua permanently absorbed Angeline's powers through churning butter, right, Chief?"

"Yes, that's the idea."

"In that case, we can infer whether the Narrative intended it to happen or not based on circumstantial evidence. Namely, did the Narrative actively try to sabotage their ability to take a roll in the hay?"

"It's that harem thing, right?" Elly interjected by poking her head over my shoulder. "You know, the thing you told me about! How, in romance stories with harems, something would always conveniently interrupt people before they could confess or kiss or… erm… how did it go? Ah, right! Grope for trout in a peculiar river!"

"Oh? I haven't heard that one yet," Judy noted, sounding unnecessarily impressed.

As for me, I thought long and hard about the topic and ultimately shook my head.

"I'm not entire sure. I've seen evidence of potential Narrative Influence going both ways, first by making Josh ultra-dense, and then by setting up the scene for them to get it on."

"But in the end, they were encouraged to make the beast with two backs, weren't they?" Elly barrelled on, earning another impressed hum from my other girlfriend.

"In that case, I have a hypothesis."

"Already?" I blurted out in surprise, and Judy immediately launched into it.

"Based on the evidence presented so far, I think this is how the events were supposed to unfold: Joshua and Angeline would start dating, and they would eventually put the banana in the fruit salad. Joshua's ability to draw power out of the bodily fluids of people with supernatural ancestry would draw on Angeline's powers, which would unseal Deus. In the meantime, the Chief would've been taken and imprinted with the memories and Personality of Polemos, so when Deus would emerge from Angeline, he would've taken her away and started the love-triangle plot."

"A solid hypothesis, and it would explain why their attempts at doing the matrimonial polka were sabotaged until the 'plot' progressed to the right stage," I granted her while rubbing my chin. "If that was the plan, I guess it went wrong in three places: I didn't become Polemos, Angie only had her inner Deus unsealed after she was kidnapped along with Josh, and Josh somehow ended up with a part of Deus himself."

"We already know how the first part happened, and if your presence as Polemos was as vital to the Angline Route as I suspect, there is a good chance you were under Narrative influence at the time as well. As for the two of them being kidnapped by another Celestial faction, I believe that was the Narrative trying to course-correct, because you didn't kidnap Angeline on your own."

"Question," I cut in, raising a finger in the process. "In your hypothesis, I, or rather Polemos, would've taken Angie once she awakened as Deus. How come that part didn't happen?"

"Maybe because they did it too much?" The princess noted a touch absently, and when we both turned to her, she let out a startled little noise and hastily explained, "I-I mean, I have a hypothesis too!"

"I'm all ears."

Hearing my encouragement, she took a deep breath.

"Do you remember that 'beta couple' thing you told me about?"

I naturally nodded. What she was referring to was a relatively common trope in romance stories, where there would be one or more secondary couples besides the main characters. For example, a bickering boy and girl trapped in a state of will-they-won't-they, who were friends with the protagonist, would get together shortly before the main couple, serving as a sort of example or encouragement to them.

Looking at it objectively, we technically fit the bill, and our unusual relationship certainly had an impact on Angie and Josh. Especially the former, as I could still vividly recall her unsubtly trying to ask me about how to angle for a polifidelous relationship, back when Josh's relationship with Snowy and Ammy was much more ambiguous. It didn't come to that, but it showed that she was considering it as an option, so from that angle, we did serve the role of the beta couple.

"You see, we are doing a lot of… um…" The princess snapped her fingers twice in frustration, but ultimately had to turn to my other girlfriend. "Judy? Support?"

"Muffin stuffin'," Judy responded without a moment of thinking.

"Yes, that! We've been doing it a lot, and started just around the time the two started going out!"

To be precise, it was exactly on the same day, but I didn't split hairs.

"So, since the 'beta couple' is supposed to influence the 'main couple', maybe we were the ones who caused them to do more corn grinding than planned?"

I could hear Judy whisper something about it being 'another new one', but I disregarded her and considered the princess's idea a bit more closely. If I thought about it, I have actively encouraged the guy to take their relationship to the next level, and I even provided him with the 'tools' necessary, so to speak, during our artificial hot-springs episode.

"Let me see if I got this," I spoke up, fingers still pinching my chin. "The core of your idea is that we influenced Josh and Angie to do way more doughnut glazing than they were supposed to, which led to Josh absorbing too much of Angie's powers, to the point he took in some of Deus."

"Either that, or he was always supposed to ingest some of Deus's powers, but he ended up gorging himself so much that it interfered with Angeline's ability to manifest her inner Deus on her own," Judy continued to theorize using Elly's idea as a springboard. "You did tell us that Angeline went on a rampage only after Joshua transformed into a Celestial on his own, and she remained the dominant personality afterwards."

"It's a pretty good Watsonian explanation," I noted, and as if just remembering that her job was to propose the Doylist solutions, Judy hastily tapped on her phone, looking for something.

In the meantime, I rustled Elly's hair to congratulate her for her contribution, and by the time I was done, Judy also found what she was looking for.

"I put together a flowchart," she declared, and I could hear my phone buzz on the nightstand. It was too far away, and I didn't want to move, so she just showed it to me on her screen instead. "It's a prediction of how the rest of the route is supposed to unfold from here on out."

"It looks complicated," Elly noted, and I completely agreed with her on the subject.

"I tried to take as many variables into account as possible," Judy told us and pulled her phone back. "You can browse it later, but in summary, there are three things to keep an eye on from now on, as they will decide the direction of where the plot will likely go from here."

"I'm listening."

I didn't need to prompt her, but I did it anyway, just to show that I was listening.

"The first variable is Angeline. Right now, she's the dominant personality, but if Deus comes to the forefront, it would catalyze romantic drama between her and Joshua."

"Obviously."

"The second variable is Joshua. Since he absorbed part of Deus's powers, he could also have a portion of Deus's personality in him. Having two Deuses at the same time could result in political turmoil, which is another prime source of drama."

I could've pointed out that we had that already, but I didn't want to interrupt her.

"Lastly, we have the love triangle angle." She paused and looked me in the eye. "Chief. I know you are tired of me saying this, but don't NTR Angeline."

"Oh, come on, Dormouse!"

"I'm serious," she doubled down with the tiniest of frowns, and for once, Elly backed her up.

"That's right! This en-tee-aar thing is really bad!"

"I know, and I'm not going to seduce my friend's girlfriend," I stressed, but my girlfriends didn't relent.

"You say that now, but you were already caught in the web of the Narrative once, so you have to be on the lookout for it, in case Deus would try to put a move on you."

While she looked entirely serious, I couldn't help but let out a throaty laugh at her idea.

"Oh, please! Listen, Dormouse. The one with an unrequited love was Polemos. Emphasis on the unrequited part. If anything, Deus would be mighty miffed from finding himself in a girl's body, and the last thing on his mind would be to make any advances on me. I mean, on Polemos. … You know what I meant."

"Don't underestimate the Narrative," Judy warned me, and when I didn't react, she sulkily added, "Just so you know, if you end up cheating, I'm prepared to become a yandere and stab you."

I was pretty sure that was supposed to be a joke, but to my surprise, the princess reacted to her declaration much stronger than I did.

"You can't do that! It's almost as bad as the en-tee-arr! No dere is allowed!"

"Princess, the 'dere' is the good part," I pointed out.

"In… In that case, no 'yan' is allowed within the same sentence as any 'dere'!"

I wasn't entirely sure she completely understood the terminology, but she was earned enough to make just click her tongue and utter, "Fine. In that case, I will only—"

She was probably going for another joke, but then we were interrupted by someone knocking on the door.

"Milady? May I come in?"

The three of us shared a startled glance, and everyone jumped into motion.

"J-Just a moment!" The princess called out and grabbed my white jacket from the foot of the bed.

Meanwhile, Judy snatched my phone up from the nightstand, and by the time she handed it over, I already slipped into my shoes.

"I'll see you tomorrow, with more data points," I whispered to her as I accepted the device, slipped it into my pocket, and planted a quick kiss on her lips.

After repeating the same process with the princess, and hastily donning the jacket, I gave them a wink and promptly disappeared from the room. We could have continued the discussion for a while longer, but it was a fine point to cut things off, as I would've had to study Judy's flowchart and ascertain a few things with our main couple first anyway.

"Gah!"

In the meantime, a certain easily startled guy let out a gasp when he noticed I was standing behind him, and for a moment it seemed like he would throw a punch. It was only when his eyes focused on my face that he let out an irritated sigh and dropped his fists.

"You're doing this on purpose, aren't you!?" Raven Boy complained loudly, and I flashed a deeply innocent smile.

"I have nooo idea what you're talking about." I let a silent beat linger in the air of the hideout's common room, and then asked, "Did you get them?"

"Yeah, they're over there," he grumbled and pointed at the table, or rather, the white plastic bag on it.

Not exactly the most dignified way to carry around a pair of high-magitech devices, but I imagined he was pressed for time.

"Good job. No one saw you, right?"

"Of course not," the guy huffed and puffed, but then his eyes caught something and waited until I finished inspecting the Magiformers in the bag before clearing his throat. "Where have you been before you came here?"

"Hm? I paid a visit to the girls to discuss the new developments. Why?"

With a wry smirk, he pointed at my stomach.

"Your buttons are off."

I glanced down, and just as he said, the buttons of my shirt were in the wrong holes, making the whole thing lop-sided. In my defence, I was paying attention to Judy's theorizing at the time, so a small mistake like that wasn't that big of a deal.

"Showoff bastard…" Agrawain whispered under his breath, just loud enough for me to hear, turned on his heels, and walked out of the room before I could respond and clear up the misunderstanding.

Though again, did I even have to? Not to mention, who the heck cared about what he thought? He was just pent-up and jealous because he didn't have an awesome girlfriend, let alone two.

While pondering so, I picked up the bag, and honed in on Josh's dot in the Elysium, ending my round-trip for the night. Yet, even as I was about to Phase away, I couldn't help but feel a little bothered. As the Kind of Knights and leader of the Ordo Draconis, it was my role, nay, my duty to help the Knights with their troubles. While Raven Boy was still high on my shit list, he's been relatively well-behaved, so maybe I should help him out. Valentine's Day was just around the corner, so should I set him up on a blind date with a nice girl that matched him perfectly, I pondered.

Like that, I left Critias, with the room softly echoing the words, "I should ask Brang where I could find female Fauns…"