I might have been just a touch too cheeky back there.

I said I would lead the way, but it's been a while since I've been in this ballroom, and only once at that, so tried as I might, I couldn't recall where the door to the tucked-away parlour room was. Luckily for me, my lovely draconic girlfriend quickly recognized my dilemma, and she stealthily pointed me in the right direction.

After making a mental note about giving her some extra kisses later, I gestured for Lord Grandpa to follow after me, and I was glad to see that I wouldn't need to make another detour on the way, as I found Roland idling right about halfway between our starting point and our destination. Since we were in public, he gave me a curt salute when I approached him and stood attentively.

"Welcome back, Leonard. It feels like it's been ages since we last met," he told me in a perfectly natural, level voice, but I couldn't help but feel that he was still overdoing the act a little.

"I feel the same. We'll catch up later, but for now, can I ask you something?"

"Do you have any orders?"

"No, not an order, more of a request," I told him and glanced over my shoulder. Lord Grandpa frowned, as if unsure whether or not it was fine for him to hear what we were talking about, so I purposefully avoided his eyes and scanned the whole ballroom for potential troublemakers. Alas, there were too many of them to count, so I exhaled a shallow groan as I faced Roland again. "Keep an eye out for trouble, and if there's a conflict, do your best to break it up, or at least hold it in bay until I'm back."

He raised a critical brow at me and responded in a low, uneasy voice.

"Are you expecting a fight to break out?"

"Not necessarily a 'fight' per se, but something," I told him with a shrug. "Call it a hunch."

While he still looked skeptical on the surface, Roland gave me another salute all the same.

"Understood. I'll go and inform the rest of the Ordo Draconis members."

"Please do."

That was the end of our discussion, and once I moved on, the old arch-mage followed behind me like my very own shadow. We turned a few heads as we made our way through idling guests. Most of them were Draconians of various families and ethnicities, but I could see the odd Kage elder and Ordo Draconis Squire here and there. In comparison, both the Assembly delegation and the Celestials kept to themselves, forming isolated islands in the sea of attendants, with only my inner circle and friends serving as something of a bridge between them.

I couldn't say I was surprised by that; the Draconians and the Knights mingling like they had been close allies for ages was an unnatural development entirely based on my identity and the insistent support of Naoren and Dad-in-law. It would've been downright uncanny if the same thing happened with the rest of the factions, considering they had been at each other's throats just as much as the Draconians and the Brotherhood used to be, but without a linchpin to tie them together now.

It was something we still had to work on, but just the fact that members of all three of the biggest supernatural power players were here and associating in the open was a step in the right direction.

In any case, we soon reached our destination, and after I signalled to the maid on duty that I'd have liked to use the so-called 'private meeting room' directly adjacent to the big hall. The inside of it was exactly how I remembered it, thought in retrospect, I didn't know what I was expecting. It's only been a few months since the last time I'd been here, after all.

The windowless room was lit by a series of wall-mounted light fixtures styled after old-timey mantled gas lamps, and with the leather-bound armchairs and the fairly no-nonsense décor, the place gave off a high-class yet at the same time surprisingly cosy atmosphere. It was also surprisingly well-insulated, and the moment the placeholder maid closed the door behind us, all the buzz and the music of the ballroom disappeared like someone cut a record, and the silence immediately gave the chamber a more clandestine feel.

My 'guest' might not have shared my sentiment though, as after a moment of hesitation, Lord Grandpa spoke about five sentences in one breath, so fast it put the micro machines man to shame, and the walls were immediately enveloped with a faintly shining sheen of light.

"Soundproofing?" I ventured a guess, and the old man nodded with a solemn expression.

"It is a necessity," he stated and sat down on one of the armchairs without waiting for me to do so first.

I didn't mind it though (I was never big on etiquette anyway), so I just followed his example, and waited for him to get started.

"Leonard," he said, still sounding unnecessarily sombre. "Or should I refer to you as Polemos from now on?"

"Nah, Leonard will do," I told him and leaned back in my seat. It made me recall the last time I was here, and the green tea Naoren brewed at the time. It didn't even happen that long ago, yet I was still feeling nostalgic about it. The human mind was so weird.

"In that case, Leonard," the arch-mage opened the discussion with a deep, resounding voice. For once, he wasn't trying to project authority, but it rather felt like he was trying to get the gravity of the situation across. "At the conclusion of your last, unannounced visit to my home, you left abruptly, without giving us the opportunity to discuss the grand implications of the information you revealed to us. I would like to continue this discussion right now."

"Is that all?" The old man frowned at me, so I clarified, "Considering how agitated you looked, I expected something more pressing."

"I am most certainly not agitated," the old coot objected under a deepening frown. "However, the subject is definitely of the utmost importance, and calling it pressing would be entirely appropriate."

"Fine, fine. I'm listening."

Lord Grandpa let out a gruff noise and placed his hands on his thighs.

"Before anything else, I would like to make sure there is no misunderstanding persisting between us. The Dionne girl is, contrary to all common sense, the corporeal embodiment of Deus, the legendary sovereign of the Celestial race. Am I correct so far?"

"Calling her a 'sovereign' is not entirely accurate. She's more of a cross between a messianic archetype, with a bit of an Arthurian 'return of the king' kind of thing going on as well, but otherwise, it's mostly correct."

"And you are Polemos, the consort of this 'messianic archetype', as you called her."

"Oh, no no no," I cut in before the misunderstanding could gain a foothold. "You've got some weird intel it seems, so let me put this straight: I'm currently holding the mantle of an Archon. Both Polemos and Deus were Archons, and I inherited the title because of some shenanigans that would take too long to explain in detail, while Angie houses the soul of the original Deus inside of her. In short, we're both considered to be ceremonial leaders with lots of vaguely defined authority, but neither the Polemos and Deus of old, nor Angie and me have an intimate relationship with each other. Did that clear it up?"

"Yes, but it is not the crux of the discussion we need to have," he insisted. "However, you have touched upon a very important detail, and I would request that you clarify it beyond the shadow of a doubt: are you entirely certain that the Celestials are correct in assuming she is their old ceremonial leader reborn?"

"Indeed. I checked her soul myself, and I can guarantee that it's the case."

"You have inspected her…" the old man muttered after me, and following a long beat, his shoulders slouched in defeat. "Of course. I should have expected at least this much from someone of your extensive track record of performing impossible deeds."

"I don't think it's that impossible. My research division can also check souls, and we both know that Saahira's entire research was about reading soul information and translating it to another body… but I digress. Staying on topic, from what I could gather so far, you want to talk about Angie being Deus."

"Yes. Or to be more precise, the global implications of the fact and how it would inevitably affect not only the whole World of Mystics but also the mundane human civilization."

"Is it that big of a—" 'deal?' is what I wanted to ask, but then, I had another one of those moments, where my brain made a connection, and I suddenly had about ten minutes' worth of thoughts in the span of about half a second, and it left me momentarily disoriented. To buy myself some time to let the realization set in, I lowered my voice and whispered, "No, never mind. Please continue."

Noticing the sudden shift in my behaviour, Lord Grandpa sat straighter in his armchair and softly cleared his throat.

"To put it into straightforward terms, the World of Mystics exists solely due to the Celestials. For as long as the written history of the Assembly existed, the Celestial agenda had never changed or veered off its single-minded course. Every ploy, every incident, everything they had ever done, was in service of one, singular goal: to maintain the separation between the World of Mystics and the rest of humanity while awaiting the return of their Deus."

I nodded along. Indeed, one of the main premises of the Simulacrum had been the masquerade from the very beginning, and it was maintained by the Celestial Directorate following the prophecy Polemos left behind. Of course, as it turned out, that whole thing was hogwash, like most prophecies were. To be fair though, it went through quite a bit of the telephone game across the ages, and I could vaguely recall that Angie thought Deus sacrificed himself to seal the Abyssals away, and that he would explicitly return as a 'human'. The thing was, neither of those were in the original prophecy.

In fact, I had Jaakobah look it up for me, and there were only three things about Deus's rebirth in the Celestials' big bundle of holy books: Deus would be reborn in the future, he would show up in a different body on Earth, and the stars would announce his return. While the last one explained the role the Department of Divination played in this whole farce, it didn't take a PhD in literary analysis to notice that Deus being a human wasn't mentioned anywhere.

As it turns out, all of this was some kind of Divine Comedy style situation, where later works insisted that, since the Celestials would remain in Elysium, the Abyssals in the Abyss, and Deus would obviously not reincarnate as a stinky dragon-blooded person, by process of elimination, Deus could only return as a pure human. Then their theology just ran with it, even after the rise of the Magi and after they started sending their unwanted two-winged brethren down in recent times.

Hell, in retrospect, not even the 'comes back on Earth' part was true, since Angie awakened in the Elysium after her kidnapping! Just shows how much these stupid prophecies were worth, I supposed.

"For the longest time," Lord Grandpa continued in the same grave tone as before, "For the longest time, fear of Celestial intervention kept the World of Mystics separated from the wider civilization," he reiterated one of his previous points, and after a melodramatic beat, he added, "But we fear that this may change, and soon."

"Because Deus is back," I noted, and he nodded along.

"Precisely. As the legendary ruler of the Celestials walks among us once again, however improbable the shape he took may be, there are many who question what the Celestials will do now. Would they still uphold the constant pressure upon all the practitioners of mystic phenomena and bearers of non-human bloodlines? Would they unite behind their messiah and pose a new threat to all of us? Or would they do… nothing?"

Out of those three options, it was the last one that seemed to disturb the old man the most, and it wasn't hard to see why. Since Deus was found, there was no reason for the Celestial high command to maintain their costly efforts to maintain the masquerade. Without this threat, it was only a question of time before some bad actors would try to push their luck, and if the masquerade broke, it would inevitably and permanently change the whole world.

It would not only remove the inhibitions placed on the Draconians and the Magi, but we also had to consider how the wider humanity would respond once they realized that they were secretly manipulated by a high society of dragons, wizards, mad scientists, and definitely-not-angels. It would lead to abject chaos, widespread mistrust of all authority figures, witch-hunts (both in the metaphorical and possibly the literal sense), and the impact of the existence of these people on the world religions would be immeasurable, to say the least. All of that sounded really, truly, absolutely…

"Annoying."

"It is a very mild way to put it," Lord Grandpa responded sourly. "Were the World of Mystics abruptly merge is human society, it would lead to untold pandemonium and chaos. It is something that has to be avoided at all costs, and I am afraid some may resort to the most forthright method they could see to avoid the future they dread."

"As in?"

The old man inhaled hard, and braced herself, as if afraid that I would jump at him at any moment.

"If Deus were to be removed from the picture, things would return the way they were, would they not?"

He was still eyeing me, doing his best to hide his nervousness, but I already came to more-or-less the same deduction on my own.

"That would lead to war," I told him dryly, and he didn't argue.

"Indeed. Yet, for some, the certainty of a war is preferable to an uncertain and unpredictable upheaval."

"Have you heard anything specific?" I levelled the crucial question at him, but he shook his head.

"No, nothing truly concrete. Hushed whispers and open-ended questions? Yes, but no clear, unambiguous word on the matter. Nevertheless, I felt that I had to inform you of this." He paused here, and looked me in the eye, looking and sounding as earnest as I'd ever seen him. "No matter the cost, it is something we have to avoid. I do not want to fight you."

"At least you're honest," I grumbled and leaned back in my seat.

This was something that completely flew under my radar until this point. In my defence, I was busy with a lot of personal matters and dealing with one minor crisis after the other, but the old man's words were a wake-up call.

He was right, in more ways than one. On a Watsonian level, the whole supernatural world had been locked in a cold war for the better part of two and a half millennia. For untold generations, 'Don't dick around with the humans, or the Celestials will get pissed' was deeply ingrained into them on a fundamental level. While outwardly the situation of the supernatural folks was of tense antagonism on the verge of all-out hostility, it was also the only status quo they had ever known. People in general hate anything that upsets that, so it made sense that they would do anything, no matter how abjectly moronic, to maintain it.

However, on a Doylist level, things didn't look any better either. Because the Simulacrum we lived in was entirely based on the premise of the masquerade, and the supernatural being sequestered away from the everyday school life of our resident protagonist, we only had two potential ways this could go down: either the masquerade would be artificially upheld, to maintain the integrity of the setting… or we were nearing the end of whatever 'plot' was allotted to Josh, and so the finale could completely flip the table, since said integrity no longer mattered.

No matter how I looked at it, I didn't like any of those options.

"We still have time," I told the arch-mage, and he raised an uncomprehending brow in return. "Angie hasn't assumed her place as Deus yet. Things are a little chaotic in the Elysium, but for the time being, the leadership generally tries to maintain the existing state of affairs. So long as I send in a word or two, we can buy some time."

"How much?"

"I have no idea," I admitted. "In the best-case scenario, until Angie gets a degree in economics, or political theory, or whatever strikes her fancy. Until then, the Directorate will keep running the show, and I can exert some pressure to have them keep at what they've been doing for ages a little longer."

"If that is her aim, then we would have six years at most."

"She probably won't go for a master's degree, so more like four."

"Too short," Lorg Grandpa whispered. "Yet, it is better than the alternative."

"Meaning, an immediate outbreak of chaos, with rogue Magi and Draconians enslaving countries?"

"The Assembly would not let such an event pass unopposed, but as for the part about chaos, it is something we can hardly avoid, only lessen with meticulous preparations." After a deep breath, he also added, "As for the safety of Angeline Dionne, aka Deus, I would like to offer the full and unconditional support of myself and my colleagues currently on the island."

"And I'm not nearly pigheaded enough not to accept it without any reservations," I told him with a smile, and for the first time, the old man seemed to relax. We couldn't have that, so I quickly added, "Just for the record though, I know you just love your schemes, but I would appreciate it if you could refrain from messing around too much. I think neither of us wants a repeat of the liquor cabinet incident."

The old coot's face twitched, but he maintained an amicable smile.

"I will keep your words close to my heart."

"Make sure you do."

With that, the main conversation was over, and for a few seconds, I had no idea how to move things along. In the end, I decided to try some small talk, sink or swim, but I barely got as far as, "So, the weather is—" before someone knocked on the door.

"Come in," I called out by reflex, and before I got to the second syllable, Sebastian was already inside.

"Please excuse the interruption," he stated in a dry voice as he glanced between the two of us. "I would like to inquire about how long your discussion would take."

"We're finished with the important part, I think," I responded on autopilot, and the elderly steward exhaled a pleased hum.

"In that case, we might still make it," he whispered under his breath and gestured for someone outside.

"Make what? Was there an incident?" Lord Grandpa asked, visibly confused by this development, and Sebastian lightly shrugged.

"There was a minor altercation between the Bernstein boy and the younger Feilong brother." I circled a finger to signal him to go on. "The latter was late to join the festivities, and after a series of unfortunate misunderstandings, he challenged Joshua Bernstein to a duel. By sheer chance, the members of the Ordo Draconis were already at the scene, and they managed to escort him out of the premises before he could cause a scene. Even now, the Feilong patriarch is in the process of apologizing to the guests."

"Hah! Called it!" I exclaimed with a satisfied grin, but then my brows automatically descended into a frown. "But if that was resolved, then why are you here."

As if to answer in his stead, Melinda entered the room, pushing a four-wheeled clothes rack with a whole lot of fancy outfits hanging from it.

"The first dance of today's breakfast party is commencing soon, and we can't have you accompany your fiancées looking like that."

Before I could protest, or even just comment, the braided maid was already pulling me out of the arm-chair and, under the ministrations of the incognito dragon, she began to rummage through the clothes she brought, completely disregarding the arch-mage in the room and the increasingly confounded look on his face.

Truth be told though; I didn't really mind this that much. Dancing with the girls sounded like just the kind of light exercise I needed to clear my head of stray thoughts and digest all of the new developments and revelations I just heard about. Such as that there apparently is such a thing as a 'breakfast party'. Who would have thought, am I right?