"It's always a pleasure to meet an alumnus of the White Griffon, no matter how unsuccessful they have become." He said while extending his hand to Phloria first and Orion later. "You have grown into a fine mage, Lieutenant Colonel Beanpole."
"Thanks." She replied with a voice that carried the warmth of an ice age.
"Nice to meet you again, Jirni's plus one."
"For the umpteenth time, I have a name!" Orion tried to crush Manohar's hand but no matter how hard he tried, the god of healing didn't even flinch.
'He sure is stronger than he looks.' Orion thought.
"And I'm too busy to remember something as insignificant as a name so I call things as I see them." The Mad Professor had long since learned to keep a hard-light construct over his hand during greetings.
Petty people always held petty grudges for petty reasons.
"Then you have to fix your eyes because we are divorcing." Orion said.
"Congratulations!" Manohar patted him with such obnoxious honesty that only years of discipline kept Orion's hands off the god of healing's neck. "I was certain that no man could bear that hag forever.
"Let's toast to your new life as a single man."
Manohar offered him a drink that Orion poured into a nearby decorative potted plant that shapeshifted in front of his astonished eyes into a catatonic frog.
"Interesting. I didn't expect it to work even on plants, but there are side effects when it's not used on animals." Manohar poked the creature multiple times but obtained no reaction.
"What in the gods' name was in that glass?" Orion put his hand on the hilt of the blade in outrage.
"Compound 54. It's supposed to make humans-"
"I meant why did you give it to me?" Orion cut him short, glad that every single note of the army regarding Manohar mentioned to never accept food or drinks from him and to consume only meals preserved inside one's own dimensional amulet.
"To get rid of the two of you, of course." The Never Magus couldn't believe that Jirni's plus one was stupid enough to need an explanation for the obvious. "Beanpole here would have been too busy taking care of you to notice my escape."
"What would have happened to my father?" Phloria pointed her estoc, Reaver, at Manohar's throat.
Yet instead of showing fear or remorse, he exploited the opportunity to study the Forgemastering techniques of the Ernas legacy with his spells.
"Nothing much. He would have just fallen into a deep slumber for a few minutes before-" The frog turned back into a plant, except now it was bright pink.
Then it exploded, filling the air with fragments no bigger than confetti.
"Did you just try and kill a member of the Knight's Guard?" Phloria was there for less than five minutes and she was already sick of him.
"Of course not! That potion wasn't intended for plants and, as I said, at this stage of development side effects are to be expected. After all, Alchemy is a little more art than science." Manohar said.
"That's the definition of cooking, not Alchemy!" Phloria said while Orion had to use every ounce of his considerable strength to keep her from ruining her future with a charge for manslaughter.
At that point, he didn't care for Manohar's life more than for that of a rabid opossum.
"Alchemy, cooking, who cares? My point was to get out of here before-"
The door opened again and this time Archon Ernas and Assistant Professor Ernas walked in.
"Orion, Phloria! What are you doing here?" Jirni dropped the uniform hat that she carried in her arm from the surprise.
"Jirni, Quylla! What does this mean?" Orion let go of Phloria who slammed against the wall.
"Manohar!" Manohar said in outrage.
The only thing that he hated more than being forced to work was being ignored.
"Shut up and sit down while the adults talk!" Jirni's glare reminded him of his mother, Sitri, and scared Manohar to death.
"Yes, Mom. I mean, Mo'om. I mean, Ma'am." He sat down quietly, hoping it wouldn't end like that time when he was still a young boy and had decided to find a way to destroy the lost cities for good.
His mother, Sitri, had been surprised when a Constable had knocked to her door, looking for her still eight years old child. The man had sat at their kitchen table along with mother and son.
Then, he had explained as calmly and politely as he could that even though the Kingdom appreciated the promising youth's sentiment, kidnapping and sacrificing the neighbors, no matter how obnoxious he considered them, it was still an act of forbidden magic.
The child's many inquiries at the local school of magic had raised more flags than a Royal parade, alerting the authorities.
After Sitri learned how her son had planned to turn her toolshed into a Lost Toolshed to study the phenomenon up close, she had spanked him so hard that Manohar could see her hand in his nightmares.
It took Orion a second to notice that Quylla and Phloria weren't surprised in the least by the allegedly unexpected development and to draw his conclusions.
"Phloria Rose Terra Ernas, you owe me an explanation!"
"What explanation? Since both of you are too stubborn to make the first move, we arranged this mission so that you can finally talk. I can't stand seeing you suffering any longer." Usually, when Orion used her middle names, Phloria knew she was in trouble.
Yet this time he wasn't ashamed of her actions.
"You lied to me and manipulated me to bring me here. You two are just like your mother!"
"Thanks." Phloria and Quylla replied in unison.
"Why are you thanking me? I'm scolding you." Orion was so shocked that he had to sit down.
"Mom is a beautiful, cunning, badass woman. Your words are a compliment to us." Quylla said with a shrug, making Jirni blush with joy.
"Quylla Nimea Daphne Ernas, you lied to me and manipulated me to bring me here. I'm so proud of you." Jirni hit Manohar in the middle of the forehead to make him faint and keep him from escaping while she was busy hugging her daughter.
"Mom, I don't have middle names." Quylla said in confusion.
"You actually do." Orion said. "After the last gala, we decided that even though we are not your biological parents, we are still your family. So we gave you the middle names that we had agreed upon in the case we had a second daughter."
At those words, Quylla started sobbing and held Jirni tight.
"We decided to keep it a secret and surprise you during your next birthday, but with everything that happened, you didn't want to celebrate and at that point, the divorce had already started." Jirni said.
"Thank you, Mom." Quylla released Jirni and hugged Orion. "Thank you, Dad."
"There's no need to thank us, little one. We gave you middles names also because they make scolding you much more effective. Also, I'm still mad at you." Yet his words and his tone didn't match as he caressed Quylla's head.
Phloria joined them in the embrace, sniffling a little, and so did Jirni after striking several of Manohar's nerve clusters for good measure, leaving him paralyzed from the neck down.
Village of Lutia.
Soon the kids felt reassured rather than intimidated by the familiar environment and they started to challenge each other with feats that their respective steeds had to perform.
The magical beasts rolled their eyes but they were also happy to see their human friends back to their old selves.
Lith was bored out of his skull and green with envy. Rena and Senton were really happy together, but all of their lovey-dovey routines reminded Lith of his condition as single.
'Back when I was a Ranger, I would have met with Kami after a big mission. I would have told her everything and she would have worried about me while I showed her the hologram of the fight as if its outcome had yet to be determined.
'I wonder what she is doing.' He inwardly sighed as the couple planned to go on a vacation alone and leave the children with their grandparents.
Having an Awakened in the family made them feel confident already but a Guardian that could bring them to their kids at any moment really took a burden off their chest.
"Hello, Professor Vastor. How are you doing?" Less than ten minutes had passed and Lith was already sick and tired of being the third wheel.
He had taken out his communication amulet to break the isolation with the excuse of getting updated about the situation in the north.
"I'm green with envy!" Vastor replied.
'That makes the two of us.' Lith thought.
"I wish I was already back home like you but things got complicated. There's no rebellion here but winter lasted too long. Food, wood, coal, you name it, they lack it. People are this close to rioting and it makes my work much more difficult."
"What are you doing exactly?" Lith asked.
"Classified, especially on a non-secure line. Let's just say that someone exploited the situation for their own ends." Vastor replied.
'Either someone experimented with Forbidden Magic and tried to disguise their victims among those of the winter or the Undead Courts stole the corpses to raise soldiers to fill the ranks of their army. Whatever it is, it's not good.' Lith thought.
"I can't believe that Manohar and I are among the few Archmages that have yet to complete their mission. Maybe I'm getting old or maybe the idea of marrying again threw me off my game.
"I never thought that Zinya would propose to me and now I'm scared to death at the idea of screwing things up again." Vastor would have gladly fought a Dragon as well instead of facing the terror of the unknown.
Lith was glad that the poor man had no idea that their conversation wasn't private. Rena, Senton, and even the kids had stopped their conversations to listen to Vastor's story.
"I'm sure that everything will be fine." Lith shushed Leria who wanted to chime in. "What were you saying about Manohar?"
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to burden you with my problems." Vastor said, thinking that Lith had changed to topic because he found it annoying. "Manohar's situation is similar to that you faced."
"Rebellious cities?"
"No, only nobles. The odd thing is that at the time of the crimes, the culprits have a rock-solid alibi, yet there's no doubt about their guilt." Vastor replied.
"Okay, you lost me." Lith said and Rena nodded.
"I wish I could tell you more, but the line isn't secure and you are back to being a civilian." Vastor shrugged. "The only thing that I can tell you is that Manohar doesn't seem to mind being forced to spend so much time working in the field.
"On top of that, there are rumors about him being a regular customer of the red-light district."
"Are we still talking about the same Manohar who throws a tantrum whenever he has to get out of his lab and that rejected countless marriage proposals?" Lith was flabbergasted.
"In the flesh. Now I got to go. Say hi to Kamila for-" Vastor realized his blunder and hung up the call.
The group reached the outskirts of Lutia a few minutes later.
Magicos were leveling the ground before workers could lay the foundations of the houses. Whenever they lost control of their spells, they would raise a cloud of dirt that the wind would scatter everywhere, making the neighbors curse their ancestors.
"Big bro, what's the difference between a small and a regular city?" Aran asked. To him, Lutia was big enough.
"It's a matter of size and population. Only once Lutia grows so big that it will need nobles to administer it and a military trained city guard will it be considered a proper city." Lith replied.
"But you are a noble, Uncle." Leria said.
"In name only. These lands don't belong to me and I don't meddle with the city's affairs. It would take me too much time." Lith said.
Zekell's workshop was now split into three different single-floor buildings adjacent to each other. He had moved in a two-story house on the other side of the road to have his family nearby without the customers bothering them or mistaking them for clerks.
Once he had owned only a small smithy beside his house, but between the money that he made by smelting magical metals for Lith and the constant need for supplies that the city's growth required, he had been forced to expand his business.
Zekell now the owner of a state-of-the-art smithy that he had entrusted to Senton, a goldsmith where he worked to keep himself busy, and of a shop from which he sold Lith's creations like chessboards, strollers, and underwear.
"About time." Zekell grunted.
He was a short man in his mid-forties, about 1.62 meters (5'4") tall, with grey short hair and a finely trimmed short beard. During his youth, he had tried to grow them both but after one burn too many Zekell had resigned to the fact that long hair and high temperatures didn't mix.
He wore a white shirt stained with sweat despite the chilly air of the morning, a canvas apron over loose brown working pants, and an adjustable glasses-like contraption on his head that allowed his old eyes to perform the finest incision on any metal.
Despite his age, he had muscular arms and legs that barely fitted his loose clothes. Only his belly betrayed the lack of exercise and the love for warm food and cold beer.
"Look who has finally remembered that they have a job! Get changed before going to the smithy. You don't want to ruin your fancy clothes."
"Nice to see you too, Dad. I just came by to make sure you were okay. I'm still on vacation." Senton replied.
"Vacation! Who do you think you are? A noble?" Zekell snarled.
"I've never taken a day off in twenty-six years!" Senton snarled back.
"Grandpa, can Dad stay with us in the Desert, please? I'm still scared at night." Leria asked with her big puppy eyes.
"Of course, pumpkin." Zekell's face and tone changed completely when she entered the goldsmith. "It's just that your Dad doesn't call nor visit. He took all my beloved grandchildren away from me and grandpa feels so lonely."
He lifted the little girl from Abominus's back and hugged her tight.
