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The Simulacrum - Chapter 118 - Part 2

They say that time flies when in good company, but the same applied to while being busy. It was hard to believe that it's been nearly a week since I took Percival into custody, and in the meantime, my life settled into a predictable rhythm.

In the morning, I would eat breakfast in the Elysium while listening to Jaakobah's reports. Then I would spend the morning pretending to train my Praetorian Guards, followed by a light lunch. In the evening, I would Phase back to the base to pick up ...

The Simulacrum - Volume 6 Extra 1: Meet the Assembly's Best and Brightest

What the actual, canonical, Dante Alighieri-inspired hell was up with this island and underground facilities?

Yes, yes, I know I keep ragging on this, but seriously? Why did the arch-mage's home also need to have an extensive underground facility too? Wasn't he satisfied by having the big one under the school building?

…

But then again, I also happened to have two separate underground bases too, so maybe complaining about this any more than this would've been hypocritical....

The Simulacrum - Chapter 118 - Part 1

"Are we calm yet?" I asked with just the tiiiniest hint of exasperation in my voice, and the two trigger-happy idiots in front of me nodded in unison. They were both sitting on their heels in the middle of the living room with the conference table. Or rather, Rinne did so, while Jaakobah was clumsily yet stoically trying to follow her example, even though he obviously wasn't used to this kind of thing.

Anyhow, the two of them kept eyeing each other instead of responding to me (though in...

The Simulacrum - Volume 6 Extra 2: Be it D20 or D6, the Dice is Always a Prick..

"Yeah, it's so cool!" Penny sounded more excited by the minute. "You can have car chases, and fights with hover-bikes, and you can even build your own mini-mecha and fight other robots!"s time for recreation. Some were socializing in the lounge area of the main hall. Others were working out in the makeshift fitness saloon, one of the newly constructed chambers of the base. Yet others would stay in their quarters and read, watch something on the TV, or browse the internet using the base's exte...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 117 - Part 3

"Udug Blood Amalgam?" Snowy's voice sounded quite startled, to the point I could perfectly imagine her face even through the phone. I waited for her to continue, and after a few long seconds, she whispered, "It's very dangerous, and highly restricted. Only the Lords of the Abyss can have it, and if found on anyone else, it's grounds for execution."

"Okay, next question then," I muttered as I leaned back in my seat and rubbed my temple. "How did Percival get his hands on it?"

"I…...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 117 - Part 2

It was a quiet afternoon in the Dracis mansion. Once the initial panic over the disappearance of a certain wildly popular, devilishly handsome, and criminally humble Leonard S. Dunning quieted down, everyone's daily routines reasserted themselves, like a river returning to its bed. It might've felt strange from an outsider's perspective, but as far as the servants and the various Draconian dignitaries were concerned, once the owners of the estate were seemingly at peace with the situation, th...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 117 - Part 1

By the time we got back to my designated quarters, I was feeling exhausted in more ways than one. Maintaining my Polemos persona was tiresome at the best of times, but when I had to do it in front of a small crowd while pretending to know what I was talking about at the same time was exponentially more so.

Sighing, I moved over to the bedroom, silently lamenting the lack of a comfy chair in this entire luxury suite (by Celestial standards, at the very least), and rested my butt on the s...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 116 - Part 3

"What's your impression so far?"

Mountain Girl considered my throwaway question way too seriously, seemingly paying little attention to where she was walking. Unlike with my girlfriends, I didn't bother with her safety, but to be fair, there weren't any lampposts she could walk into here.

The two of us wandered through the rustic Celestial settlement all night, this time starting from the outskirts, but despite my best efforts, I didn't make any new discoveries. On this occasion, ...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 116 - Part 2

The moment I returned to my quarters, I couldn't help but exhale a long sigh. It was a long day, and I was feeling pretty out of it. My limbs were hurting, no doubt the result of my bout with my 'honour guard' in the morning, made worst by my head still throbbing, nearly two days after the whole memory-transfer incident. Though again, having headaches became part of my daily life at this point, so it bothered me much less than my sore feet.

It hasn't been that long since I returned from...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 116 - Part 1

So, another complication. What's new?

While the oddly friendly (but not any less irritating) director was looking for a glass to sample the wine I brought, I quickly reconsidered the situation. First off, we apparently knew each other. Or later, he knew Leonard Pendragon. That meant we were in contact before I came to Critias, and well before I lost my memories. Furthermore, she seemed to be under some kind of misunderstanding about why I was here and how that related to Polemos, and I ...

Update

Just a heads up.

I'm completely out of it at the moment. I strained my back last Sunday while gardening, and because of it, I've been unable to get a decent night of sleep throughout the entire week. Right now, brain fog had completely set in, and I'm totally zombified. That's not exactly good for creative writing, so instead of trying to force it and risk a writer's block, I'm postponing the part scheduled for today.

Hopefully I'll be feeling a bit better by Monday, and I'll be a...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 115 - Part 3

As they say, time flies in good company, and who was I to argue with such universal truths?

In the blink of an eye, the whole afternoon rushed by me like a bullet train, leaving me a touch disoriented by the whole affair. Between the heart-to-heart discussions, the barbecue party, and playing around with my girlfriends, it was a good thing I set an alarm on my phone so that I wouldn't forget to keep an eye on Jaakobah.

Half past seven, I continued to keep one ethereal eye on the m...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 115 - Part 2

"So… are we going to sit down, or…?"

Josh sounded unusually awkward, and his expression told me that he had a lot on his mind, but at the end of the day, I simply shrugged.

"Whatever suits your fancy. I've been sitting for a while now, so I'll refrain."

"Then I'll stand too," he declared, and then fell silent, waiting.

Using the lull of the moment, I took a deep breath and centered myself. This recent deduction gave me a potential idea about what the nebulous Narra...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 115 - Part 1

"Sometimes, I feel like I'm running a daycare centre," I grumbled as I sat down between my girlfriends, once all the nuisances had been successfully chased away from the premises. They promised they would be back though, but I put that headache in the waiting out of my mind for now and accepted the skewer from Elly's hand.

"They're just relieved that you're okay," Judy commented on my other side, her own snack long since gone and replaced by her phone in her hands. "More importantly, ar...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 114 - Part 3

The reception room was plunged into a chilly silence. Sitting on one of the benches by the far wall, I continued to lock gazes with Mountain Girl, yet even as the tension (and awkwardness) of our staring contest caused the air to positively crackle, she refused to back down. Behind her, a combination of Ichiko, the slightly more distinct kuniochi with their fishnet garbs, and Odango Girl (for reasons I'll explain later) also stared at me in rapt silence, their eyes pleading for me to reconsid...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 114 - Part 2

"… and that's the gist of it."

The silence left in the wake of my straightforward and not-at-all rambling description of the recent developments was about as deafeningly still as expected. My girlfriends already knew most of it, so they were the least affected, while the other end of the spectrum was represented by Penny, who was still in near-catatonic shock over dear Uncle Percy's involvement in the events. Everyone else was stuck somewhere in-between those two extremes.

I cou...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 114 - Part 1

As soon as I stepped through the door, the main hall erupted into cacophonous noise.

"Haha! See, honey? I told you he'd be all right!" dad-in-law's voice rose above the wall of sound as he hugged his wife to his side.

"Kihihi! Galatea, quick! Bring the detectors!" Fred exclaimed in the back, lugging some kind of device on his back.

"Brother Leonard is back!" a tiny dragonette squeezed her way through the forest of legs rooted in front of the door, only to be picked up by a p...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 113 - Part 2

Time passed by quickly after I returned to my designated quarters on the fifty-second floor. Despite the initial hubbub, there didn't seem to be much for me to do as an Archon, but I still managed to find ways to fill out the rest of the morning. First and foremost, I swept the entire place for surveillance spells, and to my surprise, I couldn't find a single one. I expected at least a few floating orb thingies, but there was nary a hint of them.

That, of course, didn't mean that there ...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 113 - Part 1

"Oryah!"

Following the rather odd war cry, midriff-woman lunged at me with her cutlass. Before it could connect, I deftly leaned out of the way of the strike and focused on her other hand. Instead of following through with the initial attack, she moved past me and did a pirouette that left her back completely open, after which her right arm swept back, she struck a dramatic pose, and aimed her oversized pistol… at the spot where I stood a second ago.

"Too many unnecessary moveme...

Fantasy Economics 101 - Chapter 9

Adventuring is a serious business

While it could not compete with the capital's restaurants in quality, the Adventurers' Guild of New Reedcourt had a menu extensive enough to match theirs in length, if nothing else. After about an hour of waiting, time which Raol spent by jotting down every semi-useful tidbit that caught his nonexistent ears, his companions' orders arrived, just around the moment he filled up the first page of the book he was carrying.

In truth, more than half o...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 112 - Part 3

"Did you really have to build literally every facility into the towers?"

My question was entirely rhetorical, yet the burly Celestial by my side felt obligated to answer anyway. Not that I really minded; we were heading to the ground floor, just the two of us in the cabin, and the elevator was taking its sweet time, and the bland background music was starting to get on my nerves.

"The Seraphic Safeguard has its own headquarters in Migdál Leukós, but due to the insistence of Inte...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 112 - Part 2

To say that the elevator ride up to the one-hundredth floor of the tower was awkward would be the understatement of the century. Since I disappeared from his home turf, Director Tsephanyah didn't want to let me out of his sight for even a moment, so he was sticking to my side like a second shadow. The irritating lady followed after us like it was natural, and since he didn't want to be left behind, Director Mensah also squeezed himself into the cabin. Needless to say, the atmosphere of antipa...

Minor update and clarifications

Just a tiny heads-up about a few changes, my dear readers.

First off, I somehow managed to completely and consistently mess up the Archon's name, and I have no idea how. It was supposed to be Polemos (Greek for "war", and the first half of the "polemarch" office). I'd like to say it was an autocorrect-messup, but I wrote all of these parts on my PC, so I have no excuse.

Secondly, I'm tweaking the info-dumb part even further to make it less info-dumpy.

The two most important ...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 112 - Part 1

"Olives, you say?"

My host, a heavy-set middle-aged Celestial with a well-cut beard nodded with a hint of pride on his face.

"Just like my father, and my father's father," he stated with a delighted hum, which caused his wife to chuckle and me to let out a thoughtful hum.

I was sitting at a simple, candlelit table inside the equally unembellished home of one of the people I marked during my first foray into the Elysium. The house was small but well-maintained (as much as suc...

Fantasy Economics 101 - Chapter 8

A Scholar from Afar

New Reedcourt's was a common tale. A bustling agricultural town, sitting on top of a busy trade route leading into the heart of the Monarchy. It was, without a doubt, on the straight and narrow road to grow into a respectable city and the economic heart of the Eastern Great Lowlands. Then, the Wish Incident happened, and the townsfolk's hopes seemingly scattered in the wind like ashes.

However, the town had deep roots, and following the tumultuous decade of t...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 111 - Part 4

Where to begin, where to begin…?

Normally, the obvious answer was 'at the beginning, stupid', but there were too many different beginnings for such a simple answer to work. Still, I couldn't let the girls wait indefinitely, so I exhaled sharply and kicked things off in chronological order.

"Let's start with Archon Polemos, Deus, and the ancient Celestial civilization."

"Let's," Judy echoed me with a finger on her phone, and the princess looked just as expectant. 2023-04-28 15:52:51 +0000 UTC View Post

The Simulacrum - Chapter 111 - Part 3

"Dormouse, please stop," I pleaded, yet my girlfriend remained steadfast.

"You deserve this," she fumed and lightly tugged on my ear. "I keep telling you to think twice before you get involved with anything, and yet every time I take my eyes off you, you get into trouble."

"This time, I agree with Judy," the princess followed her up with a solemn expression made unconvincing by her red nose and puffy eyes. She was also sitting on my lap, ostensibly to stop me from running away, bu...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 111 - Part 2

In the end, my earlier predictions were off, though it made little difference in the grand scheme of things. By the time I finished hearing out the long yet straightforward explanations of Jaakobah, the sun had long set. I had no access to my phone while disguised in my Leoformer, and there were no clocks anywhere in the room, but my gut told me it was past ten in the evening by the time we finished.

Of course, we didn't just talk for over five hours straight. There were a couple of bat...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 111 - Part 1

All right. Now that we finally had a stretch of straight and level rails in front of this runaway train of a situation, it was time to spend a moment gathering my wits and summarizing what I knew.

So, Sir Percival was working for some Celestials. Those Celestials were then taken out by another group of Celestials, and then I was taken to Elysium. I thought they wanted to give me back my lost memories in order to learn something I'd forgotten, but then it turned out that their actual goa...

The Simulacrum - Chapter 110 - Part 3

Okay, let's calm down and try to figure out what the hell just happened. A weird weapon-thing came flying at me, I grabbed it, and then I was suddenly disembodied. That never happened before… unless I manually initiated it with a phantom limb, that is.

A cursory glance told me that I was in the vague not-dark not-room. Or rather, 'a' not-dark not-room, as while this one was about as fluid and nondescript as the one I'd seen in the past, with the star people and their cryptic conversat...