***Midhold, Cygnus Main House***

***Celes***

“I know, it's not my place to ask, but please release my father!”

Angrod looks a little lost for words, then turns to me for clarification. “We have her father?”

I cover my eyes, baffled how it is possible for him to not know this. “He was among the people who attacked us at the coronation. From what I surmised, he was the one who gave Tongord his orders. How is it possible for you to not know this?”

He clears his throat, looking chagrined. “Ahem... I... never asked their names.”

Tanja coughs, affronted at the obvious slip-up as a spy herself. “How could you not know their names? Didn't you have their souls for three whole days? That's more than enough to hold a proper interrogation.”

“Why would I care about their names?” Angrod rolls his eyes. “What's important are hard facts which I can use against them. Name-tags which were assigned according to their heritage were the least important point on my list. If they don't have knowledge that helps us get into the City of Light, or to stop the ritual, it doesn't concern me.”

Iris starts tearing up. “Can I have at least the body for a proper burial? I know that he was a bastard and that I should be glad that you aren't judging me together with the rest of my family, but I still need that closure.”

Stephen steps up to hold his girlfriend's hand. “I am sure that we can hold the proper rites.”

I sigh and look at Angrod until he makes eye-contact.

Waiting, I raise an eyebrow and retrieve the soul-trap from my pocket, showing it to him.

He finally catches on and shakes his head quickly. “What if anyone else finds out? I don't want to be crowded by countless beggars!”

“It's not like you didn't already demonstrate your dubious skills.” I offer him the orb, leaning closer to whisper, “Aren't Iris and Stephen your friends too?”

“More like pets, to be honest. Which doesn't change the fact that the man is a traitor to the crown.” Angrod crosses his arms in front of his chest.

“Who thought that his daughter is in the hands of the Meltheims,” I clarify. “I listened in on the interrogation, and had you not ignored their pleas, you would have at least learned their reasons. I think you can give at least some leniency in his case.”

“Still.” Angrod looks reluctant.

“It's not like I am asking you to forgive and forget. Just give him a different kind of punishment, or have you forgotten your Mirai necromancy completely?” I point out. Normally, I would never condone of such distasteful magic, but I was the one who killed Iris's father. In hindsight, I feel a little guilty about it. His attitude got me a little too enraged during the interrogation. Sadly, the fact that he was under duress was only revealed after the fact, when Angrod had already stuffed him into his soul-trap.

My impression of Iris also changed over the years. The Iris I met in our first school year was a heavily influenced and lonely child, following her parents' commands just as any impressionable child would. That incidentally made her my enemy, even though it wasn't her own fault. Almost a decade later, the Iris who was adopted by the Cygnus family is a vastly different person. Someone I can call a friend and who I would trust any time with sensitive information, unlike the rest of her family.

Margerie slips closer. “What are the two of you talking about? Are we going to witness another revelation of previously unknown magic?” Her eyes sparkle expectantly.

It tells a tale that our friends aren't surprised or frightened to experience the impossible in our presence.

Angrod looks around, searching the confused eyes of our group. Then he lets out a deep sigh. “Fine. Let's pay a visit to the morgue. I could have imagined better places to be right now, but the sooner we get this done the better. The body doesn't get any fresher.”

I pull out a perfect imitation of a smartphone, supplied directly from Angrod's laboratories. He was kind enough to supply the whole family with such convenient devices.

A minute later, our parents are informed and we are on our way to the least likely destination to celebrate Angrod's coronation, and that they should take care of some administrative issues.

———

The morgue turns out to be half an hour away from the Cygnus property.

Gaining access to Tulhelm's corpse also wasn't a problem, thanks to our status.

The storage room with all the bodies from the coronation is large and magically cooled. The authorities clearly decided that having those corpses all in one location might turn out to be beneficial for reasons only they can understand.

I find it just morbid to line up bodies in neat rows on cots, putting only a white cloth over them in order to cover the sight.

“Row three, cot fourteen... twelve... thirteen... there we are!” Angrod reaches the body and pulls the cloth away, revealing the upper body of a naked, pale man with a pointed beard. Despite his advanced age, Tulhelm kept himself in perfect shape right up until his demise. Only a trickle of conglomerated blood coming from the ears and the nose hints at the cause of death.

“Uuh! This is actually nice material to work with.” Angrod pokes the body with his fingers excitedly, testing the state of the flesh. “No visible trauma damage. No dismemberment or open wounds. This is prime material.” He gestures behind himself. “Iris, come here.”

Our friend just gapes at the dead body, as if she didn't truly believe in her father's death up until now.

Seeing that she is in shock, I push her forward while holding her hand.

That snaps Iris out of her stupor. “What!? What are you going to do to him?”

“I already told you in the car that it's a surrrprrrise.” Angrod clicks his tongue after skilfully rolling the r's in the last word.

He grabs Iris's hand and places it on her father's forehead, then gestures for me to hand him the soul-trap. After receiving the item, he places it on the corpse's chest and closes his eyes, concentrating.

For several long minutes, nothing happens and our friends start getting bored.

Tanja starts chatting about irrelevant things with Sandra and Sven tries to entertain himself with Stephen, but Iris's boyfriend isn't really into it. He is clearly more concerned about his girlfriend's well-being.

Then the corpse twitches once and everyone goes silent.

Angrod takes the soul-trap away from Lord Tulhelm's chest and I quickly claim it before he can pocket it away for his own nefarious purposes. Luckily, he doesn't have a chance to complain, because that's when Lord Tulhelm opens his eyes and gasps in a breath of air, startling his daughter and all the others.

“Dad!?” Iris tears up.

“By Seria's dangling udders!” Sandra curses, performing a crossed hand-sign to invoke the protection of the goddess.

Tulhelm blinks, looking around in obvious bewilderment until his eyes settle on Angrod.

My fiancé grins.

Recognizing his tormentor, the naked man screams like a stabbed pig, startling most of the people present.

“Silence!” Angrod commands and Tulhelm shuts up immediately.

Seeing the revived man's reaction, a little bit of worry sneaks itself into my feelings. I just hope that Angrod didn't screw up Tulhem's mind too much. Normally, a soul should be nothing more than memories without a body to support a consciousness.

Much like a data-disc is inert without the rest of the computer. The fact that Angrod managed to emulate a whole bunch of our enemies' souls within his soul-trap while retaining their previous personalities points at some serious dabbling in the dark arts. Communicating with a pure soul shouldn't be possible according to my limited understanding.

Angrod gestures for Iris to go on. “May I present to you, your loyal servant.”

“M- m- m- my what!?” Iris looks at Angrod, then back at her father.

“Your servant.” Angrod indicates Tulhelm with a dismissing wave of his hand. “I see this as the perfect punishment. You begged to get the disloyal scumbag back, so I thought that while he has to be punished for his deeds, he may as well make it up to you. He has to follow every command you or I give him.”

“E- everything?” Iris pulls down her puffy wolf-ears, looking insecure. “Why isn't he talking?”

“Oh, I just ordered him to shut up. You can undo the command, but you will have to keep track of what you order him to do. If you tell him to go to the end of the world, he would quite literally try to do just that,” Angrod explains patiently. “It's a part of his punishment.”

Iris returns her attention to her father. “Dad, you can talk.”

“What's going on here!?” Tulhelm barks, trying to cover himself with the white cloth. “What did you do to me!?”

Angrod wriggles his fingers, looking creepy. “Just a little necromancy. I don't know why, but your daughter has some unresolved business with you. Count yourself lucky that I was in the mood to humour her.”

Looking angry, Tulhelm turns his full ire on Angrod, thrusting out a hand.

When nothing happens, he tries again without result. “You imbecile! What did you do to my magic!?”

“Ah...” Angrod somehow manages to sound sorry. “I am afraid that I didn't bother with that. You are just a normal corpse. Restoring your nerve-system and the magical pathways to the point of allowing you to wield magic would have been more trouble than you are worth.

“We already called someone to forge a new identity for you, since I don't want it to become public knowledge that I can resurrect people under certain circumstances. You are just one of Iris's retainers from now on. It's up to her to decide what to do with you.”

Tulhelm turns his icy gaze to his daughter. “Iris! Are you the real one!? Or the double!? No. My daughter would never cooperate with the enemy! You must be-”

“Shut up, Dad!” Iris presses her lips into a thin line, then blurts out a rather unfortunate command to test her authority. “Do a handstand!”

Tulhelm rolls over backwards like an athlete, then performs a perfect handstand on top of his cot.

The sheet falls away, revealing him in all his pale, naked glory.

Sandra whistles. “What a hunk. I could almost be turned to necrophilia at such a glorious sight.”

I also can't help but stare. Was the old man always that well endowed, or did Angrod play a trick on him? Maybe he enlarged his organ to fuck with the man's dysfunction in his undead state? Although, why am I assuming that it's dysfunctional?

“Dad! Cover yourself!” Iris quickly corrects her mistake, embarrassed at her oversight, then turns to us. “Could you excuse me? I... I have to talk about a lot of things with... that man.”

Seeing no point in watching the drama unfold, we leave Iris to allow her to work out her family issues in privacy.

———

We return to the mansion where we spend a few more hours in the mansion's main hall, celebrating for real this time around. That is... until Tanja adds a delicious sparkling wine to the mix and alcohol comes into play.

“Every weekend Celes drags me off to some event,” Angrod announces his troubles, his tongue loosened by the intoxication. “She always chooses loud places with many people. Which I hate. You can't talk to each other properly when there is music booming in the background!”

He frowns. “Maybe I should try to go on the offensive? It would surely surprise her if I took her out on a date by myself.”

“Heey... I am right here, you know.” I poke his cheek, trying to draw his attention away from his manly discussion with Sven.

He ignores me. “If I did something like that, it would surely catch her off guard and maybe I can find a weakness. But where should I bring her to? Hmmmm...”

“I would like that.” I pull at his arm, feeling bubbly because of Tanja's wine. “Take me on a date.”

Okay, we may all be a little drunk. But I am in perfect command of my faculties! Yes.

Searching through my pockets, I pull out the list with my 'achievements of love'. “The last point on this is for you to become proactive and plan an outing on your own.”

He finally takes note of me. “Ah, the perverted list. Have you added another naughty point?”

I hug it to my chest. “It's not perverted! It's a guide to a decent life!”

“If you say so.” He looks around the room, seeing that most of the others are out for the count. Tanja and Sandra are lying on the carpet, hugging each other and snoring. Stephen fled the scene, while his sister is trying hard to come up with a formula to predict the spawning of bubbles inside her sparkling wine. Sven, is propped up on a chair next to Angrod, snoring.

Now that I think about it, it doesn't make much sense for Angrod to have a discussion with a sleeping Sven, does it?

Phew! I must have had one bottle too many that I didn't notice this earlier.

“Aw, Sven needs to learn to hold his liquor.” Angrod gets to his feet and approaches the nearby table, laden with drinks and snacks. He tosses away the empty bottles and glasses, then uses the large table cloth as a sack.

I chuckle. “What the heck are you doing?”

“Relocating the party!” Turning, he stumbles but catches himself. Then he comes over and holds out a hand. “My lady.”

“You are drunk.” I laugh, but take his hand anyway. It seems like Angrod is having one of his rare, generous moments.

Pulling me to my feet, he steps to my side and links arms with me. “Care to join me?”

“Just do it already.” I roll my eyes. “What are you planning?”

“Then let's go.”

Our surroundings distort and are replaced by a wide, grassy plateau. A valley stretches out in front of us and at the bottom is a forest with a lake. The sun is settling between the twin-peaks of a mountain, colouring the sky red and the whole valley in a mystical, orange light.

“Huh? Did you just teleport us?” I gape at the scene. “This is the valley where we had our dungeon dive.”

“Yes, I wanted to watch the setting sun with you.” Kneeling down, he spreads the table cloth on the grass, turning it and the snacks into an improvised picnic.

Feeling giddy at the idea, I plop down next to him.

He sits down on the blanket and starts munching on a crispy slice of bread with cheese and salami. “It took me a few days to clean this mountain valley of all the monsters, so we could have a nice evening here. It's really cool when the sun sets and the whole sky is painted in red. Why are you feeling my forehead?”

He pushes my hand away.

“I just wanted to make sure that you don't have a fever in addition to your drunkenness.” I lean into him. “So if I understand it correctly, you actually prepared for this trip?”

“Huh, why not? You were planning all the others. And you always bring us to noisy places with many people. So I thought I would take you somewhere quiet for once. Otherwise, talking would be just a huge pain,” He huffs. “Besides, I am thinking of building a house next to the lake. It would be the perfect spot for a vacation away from all the trouble.”

Huh? He wants to talk to me? The other places were too noisy?

So he didn't like the dates which I organized. “I am sorry. I didn't know that you don't like crowded areas.”

“Here, this stuff is really good, you have to try it.” He holds a piece of dried meat to my face and I open my mouth so that he can feed it to me.

“It's good,” I comment. “We should tell Rose to add it to our supplies at the embassy. And that house of yours sounds like a really good idea. Though, it should be made out of wood to fit into the landscape.”

For a while we stay silent, just sitting together and eating the wonderful food while we sober up a little bit.

I bet tomorrow we will both have a huge hangover.

“I chose this place because we will have a nice sunset soon,” he continues to explain.

Then it hits me what he just did! Damn the alcohol. I am so slow when I am drunk. “W- wait! Did you really teleport us over three hundred kilometres? The valley isn't exactly close to the capital! How far can you teleport with two people?”

It's incredibly hard to teleport even short distances alone and he just took me with him like nothing! I am shocked.

“Huh? It's not that hard, really. Everyone says that teleportation is an incredibly complex and dangerous field, but it's not that hard to master if you have almost limitless mana as a god. I trained long-range teleportation even before I became a god and afterwards I continued. I didn't exactly trust the pathways.”

He shrugs. “They are too convenient. Many gods rely too much on them, without even knowing if they will always be there. Teleportation is a handy skill because many worlds don't have a good transportation system.”

“Here, I have another present for you.” He grabs a small box and gives it to me. I open it and there are two nice silver earrings inside. Their style matches the ring which he gave me to assist in casting a few basic spells.

“They are a set with your ring. The ring could only hold a few selected spells on its own. Those earrings supply additional memory, so to speak. You can save three times as many spells now. If you don't copy any overly complicated spells it should be enough for thirty smaller spells. And you can activate the spells with a thought now. It will take some time to learn, but I am sure you can handle it,” he explains, clearly proud of his creation.

I blush. Somehow my face feels hot. He really did something while thinking solely about me! He wouldn't develop something like the earrings otherwise. He has no use for them.

I smile and hug him. “That's such a nice present.”

He stiffens. “It's okay. It wasn't much trouble.”

Oh, he is so cute! Maybe I should? Using the moment, I give him a wet kiss.

He falls backwards and I sit on top of him, whispering, “Today is a really good day. You made me really happy with that present and I found out that you can teleport me anywhere I want to go. That increases the amount of possible dating places by leaps and bounds!”

Angrod groans. “Why does it feel like revealing my teleportation range was a huge mistake?”

Smiling, I start grinding my hips against him, making sure that he gets the idea. “It means that we wouldn’t have had to be so careful at home. We could have just stepped out to have a little shag in the hay. Haven’t you felt a little pent up since the waterfall? It’s been a while since you got yourself injured, you oaf.” Leaning in, I kiss his neck and curl my body around him.

Finally, he grabs my ass and forces me against him, rolling us over so that he is on top. “I actually like the idea.”