Uhrwerk played host to its first guests. Six visitors strode through a doorway made of magic and altered space-time. Three of those visitors were immortals. Transcendental beings from the higher realms. Three of those visitors were mortals, or at least they were not quite fully immortal.

“This is amazing…” said one of the visitors. The Silver-haired Carter Seth. Scion of the Seth family and greatest of Earth’s Heroes. His tone was paradoxically both awed and disheartened as he spoke.

“...Quite,” said a woman with radiant white hair and skin the color of fresh cream. Vanessa Thane. A wanderer, war-mage, and a wayward student of the Norns, who dressed in silken robes and light fur armor.

“Perhaps, it’s to be expected. Isn’t this Kaylan fellow, a pal of the former Mister Gray?” said another of the visitors. A dark haired, pale skinned, man in a pitch black suit.

“Are we really going to let the Kaylan family keep fifty-percent of this entire world as their own personal possession? If the report’s to be trusted this world is still growing in size and will continue growing for the foreseeable future…The associated resources could surely be put to better use...” said another immortal. A four foot tall humanoid form completely covered in a glowing white sheet.

“Mhm, I would be inclined to agree, Mister Albert. However, I would caution that from my organization's observations and research Mr and Mrs Kaylan have proven themselves to be quite capable...Dangerously so...Beyond the evidence that we are currently standing on. They’ve also proven themselves in their work with the DPA and their tenure in the Players League,” said Director Dillan.

Her wrinkles and grayed-hair were shed, her back was straightened. The cherished affectations of age that she’d allowed herself to pick up over the years, were cast aside to avoid making a poor showing of earth’s protectors in front of the present company. Leaving her as the hawkish, tan-skinned, auburn-haired, powerfully built, woman she’d been in her youth.

“I’m inclined to agree with the Director. If the stories of my predecessor’s… ‘adventures’ are to be trusted, then the being calling itself Montgomery Kaylan would be a dangerous foe even for the house...Besides, I’ve always been a big believer in fair play. He did good work, he should get the rewards he was promised. He’s continuing to do good work, and far be it for us to try and cheat him,” said a beautiful woman in gray. Who just so happened to be the current Mister Gray.

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It was a Friday. Instead of being at work, or at home with Margot, I was standing inside one of the nicer franchise hotels. My hands in my pockets. My shoulders were hunched over as I unconsciously tried to make myself smaller. I didn’t like where I was right now, but I didn’t really have much of a say in the matter of my being there.

Margot and I had finally decided it was time to get serious about tackling the whole “nearly dying with every sexual encounter”-thing. After months and months of dragging our feet, things finally came to head, when Margot woke up half melted into a gore-covered skeleton, while I was essentially reduced to a pile of ash.

Despite our trepidation over ruining what we both felt was a pretty good thing, we decided it was time to expand our little family. It was the responsible thing to do, because looking at our track record, if we didn’t do something, it was only a matter of time before one or both of us was put in a much more permanent near-death state.

Thus I was here, standing in the city of Prospero’s largest “Chatte” Hotel, waiting for the opening of what was essentially a speed dating event for upcoming clans and the young men and women who didn’t mind marrying into those clans as a second or third spouse.

I was standing in a room occupied by a number of men and women who were all either ancient, middle-aged, or just a year shy of being too young to be here. The older folk were elders who’d focused on cultivation and business and didn’t trust their families or friends to introduce someone. The younger folk were young family heads who lacked the social capital to use the usual means to let the people within their circles know that they were looking for spouses.

It was surprisingly easy for me and Margot to find one of these events once we started looking. However, I probably shouldn’t have been too surprised. I'd seen this pattern in a number of high-magic worlds. While Monogamy was still a big thing on terminus-earth, polygamy had also become a norm in post-ENE society. The idea of popularity of big families and bigger households growing as trust in public institutions and the government fell.

World Peace, and the global dominance of Seth family control United Nations, meant that the world governments no longer had to worry about their peers, and rivals, trying to make moves on them during the frequent crises that popped up every now and then. However that didn’t mean that it still wasn’t easy for a two parent/two income household to suddenly and tragically turn into a one family/one income household. That would often end up becoming a no parent/no income household.

With no extended family to rely on, that meant trusting ones offspring to an already overworked, overtaxed state and hoping that they didn’t fall through the cracks and end up being sold into indenture, or outright slavery in more lawless parts of the world.

Regardless of how true this was now that things had settled quite a bit for Terminus-Earth, the people still tended to have two or more spouses, these days. Wealthy people tended to try and create their own marriage-, and blood-, based power blocks.

The new nuclear family was either a group of three or more adults working together and pooling resources. Or more commonly, people followed a flower and petal structure that had been popular during the worst of the ENE, where the partner with the most resources, or external power was the head of the household/clan/whatever....

This change in the culture, resulted in the birth of services like the one I was at now. Dating apps, arranged marriage consultancies, and speed dating events like today’s were everywhere. You just needed to know how to separate the wheat from the chaff.

At the moment the jury was still out on whether the service I’d chosen was wheat or cheat. Maybe it was just my nerves talking, but I was having second thoughts about going to this speed dating event.

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The waiting period ended and the event began in earnest. I found myself and my fellow “clan heads” and household heads, ushered into a massive ballroom room. A ballroom that had been transformed via the use of small tables, candelabras, elegant dining sets, standing screens, and some fairly artful use of illusion magic.

I’ll give the event planners some credit. They’d done what they’d intended to do. Turning a single ballroom, into a collection of intimate feeling destination dates. In this single evening, the clients in this event would be able to visit a beach on the maldives, the vineyards of Tuscany, a cozy apartment overlooking the most dazzling parts of Paris, the Moons of Jupiter, the Floating Islands of Ireland, and many other romantic hotspots.

The only thing that ruined the atmosphere that the event planners had worked so hard to make, were the chincy, faintly disturbing, flying babies that hovered overhead. Whoever’s idea that was, should have been taken out back, shot, brought back to life, and shot again. If my reaction seems extreme, let me just inform you that there are a number of cosmic abominations that look a lot like winged babies.

If you’ve seen enough of the cosmos you’d find that flying babies are actually slightly less romantic than mysterious genital rashes, getting served divorce papers in the middle of a date, and witnessing a trog barbecue.

I understood a desire to provide some passive security for the guests, I also understood adding a little something extra for the sake of tying the disparate themes of the various settings together. But flying babies wasn’t the answer. If it were me, I would have just gone with something simple, like your standard, ethereal balls of multi-colored light.