37 – Euphy debates religion with her dad, meets her destined himbo

The athletic center was the largest single building on campus, encompassing not only an arena but various courts and smaller gymnasiums as well. In one of the latter, which was deserted due to the late Sunday hour, Euphrosyne was holding a very large cat while her dad ran laps.

“Ôi con yêu của tôi bánh hạnh nhân¹Oh my little almond cookie, how are you so fucking cute?”

Hebe, who’d been sticking to her like Velcro since the moment they’d met, squinted and purred loudly as Euphy planted a series of kisses on her big forehead. 

“Đứa bé²A baby, that’s what you are, just a sweet baby.”

In response, Hebe tried to groom some of Euphrosyne’s long brown hair only to wind up looking silly and helpless with her tongue stuck out as she struggled to cope with the true length of it.

Gently pulling it from her mouth, Euphrosyne mumbled, “Little creamsicle, you better still recognize me when I’m not in disguise or I’ll cry.”

Freed from her mistake, Hebe happily buried her cold wet nose against Euphy’s neck, unintentionally knocking her glasses askew.

“Ah, ah, careful with the glasses,” Euphy mumbled, fixing them. 

They were another gift from Professor Iphis, one meant to help debut the fake identity the Temple had whipped up for her.

While it was possible to change a person’s eye color with shapeshifting, their mana signature would always steadily dye it back, so it was much easier to wear glasses with a minor illusion on them instead.

A mildly hilarious consequence of this was that Cydonian stories often put glasses on shapeshifted characters to imply they were in disguise, which made receiving them from Iphis feel a lot like being handed her very own official villainous mustache.

Now metaphorically-mustached, her new identity had been hired as an aide by her father under the guise of assisting him in recovering from his ‘injury’. This meant they could interact without having to sneak through catacombs, although the downside was that as someone supposedly employed by President Ianthe she had to be careful not to act too close to him.

That said, between her job, the glasses, and the uniform her dad had given her, she was now closer than ever to fulfilling her fallback dream job, which was being the sassy butler of a wealthy, preferably crime-fighting, eccentric.

So it was kind of a bummer that the news he’d just dropped on her had her too upset to enjoy that.

Her father was possessed, and even after he and Professor Iphis walked her through everything, she still felt like she didn’t understand. Not how it worked, or what it was doing to him, or whether or not there was anything she could do to help.

It was all so unfair.

Her father was already dealing with so much just coming here, and now he had to grapple with some kind of weird magical affliction on top of that? If she were in his shoes she’d probably be so upset she’d lose it on everybody around her, but he seemed to have brushed the whole thing off like it was no big deal, and she wasn’t sure if he genuinely felt that way or if he was just pretending for her sake.

As for herself, all she could think was that it felt like every time in her life she dared to feel even a little secure, something had to come along and rip that away from her. 

“Hebe, do you really work for my dad, or did he steal you from someone?”

Her father had brought Hebe along to their discussion under the excuse that he also wanted to introduce Euphy to his top employee. However, Euphy was pretty sure he only did this because he knew she’d get upset, which annoyed her because she didn’t like being emotionally manipulated.

Especially because it was working. It was very hard to focus on her distress while she was being relentlessly hugged by the cutest cat she’d ever met.

“You’re a monster, aren’t you, Heebs? Don’t worry, I won’t tell on you. I like monsters,” Euphy said, unconsciously bouncing Hebe in her arms like a human infant.

“Nyaa.”

Some people felt leery around monsters, even the cute ones, because it could be hard to gauge their dangerousness and intelligence. However, having once befriended a subterranean terror, Euphy’s threshold for what constituted a ‘scary monster’ was now so high that this bundle of fluff couldn’t possibly register to her as anything other than an ordinary cat. 

“Hebe, what do you think? Is my dad okay, or is he just pretending to be okay?”

“Miaowr.”

Part of the problem was that Euphy knew far more about spiritual possession than she did demonic possession. Professor Iphis said that the demon couldn’t actually take over, that it was just sort of stuck, so…

If spiritual possession was like being forced to hang out with a little guy, was demonic possession like being forced to hang out with an evil little guy?

What did demons even look like, anyway? In the few illustrations she’d seen here, they were usually depicted as weird glowy monsters, kind of like how spirits were…

Suddenly, Euphy couldn’t help but imagine a spirit with an evil mustache and glasses.

Anyway, since Professor Iphis said the demon couldn’t actually do anything, was having one a real problem or was it just annoying? And if she asked her father for more detail, considering his history of hiding important stuff from her, could she trust what he said?

“Well, it’ll be fine either way, right? Because I’m going to find a way to make him okay,” Euphy said, hugging the warm cat close.

She just had to keep telling herself that this was different from the time her mom got sick. She wasn’t a powerless child anymore. She was a healer, she was a Saint, she was someone who could do something and that meant she didn’t have to put up with losing people anymore.

She just wasn’t sure how she was going to do that yet. Since she was already working on one exorcism project with Psyche, maybe it would be possible to solve both types of possession in one go?

“Myapp,” Hebe said, squiggling as she protested the tightness of the hug.

“Sorry, Hebe,” Euphy said, loosening her hold. 

Then, spotting her father in the distance, she let out a sigh.

Even though working as an aide was just a cover story, Euphy was taking her new fake job to improve her father’s health very seriously, starting with exercise.

If one wanted to get physically fit, the fastest way to do that was with the help of a healer since their magic could allow one to skip the recovery period. So long as a person had the stamina to complete multiple workouts a day, they could progress twice as fast as normal, if not more so.

Unfortunately, it looked like her father did not have the stamina. He was only two laps into his second workout, yet he’d just collapsed facedown on the track.

Still hugging Hebe, Euphy made her way over to go check on him.

“Dad, do you need help, or are you just feeling dramatic?” 

Panting, her father asked, “Do you—haa—think God made us—ugh—just to suffer?”

Okay, it’s the second one.

Euphy blinked down at him a few times and said, “Wow, you really are struggling with this workout, aren’t you? You usually only get this existential when you’ve got a cold.”

“Shut up… I can’t…”

“Come on, a few more laps and then some strength training and you’re done.”

“No… you don’t… understand!” he said between breathless gasps. He tried to prop himself up with his shaking arms, only to end up accidentally pinning his long hair beneath his hands, which pulled him right back down to the floor.

This is why I told you to braid it and pin it up, but did you listen?You’re not even superstitious like people here. I really don’t understand why you don’t just cut it…

Euphy held back a sigh as she crouched down next to him, then gently pushed him over and onto his back.

Glaring up at her, he continued complaining. “This is awful—no, this body is awful! Everything hurts, my—ugh—my lungs, my muscles, I think even my bones hurt—and not a single part of it is listening to me! I know my form is shit but I swear, I can’t make it better—!”

In their past life, her father was one of those people who wasn’t aware of just how fit he was in comparison to the average person. Half the time Auntie Maria got mad at him was because he’d opened his big mouth and said something like, ‘What, is twelve flights of stairs a lot?’

Thinking about his shocked reaction to her 14-minute mile and the time he refused to believe she couldn’t do any pull-ups ‘even though she was a teenager,’ she muttered quietly under her breath, “Ah, the wheels of karma.”

“This can’t be what it’s like for most people, right? This body is just fucking broken. Doing anything at all is like torture! Alice, isn’t there some healing magic, or—or a stamina spell or something you can use? Help me out here!”

She paused, still unused to hearing him call her by that old name, but nevertheless happy to hear it. Feeling more generous, she gently explained, “Healing you again when you’ve only just started your second workout won’t help, and… while yes, there are stamina spells, it’s healthier to avoid using them until you keep up this level of activity for a few weeks, otherwise it might confuse your body’s total daily expenditure and mess up your appetite.”

“Did you just hit me with ‘TDE?’ Since when did you learn to speak gym rat?”

“Since I did a training montage for seven years in the mountains. Oh! That reminds me.” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a little notebook, offering it to him. “I calculated your daily macros and outlined a basic meal plan based on your current biometrics and exercise schedule. By the way, the meal plan is very general. I know better than to try and get you to eat anything specific so I just based it on the kinds of things they serve in the canteen daily. Just try to estimate your portions and make sure you eat within the time windows I outlined."

He did not seem enthusiastic about this, but he still reached out and took the notebook with one trembling hand.

“Okay.”

“There’s also a section for recording how you feel after meals and workouts, so try to fill it in whenever you remember, I’m going to check it later.”

“… Okay.”

Studying him more closely, Euphy patted Hebe as she murmured, “That reminds me, you’re definitely more tan than when we first met, so you must be going outside a lot? Keep that up. I think the atmosphere here is different because both skin cancer and sunburns are pretty rare, so don’t worry about UVs and get a lot of sunlight. Oh, and did I mention that food here isn’t commonly fortified? Be careful not to eat too many processed grains or you might not get enough thiamine.”

“Baby girl, take a deep breath, okay?” her father sighed, rhythmically smacking himself in the face with the miniature notebook in resignation. “I’ll follow your meal plan, and I still won’t drink or smoke.”

“Aiow,” Hebe interrupted, lifting her head to bite Euphy on the chin.

It didn’t hurt, but there was enough force behind it that Euphy could feel the sharpness even through her mage armor.

“Hebe, what was that for?” Euphy asked in confusion, lifting the cat up so she could look at her little face.

“Oh, it’s probably because we’re speaking English. Hebe can only understand Cydonian,” her dad said, switching back to Cydonian. “Sorry Heebs, didn’t mean to leave you out.”

“Mrrip.”

Hebe… can understand Cydonian?

Even among monsters that level of intelligence was rare. Euphy looked at her father, then at Hebe’s silly, empty-headed expression, then back at her father, and decided,

No, there’s no way, he’s just messing with me. 

Regardless, just to be polite she switched to Cydonian and said, “Aww, our Hebe is the smartest!”

“Mya!” Hebe said, thrilled at the praise and blissfully unaware that she’d once again been stereotyped based on her looks.

“Hebe, you’ve been hugging my daughter for ages now, come down and be a heating pad for me, won’t you? I think I’ve got some treats in my pocket.”

As Hebe shamelessly abandoned her for food, Euphy asked, “Dad, don’t you have some more laps to run?”

“What would be the point? I’ll just fall down again,” her father replied, arranging the big cat over himself like a blanket as he produced a tiny dried fish for her.

“That’s fine. In fact, if you do it enough times in a row I’ll count it as burpees.”

She wasn’t sure why that got her a glare when she was trying to be generous, but before she could ask her father suddenly said, “Hey, did you know they have a Sisyphus here?”

Giving up, she sat down and reached out to pet Hebe as she replied,

“What? Like the Greek myth guy? Yeah, I know, what about him?”

“Well, I don’t know… doesn’t that seem suspicious to you?”

“No, why would it? There’s a ton of parallel stuff like that here, it’s just, you know… ancient Earth multiversal shenanigans.”

To be honest, the only thing that did weird her out was that unlike myths from her past life, the gods themselves never directly interacted with mortals here. That might sound like a good thing, but the result was that if such an interaction was important to a story then a divine mage filled in instead. Thinking about some of the things divine mages got up to in those myths, it was a little surprising that people here treated them like idols instead of locking their doors and bolting the windows.

“Multiversal shenanigans, huh?” her father mumbled to himself, rubbing Hebe’s orange ears. “So you think this place is just a version of Earth, but in the past?”

Euphy shrugged. “I don’t know, that’s just my guess.”  

Privately, she suspected it was that in a higher dharma realm, but she’d tried to explain the trichiliocosm to her father once before and he’d gotten too stuck on the math for them to make any progress.

“But… this place isn’t even Earth, is it? I mean, I finally got a chance to look at an atlas and the shape of the continents is all wrong. Same goes for the constellations."

“Well, maybe it’s an ‘Earth’ that got whacked by some slightly different asteroids when it was doing its whole ‘becoming a planet’ thing. I mean, wouldn’t that be included in a list of infinite possibilities?”

“I mean… I guess? I dunno, I just think it’s suspicious, like—it’s a feeling in my gut.”

Euphy nodded sympathetically.

Her father had always been a rather paranoid man. Luckily, he was pretty reasonable when it came to conspiracy theories and the like, so he hadn’t become completely insufferable like some of her friend’s parents had. Still, she tried to discourage it whenever she could, a little worried that one day he’d fall down some kind of Facebook rabbit hole and turn into a nutcase.

“Do you think we’re actually in a video game or something?”

“What? No, of course not. I just think the set up here is weird, especially all this crap with the gods.”

“In what way?”

“Everyone here knows They exist because we get power from Them, right? But what exactly are They getting out of it that They're willing to give us so much? It can’t just be worship, can it?”

“Why not?”

“Come on, I’m being serious! This isn’t a religion, it’s a fucking transaction, but we don’t even know what we’re paying!” 

“Well, yeah, but aren’t most religions already like that? People want control over their lives so they pray to gods and Buddhas and such. Is taking the mystery out of the equation that important?”

“Are you kidding me? Mystery is the most important part!” he exclaimed, sounding personally offended.

“Dad… what is this really about? Is this a religious thing? Are you feeling guilty about using magic or something?”

Since her mother had raised her Buddhist, when she was little her biggest impression of Abrahamic religions as a whole was that they seemed pretty stressful. Her understanding deepened somewhat once she started living with her father, but since he seemed to regard God like an unreliable boss who owed him money, she still didn’t really get the appeal beyond it being important to him as an inherited cultural thing.

As for herself, she hadn’t really had much issue integrating her old beliefs with this world. None of the gods in the main pantheon claimed to have created the universe. They all simply seemed to rule certain aspects of it, so Euphy thought ‘oh, I guess some of that fancy cosmic stuff is real’ and went on with her life.

“Maybe? Maybe I just don’t like having to ask for Their help to use it. Oh, and I definitely don’t like having to beg for blessings,” he complained.

Running her fingers through Hebe’s silky fur, incredibly regretful that she couldn’t take her gloves off and actually feel it, Euphy replied, “Then don’t think of it like begging. Think of it like harassing Them with psychic text messages.”

“You want me to treat prayer like text messaging?”

“Why not? Just, you know, spam Them until They break down and give you what they want. I mean, almost every single prayer I make is a complaint, and I still got some good blessings—here, I’ll give you an example.”

Clasping her hands together solemnly, she closed her eyes and said, “Savage Tempest, I’ve been praying to you for years and you still haven’t given me anything, so cough up a blessing soon you stingy old man or the first thing I’ll do as the official Saint is cut Your Temple’s budget in half.”

“So the gods here don’t get offended easily, do They?” her father muttered. “That’s pretty different from what I’m used to.”

“Unless you’re committing one of Their major taboos, They don’t really seem to give a shit. I mean, I've been calling the Dread Lady ‘Scum Goddess’ in my prayers for seven years and I’m still Her fucking ‘Chosen One.’” Euphy shrugged. “Why, were you thinking of trying to get a blessing from one of Them?”

“Uh… yeah, actually. I was thinking of hitting up the Moon Gods, although saying that out loud makes me feel like a crazy person.”

“Really?” Euphy brightened. One of her blessings came from the Eight and she was a shapeshifter, so she was naturally pretty biased in Their favor. “That’s a good idea, They give out some pretty sweet gifts. Are you looking for advice on appealing to Them or something?”

Her father considered this for a while before saying, “I guess. Is there a specific one of Them I should focus on depending on what I want, or can I just do the prayer equivalent of a group text? Actually, now that I think about it, what the hell does ‘Eight-in-One’ mean, anyway? Are they eight guys or one guy with eight costumes?”

Euphy’s enthusiastic expression suddenly hardened.

Her father had inadvertently stumbled upon one of the oldest and most hotly debated issues related to the Eight, and just thinking about it had her staring into the middle distance as flashbacks of fierce religious debates played through her mind unbidden.

Phrasing it as diplomatically as she could, “That… depends a lot on who you ask. It’s kind of a regional thing.”

“A regional thing?”

“Yeah. For example, in Lycus, I think most people believe the Eight are all individual gods, but only one can exist at a time, so they kind of… take turns? But in Cimmeria, most people believe the Eight are a single god going through a cyclical metamorphosis, which is in contrast to Thymimata, where the Eight are generally considered individual gods who are fragments of one larger god, which is kind of similar to what most Hesperians believe, except that they also think ‘Eight-in-One’ means multiples of eight, so they recognize way more aspects than anyone else.”

And all of this was an intensely abbreviated version of an issue that had caused thousands of years of strife including but not limited to: riots, a centuries-long Temple schism, more than one failed coup, and the deaths of multiple martyrs.

“What the heck?” her father asked. “Isn’t it all supposed to be the same religion?”

“Have you ever heard of a religion where everybody agrees on the interpretations?”

“No, but you guys have fucking avatars of the gods running around with divine blessings, right? Can they not set the record straight?”

“Some have tried, but most of them don’t agree with each other either.”

“Wow. Okay. Well, I’m Aeonian, technically, so what do Aeonians believe?”

“That there’s eight of Them individually but They’re all sort of psychically linked… Which is to say, it doesn’t matter which one you pray to.”

“Okay, thank goodness, group text it is.”

Her dad paused, then craned his neck and stared past her, saying, “Hey, wait a second, isn’t that one of your Heroes? Boy, look at the size of him… kid sure eats his Wheaties, don’t he?”

Euphy whipped around to look and realized her father was right.

Shit. It was one of the Heroes—or two, if she counted the spirit possessing him, and… he really was big, not just in muscle but height as well. If she recalled correctly, he was around seven feet tall, which already sounded like a lot on paper but was even more intimidating in real life.

Noticing her looking at him from across the room, he briefly made startled eye contact with her before turning his back and hurrying further away.

Oh, damn it, Euphy thought, putting her face in her hands in embarrassment.

Good job staring at the guy who hates being stared at. Amazing first impression, once again she was knocking it out of the park with these damn Heroes.

“Are you gonna go say hello?”

She glared at her father.

“What? Why are you looking at me like that? He’s supposed to be one of your little friends, isn’t he?”

“So? I’m busy helping you, aren’t I? Plus I’m in disguise, and also it’s not time for me to approach him yet.”

“What do you mean ‘it’s not time’? You’ve got feet, haven’t you? Go say hi, I don’t mind, I’ll just hang out with the cat.”

“Ugh, Tate³dad…”

Why did he always think it was so easy to make friends? Euphy had literally practiced meeting Endymion like a dozen times in the game and she still felt like she was going to fuck it up, especially since this wasn’t the scenario she’d practiced!

“What, are you worried he’ll reject you? Just tell Teen Wolf over there you’ll keep him outta prison and I’m sure he’ll get on board.”

“Don’t call him that! He’s not a teenager he’s like—like twenty four, I think! And Echo is at least a few centuries, but I'm not sure how old that actually makes her because that relative age stuff really confuses me so, like, I don’t know, is it really!?”

“Okay, okay, calm down bubbeleh. I’m not trying to criticize you, I’m saying that he’s just a person. You don’t gotta think about it so much.”

“Easy for you to say,” she muttered.

Not for the first time, she felt like her life would have been easier if she’d inherited his social butterfly gene. Instead she had to listen to all sorts of people tell her to ‘just do it’ as though she wouldn’t fucking love to if she could!

“Well, there was a time in my life when it wasn’t easy, but then I practiced a lot and, you know, yeah, now I guess I do think it’s easy,” her father replied, stroking Hebe as she purred. “Talking to people is a skill just like drawing or writing is. The more you do it the easier it gets. Struggling isn’t a sign you’re doing it wrong, it’s a sign that you’re on your way to progressing.”

“Is that so? Then why don’t we practice what’s hard for you instead,” Euphy challenged, glowering at him. “For example, why don’t you tell me what being possessed is like?”

She wasn’t sure if she felt validated or annoyed by the way his casual grin suddenly became strained.

“Turnabout is fair play, huh?”

Feeling a twinge of guilt, she crossed her arms defensively. Damn it, she hadn’t meant to pressure him about his issue like this, but her mouth was once again faster than her brain.

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, I’m only asking because… I don’t really get it, I don’t know…” 

“You don’t have to feel bad, I already promised, didn’t I? I am… making an effort, this is me making an effort, oy,” he said, wearing a sour expression as he rubbed Hebe’s ears. “Okay. It’s… kind of like having a new mean voice in my head to argue with. So far it’s been more inconvenient than anything else.”

Ah? Professor Iphis just said a bunch of stuff about some weirdly advanced magical seal. She hadn’t realized her dad could actually interact with the demon directly.

“Wait, you can talk to them? Are they like… a guy sitting on your shoulder? Can they see and hear everything you do, are they looking at me right now!?”

“What, no, calm down! I mean, it can do that I think, but it's afraid of divine mages, so it always hides when one of youse is around… Well, that and cats. It's also afraid of cats.”

“Wait, what? Why would they be afraid of divine mages? Or cats? Also… why ‘it?’ Is that what demons prefer to be called?”

“Prefer? No, it’s just an evil little worm that wants to eat my soul. Why should I give a damn about what it wants?”

Euphy hesitated. It didn’t feel right to question how he wanted to view his own affliction, but he wasn’t struggling with a mindless virus. She was pretty sure demons were intelligent beings, which meant the ‘affliction’ in question could probably understand their conversation.

Giving him a gentle poke, Euphy said, “Dad, come on… do you really think it’s okay to only treat someone like a person if you approve of them?”

“‘Approve?’ Sorry, but I don’t remember signing off on a time-share agreement,” he grumbled, hugging Hebe. “I don’t care if it’s smart, as far as I’m concerned that little squatter can fuck right off.”

“Did they possess you because they wanted to?”

Now it was his turn to hesitate. Eventually he admitted, “Well, no… but it’s not like I wanted this either! And they’re the one who decided to act like an asshole first, why the hell should it be on me to be polite!?”

“Well… I mean, I guess you don’t have to.”

To be honest, she wasn’t sure if she was right to question him about this at all. Maybe she was being too sensitive about the issue, or not sensitive enough about what he was dealing with.

“Fine! Fine,” her father said, throwing up his hands in annoyance. “‘They’re’ an evil little worm that wants to eat my soul, are you happy?”

An evil little worm? Euphy thought, updating her mental image to the Very Hungry Caterpillar, and once again unable to stop herself from adding a mustache and glasses.

“Thank you, but I still don’t get why they’d be afraid of me. Or cats.”

“I’m not sure about the cat thing, but, uh… You should probably ask Iphis or Moros why demons would be afraid of you,” he said, getting strangely squirrely over the subject.

“What, why? Can’t you at least try to tell me?”

“I mean, I could, but I’m not very clear on the subject myself? Actually, if you could tell me whatever they tell you, that would be pretty helpful—oh wait, don’t look now, but I think another Hero just showed up.”

“One of the girls?” she asked, turning around in excitement only to find that no, no it wasn’t.

It was Belleros. She’d recognize that lanky, teal-haired bastard anywhere.

However, what the heck was someone like him doing in a gym? He really wasn’t the sort to be into this kind of place.

“You know, if you approached both of them now, you could get two birds with one stone…”

“Drop it, not happening,” she growled.

If it were just Endymion she might have been willing to consider it, but Belleros was… complicated. 

Even without meeting him in person she was pretty certain that Mr. Highest Difficulty was going to trouble her the most. It was better to just cross her fingers and stick to the plot when it came to that jerkwad.

“What, you worried that emo kid is gonna give you a hard time? Want me to scare him a bit for you first?” her dad suggested, brightening at the idea.

“No, of course not!”

“Come on, what’s the point of me running this place if I don’t bully anyone for you?”

“No, and stop smiling like that, you’re not allowed to bully any of the Heroes, I’m serious!” she said, resisting the urge to give his arm a smack. “People are already saying all sorts of crazy shit about you!”

“Come on, you know better than to believe that stuff, don’t you?” he replied, his eyes shifting away.

“Of course, I’m not that gullible,” she confidently declared. “Anyway, if any of it were true you’d have been arrested by now. Like, for example—”

“No, come on, do you really need to list it?”

Euphy, who picked up rumors as easily as breathing, ignored him as she ticked off on her fingers one by one, “I heard some people in the canteen saying you threw someone’s bodyguards down a flight of stairs and broke their arms, and someone in my residence hall was saying you stabbed one of your deans with a pen, and one of my classmates said you slapped the Prince of Hyperborea.”

She paused to check his expression as she listed the last one, and was happy to see that he seemed genuinely shocked.

Good. She didn’t think her dad would do such a thing, and she’d told him more than once that she didn’t want him to retaliate against Prince Damon on her behalf, but she also knew he’d been pretty steamed about that fight and so she got just a little worried he might have gone overboard.

“Hey, none of that is true! People are just exaggerating a bit because I already have a bad reputation.”

“And I overheard one of my professors telling his TA that you threatened to fuck some student’s mom to death.”

She’d expected his denials to continue, so when he suddenly paused she immediately became suspicious.

“Hey,” he asked, trying to sound casual and failing completely, “just wondering, which professor said that last one?”

Her eyes widening, she asked, “Wait… did you actually say that?”

“No! Of course not!”

“You’re lying, aren’t you? You look guilty!”

“Now, hold on—”

“Dad, what the hell? You can’t say shit like that, what is wrong with you!?”

“I—no—it—it’s been taken out of context!” he insisted, covering Hebe’s ears like she was too young to hear this.

“What context could possibly make that okay!?”

“She and her goons tried to attack two of my employees just ‘coz they were commoners, I was defending them!”

“And that was the only way to do it?”

“Well, look, it wasn’t just one lady, okay? I said it to her dead grandparents and her guards too! Seriously, I said it to like five people at once, don’t make me sound like a pervert!”

“So you said it to their faces? How does that make you sound like less of a pervert!?”

“Because—because the logistics are unrealistic! And I meant it metaphorically!” he whispered, trying not to upset Hebe, who’d somehow taken their argument as a cue to start napping.

“Oy vey iz smir,” she moaned, putting her face in her hands. “Dad, we’ve been over this, you cannot just say crap like that.”

She really didn’t understand it. 99% of the time her dad was goofy and obnoxious at worst, but every once and a while something completely heinous would come out of his mouth. He always said it was because he was from New Jersey, but she was pretty sure he was just using his home state’s reputation as an excuse.

“Hey!” he hissed back, “Don’t ‘oy vey’ me, I’ll oy vey you. You’re the one who wanted me to threaten people! How the heck am I supposed to do that politely?”

“When did I ask you to threaten people!?”

“You wanted ‘Ianthe’ to stay scary! I can’t be nice and scary!”

“I said I was worried people would think you’re too friendly, I never asked you to threaten them! And by the Lady can you at least try not to sound like a sex offender if you’re going to do that!?”

“I’m telling you I didn't mean it in a sex way! And anyway, how is what I said any different from assaulting people normally? If I’m breaking a guy’s knees, you think he’s gonna thank me for not copping a feel?”

“Dad!” Euphy exclaimed as quietly as she could, grabbing hold of the anti-eavesdropping artifact she was wearing just to frantically double-check that it was still active. 

“What? I’m serious! It’s all violence, what’s the difference?”

“You seriously need to stop talking!”

“I’m just saying, it’s always felt about the same to me, so I don’t understand why it’s such a big deal,” he grumbled quietly, still covering Hebe’s ears.

“Different words have different implications! And regardless, you’re not actually a lunatic, so don’t say crap like that, how is this hard to understand?”

“Then how else am I supposed to scare people?”

“By being like—like cold and intimidating! Not by threatening them with—oh Goddess, I can’t even say it aloud, I’m so fucking mortified,” she cried out, covering her face with her hands.

“Look, I’ll be more careful in the future, okay? I’ll—I’ll only say things I’m willing to do literally.”

This was not the first time they’d argued over something he said, so the way he was folding so quickly made her suspect either he already understood he’d been inappropriate or he’d already gotten flack about it from someone else.

Rubbing her forehead in exasperation, Euphy sighed. “I mean… that’s better, I guess?” 

“Plus, you have a point… It probably isn’t fair to expect people to get my metaphors while they’re scared.”

“You think?”

“Hmm. Hey, quick side question, would it be a problem if the Hero boys got into a fight with each other?”

“Wait, what do you—?”

Euphy turned around just in time to see Belleros dump a spell’s worth of water over Endymion’s head. 

She was too far to hear what they were saying, but judging by Bell’s sarcastic expression, the rude gestures he made, and the way he stormed off, Endymion had upset him pretty badly.

“Oh, no… Dad, what the heck just happened!?”

“Uh… while we were arguing, the emo kid was trying to use some equipment, and whaddaya know, he must be pretty new at this ‘coz he was doing a terrible job of it, and then he tried some weights that were definitely too heavy for him, and that’s when the big guy came over,” her father explained, finally releasing the snoring cat’s ears. “I think that poor himbo was just trying to help, but man, telling someone else in a gym they’re doing it wrong? That almost never ends well, rookie mistake.”

“And you just… watched them do all this? Without saying anything to me!?”

Gesturing with his hands he asked, “What? You were busy lecturing me, and you already told me you didn’t want to intervene, so what’s the problem?”

“The problem is the girls are already at each other’s throats. I don’t need the boys fighting too!”

“Wait, the girlies are fighting? Why are the girls fighting?”

“It’s complicated, it’s… Ugghh…” Euphy pinched her eyebrows, counted from one to ten and back again, then stood up as she said, “I’m going to go check on him.”

“So now you’re willing to approach him?”

“Shut up! And don’t think for a moment that our conversation is over! You and I are going to have a very long talk about this later.”

“Do we have to?”

“And no more threatening people!”

“Look, I can’t agree to that.”

“I’m serious!” she said, pointing at her eyes and then pointing at his, “I’m watching you, so you’d better behave!”

Giving Hebe a farewell pat, she left the headache she called her father to his own devices and headed towards Endymion. The man had frozen in place after Belleros splashed him, and was still standing there now, water dripping down his coppery brown skin and falling from his long lashes as he blinked in confusion. Even knowing that he was a kind person, Euphy couldn’t help but hesitate a little as she got closer. He already looked big from afar, but up close it became obvious just how naturally intimidating he was, and it wasn’t just his height. That he was nearly two feet taller than her was already impressive, but on top of that he was such a wall of ridiculous muscle that he looked less like a student and more like an epic fantasy hero who’d been given the wrong directions on the way to slay a dragon and ended up enrolling in college by accident. The fact that he didn’t have a gigantic sword, a mighty steed, or buxom lass to cling to him almost felt wrong somehow, like he was being deprived of his natural habitat.

That said, Euphy recovered pretty quickly. After all, being too tall was the flip side of being too short, which meant that as long as they were willing to reach across opposite ends of the bell curve and clasp hands, they were basically born to be comrades.

He’d just have to reach a little further than she did, because her arms probably weren’t long enough.

With this vision of solidarity in mind, Euphy approached him and tentatively asked, “Excuse me, are you alright?”

As though he’d only just noticed her, Endymion frowned down at her, his thick dark purple eyebrows scrunching his forehead into stern lines. Though his hawkish nose and scarred face further lent to his fierce aura, the fact that he clearly had no idea what to do now that he’d been splashed made him seem more lost than intimidating.

Rather than reply, he looked around and then behind himself. When he realized nobody else was around, he blinked his dark blue eyes at her and hesitantly pointed to himself with one big finger.

“Are you… talking to me?”

Even though he tried to speak quietly, his voice was so startlingly deep that it seemed to fill the silence of the gym like thunder.

“Yes, you! I saw Be—er, that man splash you, so I wanted to ask if you were okay.”

She also wanted to know if this altercation happened in the game, or was this some result of her prior meddling. Neither of them had ever mentioned such an incident, but then again, Endy was definitely the kind of person to just pretend it never happened, and Bell…

Bell was probably bullying too many people to bother keeping track.

“Oh…” Endymion said, awkwardly scratching at his cheek. “I’m fine, but I think I upset him. Is he a friend of yours?”

“W-well, sort of…”

Endymion nodded as he pulled his thick wavy hair through his hands to wring the water out of it. 

“In that case, please apologize to him on my behalf,” he replied, then bowed to her and moved as though to leave.

“Wait! You’re also my friend—or, I mean—hold on, my neck is starting to hurt—”

As Endymion hesitated again, his expression implying he was now panicking because he didn’t recognize her, Euphy darted off to grab a nearby plyometric box and drag it over. Standing on top of it so they could get eye level, she ignored her father’s laughter in the distance and continued, “I mean, I’m your new roommate! The—um—the resident advisor asked me to speak to you if I saw you, since you haven’t been checking into the dorms at night…”

“Oh?” Endymion murmured, staring in open surprise at her box solution but apparently unoffended by it. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to cause any trouble.”

“It’s fine! You didn’t, we were just worried about you. Even with the wards it’s more dangerous outside at night, so it would really be safer if you stayed in the room at least sometimes!”

Especially since, according to the game and also Professor Iphis, this guy had been sleeping in the woods beyond the wards like a bona fide wild man, and was presumably only still alive because the spirit possessing him had been protecting him while he slept.

“Anyway, I promise I won’t be an annoying roommate, I don’t leave any food laying around and I’ve kept all my stuff to my side of the room and, um, well—I, I guess I do sleep beneath a barrier at night, I don’t know if that would annoy you…”

“You do?” Endymion asked, finally sounding interested. 

“Yes! Actually, barriers are one of my specialties—I was even thinking of adding extra wards to our room so nobody can get in or out easily.”

And also because I’m pretty sure you’re afraid Echo might take over your body while you’re sleeping and wander about, and you should be, because that’s actually how you and I were supposed to meet, haha…

Euphy continued in a breathless rush, “Of course, I’ll add you to them, I’m not trying to keep you out. That's why I wanted to talk to you first.”

“I see,” he murmured. “Then… could you show me what it is you’re thinking?”

“Of course! I can show you right now, if you want,” she said, and then abruptly extended her hand. “Uh, by the way, I’m Euphrosyne of Kos. It’s nice to meet you.”

He stared at her hand, his hesitation obvious. When she refused to withdraw it despite the increasingly awkward atmosphere, he eventually extended his own hand, which completely dwarfed hers as he shook it very gently.

“I’m Endymion of Icaria… it is also nice to meet you.”