“Of course I picked the Harem-Master subclass. …Yeah. I know how that sounds.”

The silence that follows that little “oh” is deafening.

But I don’t see the immediate recoil I’ve seen from so many others. No disgust. No judgment. Just thought. Her purple eyes go slightly distant as she works through something, no longer looking at me like a scandal, but like a puzzle with inconveniently attractive pieces standing around it.

“Enora,” I say carefully, “yeah, I know how that sounds.”

She holds up a hand and cuts me off.

“No,” she says. “It actually makes sense.”

That is not the response I expect.

“What?”

Enora frowns slightly, her attention shifting between me, Kit, Raka, and Perri. “You’re a sorcerer. A mana-intensive class. And your…”

“Harem girls,” Kit offers testingly.

Enora winces, but only at the term.

“Bonded companions,” she corrects almost immediately.

Kit’s ears flick once.

Not pleased exactly.

Satisfied.

Enora continues, her voice settling into that careful academic rhythm again. “If your class grants increased mana regeneration based on the number of individuals in your circle, then the math works. A normal caster couldn’t sustain a summon like Edwin for very long. Not without dedicating most of their mana income to it.”

Her eyes narrow thoughtfully as she looks back at Ed.

“But you aren’t a normal caster. You’re effectively pooling passive regeneration through multiple bonded companions. That means maintaining a persistent summon becomes much easier, especially a defensive summon that isn’t constantly expending mana on abilities.”

She pauses.

“It’s actually rather clever.”

I stare at her.

For a moment, I’m not sure which surprises me more.

The fact that she figures it out so quickly.

Or the fact that she sounds impressed.

“Exactly,” I say.

Or stumble, really.

I have never thought to put any of it so academically. To me, it has always been instinct, warmth, mana, closeness, and the strange terrifying miracle of not being alone anymore.

Raka smirks like she enjoys seeing someone else explain my class better than I can.

Perri is the one who breaks first.

“Enora, it’s more than that,” she says, still lingering near her side. Her voice is soft, but there is steel under it. “Vincent is good to us. We’re in this together. As family.”

Enora turns toward her before I can answer.

“I can see that,” she says.

Perri goes quiet.

Enora’s eyes move from her to Kit, then to Raka, then finally to me. The shadow of her hat slips lower again, but her voice stays steady.

“I can see it in the way you look after each other,” she says. “And in the way you’ve looked after me.”

Enora’s hand remains on Ed’s arm, holding him like something solid in a world that has not been kind enough to stay still yet.

“I’ve been grieving,” she says quietly, “but I’m not blind. Whatever this is, Vincent, it is not nothing. And it is not only what people will assume when they hear the name.”

For a moment, no one says anything.

Then Enora’s mouth curves faintly.

“Besides, I am hardly one to question relationships based on…”

“Love,” Ed says.

The word cuts through the clearing with all the certainty in the world.

Enora lets out a small breath that is almost a laugh.

“Yes,” she whispers. “Exactly.”

None of us quite know what to say after Ed’s dramatic ending to the conversation.

The clearing falls awkwardly silent.

Even Ed seems satisfied with himself.

Enora is the first to crack.

Or maybe flinch.

The sudden realization that everyone is staring at her finally catches up.

A faint blush creeps across her cheeks. Her hat dips low, but there is a tiny smile under it.

Then, in what might be the healthiest reaction I can imagine, she clears her throat and straightens her hat.

“So,” she says, “we were going hunting today, right?”

My smile couldn't be wider.

Raka breathes out as if she has been holding it in for hours.

“Yes. Finally.”

We turn and cross the road toward Bushmen Forest a little lighter than before.

And, at least for the moment, plus one black mage.

Bushmen Forest looms ahead of us, a tangled wall of bramble, vines, and briarflies.

But here, on the outskirts, it is old hat.

Raka locks in up front, shoulders rolling once as her hand settles near her shield.

Kit’s smile turns sharp.

“Lorica Noctis.”

Spectral armor slips over her like moonlit smoke as she glides into the shadows to scout ahead.

I hold the center with Stormcast raised, the spear lightly crackling with energy. Perri stays just behind me to the left, close enough that I can feel her steady presence through the bond.

Enora naturally falls in behind and to my right.

Ed shadows her.

Apparently, he likes her more than me.

I try not to take that personally.

A few moments later, Kit’s voice slips through the bond.

“Scouting party up ahead. Three Bushmen. Standards. Oblivious and looking juicy.”

Raka’s grin goes wide and toothy.

“Gods, I missed this.”

I can practically feel her adrenaline as it rushes through the bond. The anticipation. The excitement. The simple joy of having something to hit.

Eldritch energy crackles through me in answer.

I smirk.

“They have no idea.”

Even Perri feels it. Her little feet plant firmly against the forest floor as if she is already preparing to spring.

I breathe out slowly, grounding myself as the familiar rhythm settles into place.

“Nothing fancy,” I call through the bond. “I’ll pull. Raka, hit them hard. By the book.”

For a moment, I forget Enora can't hear any of that.

I glance over my shoulder and lower my voice.

“Enora, I’ll pull them. Just ease in when you’re ready.”

The brim of her hat dips once.

A nod.

We move forward as a unit, excitement and anticipation running high.

I sense Kit slipping through the shadows ahead, patient and predatory, waiting for the perfect moment to strike.

The Bushmen come into view a few moments later, lumbering through the undergrowth exactly as Kit described. Three of them. Tendriled vines dragging through the underbrush. Completely unaware.

Stormcast hums in my hand.

Raka lowers her center of gravity at the front, eager energy practically vibrating through the bond.

Perri's ears stand tall.

Behind us, Enora adjusts her grip on her staff.

The forest goes quiet.

I smile.

Arc Lightning rips through the forest, flashing with eldritch energy, deafening and bright.

The first arc tears through the lead Bushman and splits it apart in a shower of burning sparks.

The second snaps sideways in a blinding line, punching a smoking hole straight through the Bushman beside it and dropping the creature in a smoldering heap.

The bolt lurches onward into the last one, shearing a tendril arm off at the shoulder.

For half a breath, the clearing only rings.

Light Barrier pops up in front of Perri on pure reflex.

Kit’s Echo Step takes her away from the blast instead of forward.

Raka charges in startled, Starburst angled toward me like she is not entirely sure whether the threat is still in front of her.

Savage puts a quick end to the maimed and burning Bushman.

Then silence falls again.

I stare at the bodies.

Then at Stormcast.

Then at the thin curls of smoke rising from the scorched earth.

Kit’s voice cuts through the bond, sharp and almost scolding.

“Master? What the was that?”

I blink.

She appears out of the shadows a heartbeat later, ears pinned back and eyes wide.

“Three standards,” she says. “Three. You upcast on the pull?”

Raka looks back at me, partially covered in sap, some of her fur standing on end.

“Overkill, Master?”

Perri lowers her glowing hands slowly from behind her barrier, ears still tall and alarmed.

Even Enora is staring.

Not at the Bushmen.

At me.

“Um…” I say.

Stormcast crackles softly in my hand.

“I didn’t.”

Raka starts picking a handful of silvers out of the smoking remains like this is all perfectly normal.

Kit walks back toward me with that concerned look.

Not angry.

Concerned.

Which is worse.

Perri looks unsure, ears still standing tall, while Enora watches me with a slight puzzled frown, still outside the loop everyone else is reacting through.

I bring up my HUD.

“What the hell just happened?” I mutter.

The blue-white panels flicker open in front of me as I start digging through the combat log, half expecting to find some critical mechanic I somehow missed.

It doesn’t take long to find the answer.

It isn’t an upcast. It isn’t a mana spike. It isn’t some mysterious critical hit mechanic I somehow overlooked while pretending I understood my own class better than I apparently do. The answer sits there in the combat log, plain as day, waiting for me like the System has been polite enough not to laugh.

My eyes track down the glowing lines once.

Then again.

Right to the modifier.

[Tier 2 Damage Modifier: Applied]

I blink.

“Oh.”

Behind me, Raka is still collecting silvers from what remains of the scouting party like this is all perfectly normal. Kit steps closer, her ears still angled back, trying to read over my shoulder. Perri lingers near my side with her hands half-raised, unsure whether she should heal someone, shield someone, or ask whether I have accidentally become dangerous in a new and exciting way. Enora just watches all of us, confused for an entirely different reason.

I point at the line.

“Found it.”

Kit leans in like she can actually read the glowing haze of my HUD.

I read the line out loud, because apparently saying it aloud is supposed to make it make more sense.

“Tier Two damage modifier…”

Kit gives me a questioning look.

Then it dawns on her.

All at once.

Her ears perk. Her eyes widen. Her whole face lights up like I just handed her the biggest pastry in the bakery.

“Are we all going to be like that?”

Raka catches on surprisingly fast.

Her grin turns dangerous.

“Fuck yeah, we are.”

What follows is nearly a week of haphazard lightning and thunder pealing through Bushmen Forest.

At first, we try to pretend we have a plan.

We do not.

We have enthusiasm, overpowered magic, and Raka shouting every time something large enough to hit comes out of the brush.

My XP bar barely crawls past Level 21, just a stubborn little sliver refusing to be impressed, but the rest of the party starts dinging fast. Standards turn into warmups. Thorncasters become practice. Bushman Elders still demand respect, but the difference is impossible to miss.

Tier Two has teeth.

And apparently, so do we.

The loot is not bad either.

By the end of the week, we are all Level 21.

All Tier Two.

All sitting on evolved subclasses and new power we barely understand.

And somehow, none of that makes the meal in front of us any easier to swallow.

Our last meal in the apartment.

Our last night in the tiny place that somehow became the first home I have ever had in this world.

Kit sits beside me at the kitchen table with her shoulder leaned against mine, pushing around the last morsel on her plate like she can’t quite bring herself to finish it.

Her tail curls around the leg of my chair like she can physically anchor us here if she tries hard enough.

Raka and Perri have already gone to bed, though neither of them is really asleep. I can feel them through the bond, quiet and heavy and pretending not to listen.

Enora, after days of sleeping in an adjacent tent like proximity might bite her, has agreed to spend the night on our couch.

Progress.

Small, strange, couch-shaped progress.

Kit half pouts and half purrs beside me, as if making herself impossibly cute might somehow change the thing we already decided.

“Master,” she says softly, “this is our home.”

Her fingers find mine under the table.

“Couldn’t we just stay?”

The bond hides nothing.

Not from her.

Not from any of them.

“It is, Kit,” I say softly. “And it’s wonderful. Chaotic. Peaceful. Beautiful. Everything we’ve all made it.”

She sighs against my shoulder.

“But…?”

My gaze drifts across the hall toward the bedroom, where I am absolutely certain Raka and Perri are listening.

My thoughts slip backward before I can stop them, all the way to that first night Kit and I met. To our first bed at the Feisty Dwarf. To the first time we lay down together and the Harem Bed answered us with warmth that already felt like ours.

“Home isn’t about where we are,” I say. “The magic was never really about the room or the bed.”

Kit goes very still beside me.

“It’s about who we’re with.”

My fingers tighten gently around hers under the table.

“I’m home with you,” I say. “With all of you.”

The bond answers in quiet little waves from the bedroom. Raka, pretending not to feel too much. Perri, failing completely.

Kit presses closer.

My gaze drifts to the couch, where Enora appears to actually be asleep beneath one of our spare blankets, her hat tipped low over her face and Ed standing in the corner like the world’s thorniest sentry.

“Families grow,” I say quietly. “Ours has.”

I chuckle under my breath.

“Plus one.”

Kit follows my gaze, and the faintest smile touches her mouth.

“She needs a fresh start,” I say. “And I think maybe we do too.”

For a moment, Kit says nothing.

Then her tail loosens from my chair just a little.

“Will this Thronstadt have pastries?” she asks.

I look down at her, trying very hard to sound serious.

“Kit,” I say, “how could any place that cold not have warm pastries?”

And just like that, I kill the moment.

Her ears flatten instantly.

“Cold,” she mutters. “Ugh.”

Through the bond, I feel the judgment hit from two directions at once.

Wrong move, Master.

Raka from the bedroom.

Kit from right beside me.

I wince and try to recover.

“But we’ll have each other to keep us warm.”

Kit looks up at me with squinting amber eyes.

“You are so lucky, Master.”

My eyes meet hers.

I smile softly.

“Beyond words.”

The next morning, we say our goodbyes to the Innkeeper and the Busty Barmaid over breakfast at the Feisty Dwarf.

It is harder than I expect.

Not dramatic. Not messy. Just heavy in the way final things are heavy when everyone is pretending they are not final.

After that, we make the several-hour trek out of town, packs loaded, weapons checked, cloaks pulled tight against the morning chill. By late afternoon, tired and hungry from the road, we find ourselves standing on the warm side of an ancient stone portal half-buried in old earth and older magic.

Runes flicker across its weathered arch as we approach.

The air hums.

My hand tightens around Stormcast.

Be ready for anything.

The warning passes through the bond, quiet and firm.

My eyes move over each of them.

Kit, tense but smiling.

Or at least pretending she is.

Raka, eager and unafraid.

Perri, nervous but steady.

Enora, standing just outside the bond, hat brim low and staff held close.

We have come a long way.

Farther than levels can measure.

But now it is time to take the next step.

…and we do.