Reed lowered his glass of brandy in disgust.

“Yes. It is complete. The Astralitar becomes nothing but a puppet to his wife,” Alu’rak confirmed.

Looking away in fury, Reed knocked back the drink.

“I’m sure there are some side effects on her. But essentially, he is her slave.”

Reed set the glass down. He’d finished eating.

“Further, the Di'alletta is a much more powerful core than any other you will find in this world. It is a whole army.” Alu’rak set his empty glass down and made to get up.

Reed followed. Kar’un stayed glued to his side, gripping his hand happily as the king led them to a balcony. He gestured out across the horizon, dimly lit beneath the boiling black clouds. “Those scars are from the fight with Ria’naut.”

His sad tone reminded Reed that these Demon Lords were his children. Of course he would be upset to see them killed.

“What’s the consequence of just leaving the Demon Lords alone?” Reed asked, looking out at the damage. Great gouges had ripped the land into ridges, like a giant cat had clawed it.

“They will eventually poison the land and make it impossible for anything to live here,” Alu’rak admitted. He looked sadly at Kar’un, caressing her cheek as she looked up at him with a smile.

She looked up at Reed, deciding to join the conversation, finally. “I know I have to die,” she said with a clarity he didn’t expect. “I love my father. I love this country. If there was a way for me to live and not destroy everything, I would want that… But if I can’t have that, then I’d like to die on my own terms.” Her expression soured. “And those arrogant southerners are always invading our lands and acting like we started it!”

Reed nodded slowly. “Let me guess, resources ain’t easy to come by up here so y’all gotta steal sometimes?”

Alu’rak looked away guiltily.

“I ain’t judging, man,” Reed assured. “I’ve done some shit I ain’t proud of just to survive, too.” He grunted and added, “I ain’t clean, and I ain’t got the right to judge you for doin what you gotta to take care of your people.” Reed met Alu’rak’s eyes. “But what I can do is offer assistance in finding a better way to deal with this.” He held his hand out.

Alu’rak stared at him, then Reed’s hand in shock.

“Daddy,” Kar’un pleaded softly.

“Are you sure about this?” the vampire king asked, looking from Kar’un to Reed. “This is… not your purpose.”

“My special mission is to punish those brats down south,” Reed said. “I ain’t got anything else to do past that. May as well make you my ally.”

Alu’rak laughed softly. He took Reed’s hand.

**

"Looks like the Trash-Astralitar has decided to make the world a better place without the guidance of our avatars," Loki mused, leaning forward to put his elbows on his knees.

"Why did you choose the former Astralitar?" Freyr asked, giving the trickster god an exhausted look.

"I thought it'd be funnier." Loki grinned. He sat back and crossed his legs, draping his arms over the back of the seat.

Freya flicked a glance at him as his hand came close to her shoulder, then turned her face away. Of course Freyr was angry about Loki choosing Dylan. Freyr was the one who did most of the work in choosing the Astralitars. When Loki had dropped the first Demon Lord into the world, no one was powerful enough to fight it. Thor had overheard the situation, then suggested the idea to repurpose the mechanism they'd used to populate the world to bring in heroes. He’d been on Earth recently and heard of a thing called anime and isekai. He’d insisted that people from Earth would understand, adapt, and overcome if given the tools.

Raking her fingers through the thick grey fur of the cat in her lap, Freya said, "You're allowed to communicate with your tools once. After that, you cannot interfere in the world at all. My barrier will let me know if you've done something, Loki. No avatars of yourself or other ways to directly or indirectly manipulate events in the world."

Freyr gave Loki another disgusted glance. "Bella," he said, addressing Oria. "The Astralitar Reed has been given a new task. He is to balance all the world's elements. Even the ones introduced by Loki. You are to assist him in that task. But he must come to this conclusion on his own."

"I cannot speak of it directly?" Bella asked for clarification.

"No."

"Understood," she said.

"Until this task is done, I will be unable to help you."

"Understood..." she said a little nervously.

Freyr nodded, indicating that he was finished.

Having kept her attention on the world while Freyr spoke, she was certain Loki hadn't slipped anything in. However, now it was his turn.

Loki grinned, cleared his throat, and spoke in Freya's voice. "Dylan. You are my chosen warrior for a special mission. The other Astralitar is a false creation, brought to this world by Loki. You must remove him. You must put the world back as it should be."

He nodded to Freya, indicating he was finished. He had not snuck anything else in with his message. She knew he'd used her voice to annoy her. Refusing to rise to the bait, though, Freya sealed the world from her brother and her adopted brother's meddling with a wave of her hand. She did make sure to search for any small holes or cracks Loki could sneak through to violate the rules. Unfortunately, she already knew his choice of avatar and message would create nothing but havoc.

Little did either of them know... Loki wasn't the only one who could be crafty.

**

Bursting awake from a restless sleep, Dylan sat up in the cold excuse of a tent he'd created from his core.

Confused, he looked around before remembering where he was and how he'd gotten there. Bella was not there, which sent him into a panic at first until he crawled out to find her facing the rising sun, arms folded as if she'd received bad news in the night.

Disquieted, Dylan ran his hand through his crusty hair. "Something wrong?"

Blinking back to herself, Bella turned to look at him. "No. It's fine. You don't look alright, though."

"No." He looked back at his tent. It barely qualified as a tent. It was essentially a tarp strung between two poles. He'd never been camping on Earth. He didn’t know what real tents looked like. Further adding to his misery, he'd not eaten in.... who knew how long, and after rowing a tiny boat for hours the day before, he was starving. Again, with no experience in the wilderness, Dylan was lost and knew he wasn't going to survive. "Bella. It was stupid of me to run."

"No, it wasn't," Bella assured, turning her full attention to him. Hovering in his face, she squished his cheeks. "You trust me?"

"Yeah... but..."

"No buts." Bella shook her head, floating back. "We're going to get Reed. He'll take care of you."

Dylan clenched his fists, suddenly remembering the dream from the night before. "Bella... That other Astralitar. Are you sure Freya and Freyr made him?"

"Yes." Bella's gaze searched his face briefly, then sighed softly. "Yes. I helped design his form. He's not like the other Astralitars we've chosen, certainly, but he's ours." She squeezed his face again, trying to be reassuring, but Dylan could tell that she was hiding something.

Lifting his hand, he gently pushed her back. "What are you keeping from me?"

"You know there are things I can't talk about," she said, meeting his gaze without hesitation. "Please trust me when I say that Reed is definitely not what we would normally choose, but he's a good person and just trying his best. Once you meet him, you'll understand. He can tell you things I can't."

"Why would he know things you can't say?"

Bella laughed. "Because I never got around to asking much about his past. I thought we had more time. You'll like him. He can show you how to do this camping thing right." She floated back and pointed north.

Dylan sighed. "I'm not going to make it walking there the whole way."

His statement was interrupted by the cry of a bird.

Looking up, Dylan squinted against the rising sun, then offered his arm out. A small, familiar falcon swooped down, landing on his arm. "Storm!" he said in excitement.

Snow's familiar preened itself. While it couldn't talk, she could hear him through it.

Before he could open his mouth to speak, the bird launched off his arm and circled the small camp before swooping north, gliding down the path that followed the river.

Dylan sighed. It seemed Snow wanted him to go north, too. Rubbing his greasy face with both hands, he called his core back and started walking. He wasn't wearing shoes suited to this kind of thing. His hands were already blistered from the oars yesterday.

Storm landed on a branch ahead and waited for him to catch up before gliding to the next tree in the forest growing alongside the Yangeep River. Bella kept by his side, floating near his shoulder. She had nothing to say, though, apparently lost in thought. It left Dylan too much time to think about his mixed emotions about the situation.

His strange dream was filtering into focus the longer he was awake.

A voice like gold had told him the other Astralitar was a fake. But Bella insisted he wasn't. But how could there be two? It just didn't make sense. Something had gone horribly wrong, and Dylan did believe that Loki had something to do with it. "Bella," he said after ten minutes had passed with no sign of stopping.

"Yeah?"

"This... other Astralitar. What is his plan? You said he wasn't meant to help this world. Why are you saying he's a good person?"

Bella sighed, hanging her head. "It's a mess," she said, rubbing her face before flying a little ahead to face him as she spoke. "After you died, the princesses waited three weeks and then used trash to summon a new Astralitar. The gods were so offended by that... We picked someone at random. Someone we thought wouldn't be helpful to them at all. But maybe he's exactly what we needed."

Looking down at the ground, Dylan frowned.

"Oh, Dylan, that doesn't mean you weren't. We spent months before we picked you. Reed... was living under a bridge, and I hit him with a truck."

Sputtering in shock, Dylan stumbled to a stop. "You what?"

Storm had circled back closer, perched on a nearby branch, its head cocked to watch and listen.

"Reed was an angry old man I hit with a truck," Bella repeated. "We picked him because he looked like someone who would not adapt well to the situation and would make things difficult."

"You hit him? With... Truck-kun?" Dylan gripped his belly as he collapsed into laughter.

"You know... Reed laughed too," Bella said playfully, pretending not to know what she’d done.

Wiping his eyes, Dylan straightened and took a deep breath before looking around. "Okay... But what has he been doing?"

"They wanted him to pick a Di'alletta. He refused... got attacked by the Demon Lord, and managed to bespell her."

"Bespell?" Dylan asked, still wiping tears from his eyes.

"Yes..." Bella looked away sheepishly. "His Affinity Mark casts Charm on people." She sighed. "The Demon Lord is, more than likely, in love with him." She poked her fingers together. "As are the princesses."

Dylan's heart fell. He bit his lips together. "Even... Snow?" He looked up at Storm.

The bird didn't move. Just silently watched.

"Yes," Bella admitted, then lifted her hands. "He had no idea. It wasn't even an hour after getting summoned when it happened. You know how erratic your powers were in the first few weeks. And the Sacrifices they used to summon him were absolute trash. I'm sure there's a way to break the spell, and he ran away from them."

Dylan forced his hands to relax. "Did he do that to Meg's face?"

This time, Storm chittered, as if agreeing.

"Yeah," Bella admitted since Storm had confirmed already. "But she started it. And you know how Giants are about fighting. She could have been healed as if nothing happened, but chose not to."

Dylan's shoulders fell. Meg'ante had never respected him either, probably for that reason. He couldn't go toe to toe with her like that. Snow had been the only one to really answer his questions aside from Bella... but he knew they wanted him to choose a wife. He'd put it off because he wasn't stupid. He could tell they were all much older than him, and this... felt wrong.

His whole life in Oria had been hollow; nothing but a show. He was supposed to be the hero who saved them all, but he'd never left the palace. They’d told him he was special, but no one listened when he suggested improvements.

Now, there was another Astralitar, and they'd only waited three weeks after his death to summon him?

Whether the man was an impostor sent by Loki or not, that stung.

Worse... he felt angry. This guy had just shown up and stolen the hearts of all four of the princesses and the Demon Lord! He’d seen more of the world in the last few days than Dylan had his entire two years. He was making way more progress defeating the Demon Lord by sheer accident than Dylan knew he ever could on purpose.

The jealousy made his stomach churn.

The princesses were his.

While he hadn't been sure of who he would choose, they'd been courting him for two years. That had to mean something. Right? He wasn’t just a tool to be so easily replaced. Reed had cheated. Reed needed to be forced to break his spell. The princesses would come to their senses once that happened.

He started walking again, heading north.

Ahead, Dylan saw a curl of smoke rising up from among the trees. "What's that?" he pointed.

Bella looked. "Uh... let me go check. Keep walking, don't leave the path. I can't keep track of you like I used to. Storm. Stay with him." She zipped away, leaving Dylan to walk by himself.

Alone, he folded his arms and scowled at the ground. His jealousy of Reed chewed at his heart. Whether he was Loki or a mistake, Reed had taken the free will of those ladies and needed to pay for it.