Sunday afternoons were supposed to be fun. That's when you get together with friends, your significant other (or others, plural), or just relax and laze around in preparation for next week. I sadly wasn't allowed this particular luxury, because we had a timetable to keep.

But let's not get ahead of myself and look at the situation from the comfort of a backup comfy chair I installed in the backup base, where I trained, conspired, and rehearsed with future-me. It was a little over three in the afternoon right now, timed so that everyone would have ample time to digest their lunches and nobody would have stomach problems, and things were going… rather haphazardly, to be honest.

"Come back here, you coward!" my usually adorably awkward Knightly sister yelled as she charged, her zweihander raised high over her head.

"Don't rush in! We need to stay together!" Josh, in full-in Celestial mode, tried to stop her, but it was too late, and he muttered a defeated, "There she goes again…" before flashing his Celestial wings and flying after her.

"Like, don't worry! We're, like, totally enough to protect Amelia!" a certain rejuvenated arch-mage, currently dressed in some weird neon-green and pink Japanese gyaru ensemble, exclaimed a tad cockily. She cracked her knuckles, and three pairs of large, semi-transparent blue arms mirrored her actions. But then…

"Come back here! Don't go after her!" Angie yelled out, half-panicked and half-irate, and she turned into a golden streak as she rushed after the other two, causing Sahi to freeze for a moment, then continue to crack her knuckles all the same.

"I mean, like, I'm totally enough, right?"

That question was aimed at the class rep, who was currently hiding behind her golem and trying to stay out of sight in the purple-tinted street. This all started about half an hour ago when the Axis of Evil nefariously trapped their little group in a Purple Zone that covered the entire city block.

"Look out!" Ammy exclaimed, and Petra automatically moved in to shield her from a descending Abyssal. It was a woman of indeterminate age, wearing a colour-mirrored version of my Bel costume, mask included, and as soon as she landed, she immediately began to ham it up.

"Foolish… fools! The wrath is upon you! Lord Bel's wrath! That's what I said!"

…

Okay, so while future-me clearly found some willing accomplices, they weren't exactly the best actors in the world. But hey, at least they were enthusiastic. That counted for something.

"Like, who are you calling a fool, you… you grody Joanie!"

"… Excuse me? What does that even…?"

Before she could finish her question, Sahi was already upon her, leaving the class rep to fend for herself. So much for being a bodyguard, eh?

So, the Abyssal in a suit and the flashily dressed schoolgirl began to duke it out in the middle of the already pock-marked street. It was lucky that this Purple Zone was the type that didn't try to represent the locations of the people outside with those hazy mannequins, or otherwise the sight would've been a bit gnarlier. After all, the group's 'strategy meeting' took place in one of Angie's favourite sweets shops on one of the promenades of Timaeus's historical city center, on a Sunday, so there were quite a few passers-by on the street.

The official reason why they met up was so that they could discuss strategies against Bel and his minions, but I had a solid hunch that Angie was just stressed out by the recent events and wanted to treat herself (or rather, have her boyfriend treat her) to a cake slice or five. I wasn't judging her; in retrospect, I could use some sweets too to lift my mood. Especially after watching her sample half the menu, but I digress.

Anyhow, the meeting also involved Josh and Penny, since they've been training together to face Bel (they also came up with a name for themselves, but I wasn't going to call them the Joshtice Squad, ever), while Ammy was invited out of goodwill. She couldn't socialize outside of the approved areas (read: the base, the Dracis Mansion, and the School complex) because of her floating orbs, but since that got resolved, they invited her to have fun. Also to question her about the whole Conduit business and what I'd done to piss off the Assembly. I mean, I wasn't trying to keep it a secret from them, but I wasn't exactly forthcoming with the information either.

"Pincer manoeuvre!" Penny yelled at the forefront, drawing my attention back to her.

When I glanced her way, I found her literally running up a wall in pursuit of another of future-me's groupies.  The man slightly ahead was dressed the same way as the rest of the Axis of Evil, and he was scaling the side of an old building face covered in stuccos like a certain arachno-person, yet my sister was keeping up the pursuit.

That was pretty neat, but Josh was considerably less impressed by the acrobatics on display and yelled back, "From which side!?" He got no answer, so he grit his teeth, his three pairs of Celestial wings flared up again, and he suddenly accelerated with sword and shield at the ready… only to immediately crash into a translucent wall of energy. "Gah! What the hell?"

"Target acquired!" another Axis of Evil member, this one a tall and wiry man with a surprisingly deep voice, exclaimed from the top of another building. He was standing with his feet apart and continued to make sweeping yet oddly delicate motions with his arms, as if trying to weave an invisible basket or something.

"Josh!" a different voice exclaimed once Angie caught up to him, only to reel back when she also hit an invisible wall. They couldn’t see it, but Josh was quite literally boxed into a steadily shrinking cube of magical force fields.

"Don't worry about me, I'll deal with this!" the guy told her even as he put his hands against the walls surrounding him. "Go, help Penny instead!"

The Celestial girl hesitated for a second, glancing between her trapped boyfriend and the girl waving a great sword while scaling a building, but then she flinched when a bunch of bright red magical projectiles started streaming towards her. Back on the rooftop, where the tall man was still weaving the spell that enclosed Josh, two more masked minions appeared. They made a series of quick finger gestures, pointed their hands at the sky, and let loose another volley of magic missiles towards the childhood friend couple.

The way they held their arms, and especially with how their hands were bent into straight-up finger guns, it kind of looked like they were wrangling a pair of imaginary Tommy-guns going full auto, but they were spraying crimson bolts of magic instead of lead. It was kind of comical in a way, and it made me wonder if this was a side grade of the Celestials' magical guns, some distant predecessor, or some wild offshoot of The Man's worldbuilding. Either way, Angie's eyes flashed gold as she abruptly shifted to Deus, and she immediately erected a flat dome-shaped barrier made of small, interlocking pentagons.

It was obviously hastily made and a bit flimsy, which I could tell not just because the magic missiles quickly cracked the individual panels, but because it was made of pentagons. Everyone knew that the hexagons were the bestagons, so it was clear this barrier wasn't the best either. It still held long enough for Angie to make up her mind, and after switching back, she told Josh, "I'll bring her back, and she's getting an earful after this!"

Her golden wings flared up and she flew after the wayward (and easily provoked) Knight, leaving Josh locked up in the magic cube. For a silver lining, at least it was protecting him from all the magical projectiles too, so he wasn't in any immediate danger.

Meanwhile, Sahi was still going toe-to-toe with the female Axis of Evil member, her floaty magical hands relentlessly pressuring the Abyssal with an endless rain of punches. To her credit, the masked woman continued to deftly avoid them, as if dancing, and based on how much magical light she was giving off, I imagined she was using some kind of special magic or skill to do so. Since future-me had been 'stealing' prisoners from Crowy's dungeons, I wouldn't have been surprised if she was a pretty high-ranking Abyssal noble, and thus pretty powerful.

"You foolish fool! You! Cannot defeat! … Me!"

She was still a terrible actor though.

Not that Sahi minded, as she was kind of lost in her own little world. On one hand, I couldn't blame her, since she barely had any opportunity to flex her arch-mage specs, so I understood why she was enjoying being able to go all-out against a strong opponent… But on the other hand, she joined the 'tactical meeting' at the confectionery as Ammy's bodyguard. She had volunteered herself to the role during our vacation to the Elysium, and she never quit it, so she'd been hanging out with Ammy a lot as of late. If you asked me, I'd bet she was just bored. Since the Homunculus project was effectively finished, the class rep (and her conduit-ness) was much more interesting.

Which, of course, made the fact that she was completely ignoring her in favour of duelling this Axis of Evil woman all the more egregious. Though to be fair, the class rep wasn't in any real danger. Not just because nobody here would try to hurt her, but also because being the Conduit of the Grimoire supercharged her magical capabilities, so if she wanted, she could not only throw fireballs now, she could do it all day long. The only problem was that… well…

"Fascinating… I never thought such things could be…" she whispered in a daze while shyly peeking at the battlefield of the promenade.

While I was already completely used to it, being able to see magic in its raw form was endlessly fascinating to our class rep, and so she would often just kind of forget to even defend herself while being immersed in observations. While future-me never said it outright, I was half-convinced that their attacks were meant to acclimate her, so that she wouldn't get distracted at a critical junction in the future.

Yes, I said attacks, because this was just the beginning. While we weren't going to make this a daily thing, we were planning to keep orchestrating these 'random combat encounters' for the foreseeable future. This was going to be the template, more or less; pull some or all of the usual suspects into a Purple Zone, heckle them a bit, have a short skirmish, then wrap things up before anyone else from the outside could interfere.

Now, one might ask the question 'How is that any different from what Fred was doing during his sentai-style attacks?', and while I naturally had a very conclusive, nuanced, and entirely satisfying response to that, this wasn't the right time to discuss that, so let's focus on the action!

By the looks of it, Penny and Angie still couldn't manage to catch Mr Legally Distinct Arachno-Person, and Sahi was no closer to touching the slippery masked woman, so I focused on Josh again, just in time to catch him turn off his Celestial transformation (or rather, turn on his Magiformer, on the school uniform setting), much to his captors' surprise. Of course, that only really affected his outfit, so the wings and the halo and the weapons all stayed. At least until he put away the latter and grabbed the pouch attached to his belt.

After fumbling for a moment, he took out several blood capsules and threw them into his mouth. His wings quivered and his Magiformer outfit strained to keep his transformation in check, though not for long, as he immediately turned it off. He did the whole thing with such good timing that I had to wonder if he was secretly practising this on his own. In any case, his Celestial form began to shift as a pair of white horns grew from his forehead, his toga-robe-thing clung closer to his body and turned into silver scales, and his wispy Celestial wings melded together to form a single pair of draconic-looking wings before completely dissipating. His draconic form wasn't up to that stage yet, it seemed.

Curiously enough, the halo remained, and I couldn't help but notice that there were some strange, dark red flashes of light while he transformed, but they only lasted until the switch was over and he was in his full white Draconian form. Then, he opened his mouth wide.

"Shit! Take cover!" the lanky man with the deep voice bellowed, just in time for Josh's dragon breath to engulf the front panel of the cubic prison.

It wasn't full-fledged true Dragonfire, only the garden-variety kind, but even that had some anti-magic properties, and the barrier only lasted for a second before it cracked and the beam-breath cascaded over the building. It was to be expected though. This barrier wasn't made of hexagons, or even pentagons, but just a single tetragon. The only reason why it was as sturdy as it was had to be because it was the side of a cube, and cubes get browny points for being a platonic solid. Or something.

…

Fine, I admit, I had no bloody idea about the logic behind magic forcefields and barriers, but my explanation was as good as any.

Anyhow, while Josh was busy demolishing the build in front of him, the two girls finally caught up with the wall-climber.

"You have nowhere to run!" Angie (or maybe Deus; I couldn't see her eyes) declared as she cast her favourite magical sword-summoning spell and had them rain down around the masked man, limiting his movements enough for Penny to catch up to him.

"Nice job!" my Knightly sister exclaimed with glee, her large sword already swinging.

She was just a bit too late though, as the man wordlessly jumped off the building, spreading his arms wide like a springboard dive-jumper at the Olympics, and then after doing a couple of spins, he landed in the middle of the road in a crouching pose that was… Wow. This guy was definitely infringing on the Friendly Neighbourhood Arachno-Man, wasn't he?

"Stop right there!"

And then my sister decided she absolutely had to one-up him by also jumping off the building and doing extra-nonsense spinning, with a three-point superhero landing at the end. … Was this a good time to point out that, despite all of her weirdness and over-the-top fighting style, she was still probably the most dangerous Knight thanks to her speed and reflexes? Sometimes I had to remind myself of that.

"Angie, keep throwing spears to stop him from running away!" she instructed the other girl floating above, much to her chagrin.

"They're swords, not spears!"

That was probably Deus speaking. They've been switching so much lately that it was giving me vertigo. More importantly, Penny awkwardly hefted her blade and yelled, "Y-Yeah, I know! I was just… you know? More used to Snowy supporting me from above…"

As a matter of fact, my other sister was supposed to also attend the 'tactical meeting' today, but she cancelled the last second, because she had a meeting with Percival. I was tempted to Far Glance at them, just out of curiosity. Not because I was in any way worried that she was spending too much time learning from the old snake or anything. Just curiosity. I couldn't quite take my eyes off this situation though, especially since if everything worked out as planned, I would soon have to make an appearance.

Penny rushed forward in the meantime, the fight between Sahi and the masked henchwoman was still at a standstill, while Josh…

"Stop that! Come down here, and fight like a man!" he yelled at the people on top of a different building alternating between 'reloading' their spells and peppering him with a hailstorm of magical projectiles. He had his arms crossed over his head, and his scales deflected the incoming attacks without leaving a mark, but he was essentially pinned in place and continued to growl.

"Why don't you come up here, and fight like an Abyssal?" the lanky man quipped back while making what looked like finger seals and started firing with wild abandon as well.

"Maybe I will!" he snapped back, his voice trembling with anger. Around him, the air was flashing with dark red sparks again, which I normally would've chalked up to him returning to his permanent Celestial form, yet it was too early for that. The air grew heavy and the rubble kicked up by the magical projectiles remained floating in the air around him as more and more sparks flashed.

Then, just as things were getting heated…

"Listen up, children! Playtime's over for the day!"

An upbeat voice resounded in the Purple Zone, slightly warped by amplification, and it stopped everyone in their tracks. All eyes were glued to the sky in the middle of the promenade, where a masked figure slowly descended from the…

…

Wait. How the heck was he doing that? Future-me was literally floating down while pretending to by lounging on a divan, or something. It was done with some magical doohickery; I could tell that much from the lightshow, but… how?

"Bel of the Abyss!" Penny yelled from the top of her lungs, distracting both me and the rest of the people present from the peculiar sight unfolding before their eyes. "What kind of vile machinations are you up to this time?"

"Veeery vile machinations, I assure you, my Dame Unicorn," future-me responded as you would expect and shifted his posture just before he landed. "You should know that I have plans within plans within plans within cookies! The nefarious kind! Haha!"

"I will stop you and your cookies! I mean, plans! I'll stop you dead!" my sister tried to menace him with her sword, but considering that they were standing a good thirty meters apart, it looked more comical than anything. Also, she was lucky that the Amazing Arachno-guy was sticking to the script and quietly left the stage, because she completely forgot that she was in the middle of fighting him.

"Since when has the great Emperor of all Abyssals become a petty thief?" a different booming voice asked, and it was coming from Deus. He immediately turned up the lightshow as soon as Bel arrived, bathing the purple promenade in a warm golden light. "Return the girl's stolen bow at once!"

"Oh, Deus, old friend! I wish I could, but it's quite impossible."

While their back-and-forth unfolded and everyone's attention was on Bel, the Abyssal henchmen proceeded to silently retreat and regroup without them being the wiser. It was convenient for our play, but once we were done here, I would have to sit the whole gang down and drill them on the importance of situational awareness in these situations. But back to the drama.

"Why did you do this?" came the next question from Josh, still in his Draconian form and practically seething with indignation over his previous exchange. "What could you possibly achieve by attacking us like this?"

"My, my! The boy got a fiery temper, doesn't he?" future-me chuckled as he leisurely turned towards him with the same kind of energy as a panther facing an angry raccoon. "What I'm trying to achieve is not something someone with such a… limited perspective could understand. To put it into terms you lot could understand, think of me as a great weaver, working hard to ensure that the tapestry of fate would reach completion in an aesthetically pleasing manner."

Ah, that was my cue. I quickly jumped to my feet and picked up Cal from the nearby table, startling the absent-minded Pudding-kun lazing about on a nearby crate.

"[Is it time, young Knight?]"

"Yep."

"[Have I told you that I do not find such theatrical deceptions befitting your status?]"

"Only a hundred and seventeen times," I joked and Far Glanced back at future-me, who was holding his arms up high, as if praising the sun.

"Yes, the tapestry of fate! Such a grand design, and one where every single one of you is a finely spun thread that must be guided into its destined place." He let the dramatic beat linger, during which I firmed my grip on my sword, and as soon as he added, "All of you," I immediately Phased in.

"Bel!" I yelled before striking, just as we rehearsed, and my brightly glowing blade met with his red-clad fist, resulting in a deafening clang. The collision caused a shockwave and we used it to move us apart, which both gave the clash more impact and also gave us some space.

"Aw, come on, Polemos!" future-me whined while shaking his 'injured' hand. "You were supposed to yell 'It's nothing personal, kid,'! Didn't we discuss this the other day?" I raised my sword in response and future-me defiantly crossed his arms in return. "You ruined it. This day is ruined. I'm going home now."

"Oh, no you—!" I yelled after him, miming exasperation as he suddenly disappeared. "Argh! Bloody sunova—!" I bit back the end of my curse and looked for Josh. Once our eyes met, I pointed at him with my free hand and bellowed, "I'm going after him! Gather up, and stay on guard!"

Before anyone could respond I also Phased away and reappeared in the exact same spot in the second (technically third, but who's counting) secret base. Future-me wasn't here yet, though I had a hunch why, one which he confirmed as soon as he Phased in about five minutes later.

"Sorry for being late," he spoke nonchalantly as he took off his mask. "I had to pick up the other actors."

"I figured." He didn't say anything else, so after some hesitation, I also added, "Honestly, I'm still feeling a tiny bit bad for the guys. I mean, I know the big picture, and that it's technically kinda-sorta training for them, but it still feels a bit… I don't know how to put it."

"Don't worry about the guilty conscience; it'll pass," future-me stated without much emotion as he rummaged through the nearby crates. "It's not the first time we've deceived them like this, anyway."

"Yes, but that scale just feels different and… what exactly are you doing?"

"Looking for snacks," he told me without any pretence and showed me a large bag of cheese-flavoured potato chips. "The Axis of Evil did a commendable job, so we're going to celebrate."

"Isn't it a bit early for that?"

"Nah. Abyssals just love to throw parties at the drop of a hat. They're almost as obsessed with them as the Celestials are with their grand processions and parades."

"Really? I learn something new every day…" I muttered, and realizing that this was a nice segue, I hurriedly asked, "Speaking of learning, just how the heck did you do that floating thing back there?"

Future-me paused for a second, then turned to me with a soft smile.

"I would love to tell you, but unfortunately…" He put his Bel mask on and gave me a wink. "It's a trade secret."

"Wait, wha—?"

And then he disappeared. Along with the whole crate.

…

Sometimes, I kind of hated myself.