Sophia invited Menzor and Nathan to have a bit of a political talk. During that, she officially tasked the prince with the continuation of her portal project and provided them with a bunch of pre-made portal keys for future use. She also told them about her group's plan to leave for the demon continent, which shocked them greatly. However, especially the king, who knew there was no stopping them, gave up on persuading her. Nevertheless, when Sophia offered to set up a relationship between the beastfolk and the demons in the future by using her portals to connect the continents, Menzor finally got overwhelmed for good.

  “I’m surprised Father still has his luscious and colorful mane-like hair.” Nathan and Sophia were walking together through a hallway of the castle as he looked to his side to address the blonde next to him. “If you’re always like that, I would’ve expected him to be fully gray at this point thanks to the headaches you provide.”

  “How rude!” She started pouting. “Menzor actually did have the audacity to blame me for getting gray hair, so I shut him up by reversing it and making it more vibrant than ever by using healing magic on it.”

  “Healing magic can do that?!” His eyes grew wide.

  “If you’re good at it~.” Sophia just smirked at him.

  “You are something else entirely.” He had no other words for her, but there was some admiration in his tone.

  “Hehe.” She liked that. “Anyway, let’s head over to the others for the time being.”

  “Time for a different topic, huh?” Nathan rolled his eyes. “Sure, I guess.”

  “There they are!” The duo went to Anna’s room, where the princess immediately looked at them standing in the doorway. “Where were you? I thought we all wanted to meet up here like an hour ago?” Ari, Nina, and Vivi were also with her.

  “Well, stuff took a little longer than expected.” Sophia scratched the side of her head. “I thought we’d be done in ten minutes, but it ended up being a little longer.”

  “You thought those insane things you talked about would take ten minutes?!” Nathan raised his voice as he stared at her.

  “Yup~.”

  “What did you do…?” Ari had a bad feeling about this, especially after noticing how tired the prince looked.

  “Nathan, Menzor, and I talked about politics.” Sophia gave her a thumbs-up.

  “WHAT?!” Anna and her jaguar raised their voices.

  “We talked about all sorts of things and discussed some fun suggestions~.”

  “Why didn’t you bring Maya and us with you?!” Ari feared what the chaos tiger had done to Menzor without any supervision.

  “Is that why about 15 ministers and advisors rushed to Father’s office about fifteen minutes ago?!”

  “I might've suggested to him the most complex and important thing he ever had to decide on in his life. Maybe even in all of the beastfolk’s history~.” Sophia looked even more smug than before. “I didn’t take any of you because I did not need a voice of reason. Well, Nathan and Menzor would disagree there, but I wanted to discuss things my way as almost everything was related to my magic and way of doing things.”

  “Is Menzor still okay? His head didn’t explode, right?” Ari’s bad feeling got worse.

  “He doesn’t have time for his head to explode.” The prince shook his head again. “The thing Sophia told him about and suggested is too important for that.”

  “What did you tell him?!” The black-haired jaguar was getting impatient.

  “Mostly more about my portals while teaching him and Nathan how to use the enchanted deactivated portals I gave them. Then, there was the reason for me handing it over to the prince. Us going to the demon continent, that is. Based on that, I also asked him whether or not he’d be interested in building a relationship between the beastfolk and the demons with the help of my portals once we get there.”

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  “That explains all the ministers and advisers.” Anna nodded a few times.

  “What did we tell you about not doing things without supervision?” Ari slowly shook her head. “You’ll give the king a heart attack eventually if you keep doing that.”

  “Wait, you weren’t messing with me when you told me last night about all the things Sophia showed and mentioned to you?!” Nina looked at Vivi beside her with big eyes.

  “Absolutely not!” The puma-girl shook her head. “I even downplayed some things.”

  “You told me that you met a dragon?! And the overseer of magic?!” The golden-haired jaguar raised her voice. “How is that downplaying it?!”

  “Did I mention the part where Sophia brought me to a different world?” Vivi smirked at her girlfriend.

  “WHAT?!”

  “S-So you punching a dragon was true… If Vivi met one…” Nathan remembered the earlier conversation and looked at the blonde. “Wait, different world?!”

  “I sure did punch a dragon~.” Sophia smiled at him. “For everything else, I’ll do another show and tell soon-ish, as it concerns you, too.”

  “I have a bad feeling about this!” The prince shuddered after seeing her playful grin.

  "A more than adequate reaction.” Ari was proud of him.

  “For now, let’s go and pick up Luca first, though.” Sophia didn’t want to start explaining just now. “He's with Maya, his sister, right now, and I want to get everyone on the same page."

  ----------------

  The group left the castle together and took the scenic route to Sophia’s mansion instead of simply using a portal because she wanted to chat a little more.

  “So, it sounded like Vivi already prepared you for my more interesting skills?” The blonde looked at Nina as they walked down the street.

  “Vivi and Ari did.” The golden-haired jaguar nodded. “With very varying levels of enthusiasm, too.” She looked at her little sister during the last part.

  “Ahaha…” Sophia scratched her cheek.

  “Vivi was super excited and told me about all sorts of things she witnessed yesterday, while Ari was mostly complaining." She kept looking at the blonde. “I’m actually not even sure anymore if you two like each other or not. Vivi seems to be a fan, though, so I’m rather confused.”

  “You vented a lot, huh?” Sophia glanced at Ari.

  “Sure did~.” She just smiled back at her.

  “Ari and I totally love each other! She just likes to complain.” The blonde then faced the older sister again.

  “Really now?” Nina raised an eyebrow.

  “Really.” Anna was the one who answered her. “If it wasn’t for me, as Ari likes me slightly more than her, those two would definitely be dating.”

  “That’s absolutely not true!” Sophia firmly shook her head. “I still have Maya, after all, and I like her slightly more, too!”

  “Exactly!” Ari agreed with her before lightly glaring at Anna. “I’m no homewrecker, you know?” Even though she said that, the jaguar still put her arm around Sophia’s waist and pulled her slightly closer.

  “That was not the issue you should’ve pointed out here!” The princess got loud. “It wasn’t an invitation to flirt, either!"

  “Hehe.” The two liked her reaction. “You started it, so of course we finish it~.”

  “Grr.”

  “Ahh, you two are besties, got it!” The golden-haired jaguar nodded understandingly once she saw them in action together.

  “Yup!” Sophia gave her another thumbs-up. “Ari just loves to complain.”

  “Yes.” The girl in question agreed with her. “And you love to do things I have to complain about.”

  “That’s definitely true.” The blonde couldn’t defend herself in that regard.

  “You three sure have an interesting dynamic.” Vivi liked their exchange

  “You’ll love the full group then.” The short tiger smiled at her. “We all constantly tease each other.”

  “Looking forward to it~.”

  “By the way, what did you mean by show and tell earlier?” As Nathan had already heard a lot of intense things from her, he was more interested in learning more about that rather than their relationships with each other. “It appears that you already showed Vivi a lot of whatever you did? Are you going to tell Nina, Luca, and me the same?”

  “Luca already mostly knows.” Sophia looked back at him. “He was the first to learn more about my magic while you all were reuniting with your families. Though, I’m not entirely sure how much he retained from what I showed him because I slightly overloaded his brain by not holding back. He’s the brother of my girlfriend, after all. He has to deal with unhinged me~.”

  "Wait, does that mean you held back with me?!" Vivi didn’t like the implications of having missed anything. “What else is there that you didn’t show me?!”

  “You actually were so excited about everything that I ended up showing you more than I intended.” She lightly shook her head. “You saw even more than Luca did. It's just that he just had to witness it, no matter whether he liked it or not."

  “Ah, I see!” The puma-girl started smiling.

  “Anyway,” Sophia then focused on Nathan again. “I mentioned earlier that the portal I want to give you works a little differently from the ones I enchanted the keys with for the cities you might visit in the future. I want to show you all how they work and what it implies for your traveling plans.” She then paused for a moment. “I just don’t want to explain everything seven times, so I’d like to wait with details until everything is together in one place.”

  “Alright, I see.” The prince could follow her reasoning.

  “Get ready to say goodbye to your common sense.” Ari just looked at her sister with a sympathetic expression.

  With that topic put on hold until later, the group continued walking towards Sophia's mansion, where Maya and Luca were currently, while chatting a little more with each other.

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