The Gamer Chapter 1306 – Fusion Festival 13 – Withdrawing from the Gathering (Patreon)

“You did what?!” Maximillian hissed at John, after having been told what had conspired in the backroom.

John was in too good a mood to entirely be taken aback by his friend’s hostile tone. “I think that’s a rhetorical question, so what exactly is your issue?”

“Why would you blatantly disrespect Romulus like that? After all he did for you today?”

Furrowing his eyebrows, John stared at Maximillian. “He disrespected me first, in my own home no less.”

“One does not apply normal rules to the Apex.”

“You perhaps won’t, but I’m no subject of his,” John responded, harsher than he immediately meant to.

Maximillian opened his mouth, John was categorizing his responses, both suddenly glanced to the side when Lydia stepped into their field of view. “I recommend you postpone or at least relocate your spat,” she told the two of them, wine glasses in hand. She offered one to John, who declined. The offer was then switched to the gravity king.

A moment of silence ensued. Maximillian took and sipped from the glass. Darkly, he gazed into the red wine. “I’ve never loathed your pride as much as now. You talk to a man that has forged the Abyss as you know it and you trample on his good will.”

‘Seems to me he was the one who survived those that innovated for him,’ John bit back that thought. “I do not bow to Romulus.”

“Of course, you don’t, you don’t bow to anything. No traditions, no wiser men, nothing,” Maximillian’s voice was hollow. Without another word, he stepped away. Following him as he walked through the room, John saw him seek out his fiancée. The two then withdrew from the ball altogether.

“Will it be fine to let him leave like that?” Lydia asked.

“I don’t know,” the Gamer mumbled. Annoyance, irked pride, and concern for his closest friendship all mixed inside him. He could understand why Maximillian was annoyed at this, but how was he the bad guy here? All Romulus had needed to do was to send a more diplomatic message. What kind of ruler would he be if he hadn’t put his foot down? “I trust we can talk this out another time… or at least live with the difference.”

Lydia put her arm around him and gave him a nice, deep hug. A wine-flavoured kiss later, they stepped away from the corner of the ballroom. It had been wise of Lydia to intervene, the only way to be more public in their disagreement would have been to have the discussion in the middle of the room.

Luckily, there was a massive distraction at the moment.

“So, if I win, you will tell me everything I want to know?” Suel asked.

“Whatever you wish, all you wish,” the Horned Rat promised.

The two pains in John’s side were sitting across one another, a chess board between them. Suel took one of his knights and advanced. His position was quite good.

“Truly everything?”

“Here’s a freebie: you are annoyingly smug.” Richard took a pawn and advanced it. It appeared to be an immediately useless, even detrimental turn. Suel swiftly took the pawn with one of his own, the Horned Rat retaliated with a bishop, which was then taken out by a tower. Then, the Horned Rat suddenly dragged his second bishop into a square no longer threatened by that tower. “Check,” he said.

Suel stared at the board. His eyes dashed around, calculating numerous turns. He reached for his king, who only had two directions to go, and both would have ended up with him losing his queen. “I surrender,” he then said, dismissively toppling over his king. “Best of seven?”

“No, I think that will be quite enough.” The Horned Rat stood up from the chair giggling and shaking his head. “Nobles are as impudent as ever.”

“Do not gaze at me as you state this, he is not one of mine,” Lydia told the passing god.

“Of course, he is not.” Cackling, the Horned Rat walked over to Socrates. The representative of Prometheus stopped in his conversation with Luna and met the patron god of the Illuminati halfway.

It seemed to be a fact of any layer of reality that European alliance networks were complicated. An inevitability, really, when so many different nations, ethnicities, and cultures were cramped together in such a relatively small space.

The Sons of Rome were the hegemon of Europe – except their powers had declined noticeably and even with current reforms, the Illuminati, Prometheus and Rex Germaniae were growing faster. In large part because those three powers had already reformed and were thus enjoying the fruits of a more effective government and easily understood legal codes.

Despite that, the Sons of Rome were still the nexus of power in the region and, de-facto, the world. They were not directly allied with any other forces, instead retaining their relevance through vassalages, Romulus’ sheer power, and the long-standing influence they had with the gods of the world.

That being said, the Sons of Rome did have a good relationship with Prometheus. The Greek-centered guild, in turn, had a good relationship with the Illuminati as well. A similar ethos of knowledge-seeking underpinned their cultures, making them naturally adjacent. This was further complicated by the Illuminati having splendid diplomatic ties to several of the members of Rex Germaniae, although not Rex Germaniae itself. Speaking of Rex Germaniae, the semi-autonomous vassal, in and of itself a great power, had several deals with the Odin’s Sons. Those stayed generally isolated, being themselves bogged down by millennia of pantheon-led laws and traditions accumulating into an unreadable mess. Problem with them was that they had a parallel society of those that strictly obeyed the pantheon and those that paid lip service to it, and those two factions somehow lived right next to each other, in harmony.

Then there was the Great Sultanate. Anatolia was a difficult region no matter who possessed it. Being at the crossroads of three continents gave great opportunities and great dangers. In the case of the Turkey-centred guild, it appeared that they had mixed enough with all surrounding influences to become an island of themselves. That being said, they were still a large power at the border of Europe, with territory designs on both Prometheus and the Sons of Rome.

To detail the chaos that came with the various new polities and vassals created with the breakup of the Blood of the Proletariat would have taken much too long. As would the interconnection of various noble houses, as all but the youngest of them all were once part of Romulus’ Empire, when it spanned practically the entirety of Europe and the Mediterranean.

In summary, European diplomacy was a mess, where insulting a minor noble could somehow lead to the High Lady of the Illuminati, the leader of the aristocratic faction of the triumvirate, holding a grudge. It was a headache.

Such a headache that John actually developed one. ‘Well, probably has more to do with that fight just now,’ he thought. In either case, he felt the tiredness and sensitivity to sound creep back in. “Honoured guests,” John raised his voice, while the attention still lingered in the area. “I’ll have to retreat for the day, and tomorrow various pre-determined activities will take my attention. You are welcome to stay for the rest of the Fusion anniversary, and beyond should you require it. My lovely maids will see to it you have everything you need.” He gestured towards Aclysia, Beatrice, and Claire, who had rowed up behind him and now bowed in perfect unison. “With that, I wish you a good night.”

A general wave of farewells hit him, while he waved and turned around. His eyes found Romulus’ for a moment. The Apex gave him a slow and respectful nod. Ironically, he seemed to take the incident earlier better than Maximillian. John was certain the entire thing had just been a test to get a better read on his character and Lydia’s reaction. Neither he nor Lydia had done anything they wouldn’t have plainly admitted to, so that was no issue.

If Romulus learned from this that he would not be a foreigner that could be toyed with, then that was all John needed.

‘Really, he should have known better,’ John thought and headed upstairs. The moment he made it up the spiralling staircase at the heart of the floor, the sounds drastically decreased. Magic bound in the walls distorted space and noise. When he began to walk down the labyrinthine paths of his home, it completely vanished, leaving him with Lydia and blessed silence.

Even in his happy space, he let out a grunt. “Just write him a message,” Lydia told him.

“What would that do?” the Gamer responded. “I doubt this is a discussion that can be resolved in a few words and certainly shouldn’t be had in text.”

“Do not be blind, deaf, or dumb, my love, it doesn’t suit you. My suggestion is you let him know that you do not treat this as a cause to break your friendship. This rift cannot be mended anyway.” Lydia cuddled up to John. “Maximillian’s loyalty to Romulus is absolute. To him, the Apex is the bedrock of our civilization. Much would have gone different had he acknowledged that Romulus is a man. A man above gods, in power, but a man nonetheless.”

“That was the primary divide of your relationship, wasn’t it?”

“I do not like to talk of that time.” Lydia put a hand on his cheek and turned his face towards hers. “Many things doomed our young and naïve affair. Yet, it is likely that it could have persisted until after the election, which could have meant that we would not have met. At least not as early as we did.” Her thumb caressed his cheekbone. “There is only us, now, my love. He is your friend more than he ever was my partner. Retain him.”

John sighed, because he knew she was right. Pulling out his smartphone, he halfway hoped that Maximillian had already sent him a message, to spare him the awkwardness of being the first. No such service had been provided. ‘He’s done a lot for you, you can do that much,’ he encouraged himself and wrote a horribly inadequate message.

John: Hey. I can’t say that I’m sorry, but I care more about our friendship than this disagreement. Just wanted to say that.

“Never tell Jane that I wrote that,” John begged.

“That will entirely depend on our date tomorrow,” Lydia teased him, just as the phone vibrated in his hand.

Max: You’re an asshole… but same.

John did breathe a little lighter. Before pride and annoyance could ruin that by re-starting the argument, he put the phone away and concentrated entirely on Lydia. Arm in arm, with an occasional kiss, and stated plans for tomorrow, they walked through the corridors.

The Palace was expansive. Each floor was 1600 square metres and that was before the Building did its spatial adjustment. That was about a fifth of a football field per floor, of which only two were currently in use. The consequence of this was the corridors cutting through the second layer of the Palace were, for the uninitiated, difficult to navigate. Only differently designed doors and the occasional art piece around really gave any indication of where one was.

John could navigate it by heart. Haremettes, for the most part, could too. In case of confusion, there was always a map they could access. Streamlining the entire layout was an option. Paranoia advised to keep it the current way.

They entered the apartment, finding about a third of the harem inside. Rave was currently latched onto one of Nia’s tits, while fingerbanging the pariah. The blankness of the pariah’s expression was intensely compromised by lust. As John closed the door, pussy juice squirted from her cunt, broken up by the constantly moving hand of the harem’s leader.

“Good girl,” Rave purred. A few more rubs across the pretty pink lips later, she turned to John. Rather than address him immediately, she sucked the love juices off her fingers.

In a chair not too far from them sat Scarlett, staring at her smartphone and probably browsing through several dozen reports. Metra was continuing her attempt to get a no-hit run of Dark Souls, much to the amusement of Salamander, who continuously mocked her when she almost failed. Their back and forth was the main source of sound in the room. The last person around was Lorelei. Everyone else was either downstairs or busy elsewhere.

John approached the Couch and sat down next to Scarlett. The armchair transformed into a bench for three, creating one space for him and one for Lydia. Be it that the queen did not immediately take the offer to sit down. “Surprised to find you here,” he addressed the redhead. “I figured you’d be creating business ties down there.”

“Nobles sicken me – the embodiment of fucking nepotism,” Scarlett responded dismissively. “No offense.”

“None taken.” Lydia’s hands were going down the front of her shirt, loosening each button. John hoped to see some sexy lingerie. The shirt and pants were discarded to leave her completely naked. “I did not have the time to grab the harem-appropriate underwear, my love,” she responded to his disappointed gaze.

“My whole day, ruined in an instant,” John grumbled.

“Ya staying the night?” Rave asked, now that she had cleaned her fingers. A pretty useless exercise, as she pulled the slender blonde half into her lap and went right back to masturbating her. “Come, moan for me,” she whispered in the quiet woman’s ear. Reminded of what people usually did when they were experiencing pleasure, Nia did gasp and cry in all the lewd ways. It sounded natural, even if her needing to be told to do it wasn’t.

“Yes,” Lydia gave the short answer. “And I require a bath. I have been moving quite hurriedly.”

Scarlett sniffed in the general direction of John’s armpit. “So does he, so take the cuddler away from me already.”

“Fine, fine.” John groaned and stood up again. “If you don’t want it, I can find someone else.” He whistled, like a dog owner would to get the attention of his pet. Ears standing at attention, Metra rapidly quit the game and turned around. “I need someone to clean my cock,” he stated in no uncertain terms. Attention shifted to Salamander and her massive tits. “And my back.”

“Roger that, stud,” Salamander cackled and hovered up from her seat. “Bathtub, jacuzzi, what are we thinking?”

“The big jacuzzi,” John told her. “Jane, can you-“

“Already writing the message.” The feline Lightbearer opened the Harem Comms and was about to actually start typing when she stopped to slap Nia’s hands. “No touching yourself, that’s my job.”

“I’m so close though.” Nia’s voice, calm as it was, reflected her need.

“That’s what makes it fun.” The pariah did obey the logic and John walked to the bathroom with four women in tow. Scarlett, for every easily guessed reason, was following along with the rest of them.

Tonight, a night for a big jacuzzi party.

Tomorrow, a day for more dates.