The frosting was uneven, the candles were bent, and one side of the cake was suspiciously caved in like someone had poked it too many times. Which, to be fair, someone had.
"Stop poking it!" I swatted at Lina's hand for the third time.
"I'm checking for poison," she said innocently.
"By jabbing it like a wild animal?"
"It's how I was raised."
Kaela tilted her head. "Is that… a beast tribe tradition?"
"No, she's just annoying," Iris muttered, slicing a perfect wedge of cake before anyone else could ruin it.
We were celebrating our official guild approval. After weeks of quests, paperwork disasters, slime wolves, and setting things on fire (both intentionally and not), the Guild Registry had finally relented and given us a real nameplate.
It read: [Guild #748: Tempest Hearts]
It was temporary. It might change. But for now, it was real.
I looked around at my party — my friends. Lina, bouncing with energy, her fingers already sticky with frosting. Iris, calm as ever, hiding a smile behind her tea. Kaela, trying to look unimpressed but feeding cake crumbs to a squirrel on her shoulder.
A week ago, I was a nobody with a joke of a System. Now… things were starting to feel like a real adventure.
"Here's to not dying horribly!" I raised my mug.
They clinked theirs in response, some more enthusiastically than others.
Far above us, the stars shimmered over the city. The inn's rooftop gave us the perfect view — of towers lit by magical lanterns, of airships hovering in the distance, of people just… living. Laughing. Adventuring.
And none of us noticed the other presence watching from the shadows.
Not far from the inn, deep beneath the surface — even deeper than the Guild Council's chambers — there was another gathering.
A circular room, carved from obsidian and lined with glowing runes that pulsed like veins. Hooded figures knelt around a central platform where an orb floated in the air, its surface swirling with projections of System data.
A voice echoed from the darkness. Genderless. Ageless.
"We have confirmed it."
The orb pulsed once, displaying a name none of them dared speak aloud. Just two words, marked in red script, followed by a blinking status update: ACTIVE
"The Harem King Protocol has manifested."
Murmurs rippled through the circle, though none dared stand.
Another voice, older and raspier, spoke next. "We should have erased it during the Awakening Cycle. The Glitch should never have survived."
"Erasing it then would have drawn attention," a third replied. "Now it evolves in the open, tangled in emotional code… unpredictable. Dangerous."
The first voice spoke again. "Do we know the anchor points?"
A new image formed in the orb. Faces. Lina. Iris. Kaela. Lines of energy mapped between them, glowing threads that pulsed with shifting intensity — affection, resonance, power.
"The tether has reached three."
"Then the gate is opening."
In the farthest part of the chamber, a figure stepped forward. Unlike the rest, their cloak bore an insignia — the Mark of the Null Bloom, symbol of forbidden Systems. They bowed before the orb and raised a hand, revealing a grafted interface on their skin — old, cracked, and dangerous.
"I volunteer for field observation," the figure said. "He must not realize what he is until we are ready."
"And if he already suspects?"
"Then I'll accelerate the collapse."
Aboveground, I sneezed. Again.
"Someone's really talking about me today," I muttered, wiping my nose on my sleeve. "Hope it's not that guy who sells fake potions near the QuestHub. He still thinks I owe him a goat."
"I thought we gave him a goat," Kaela said.
"No, we gave him a very confused sheep," Iris corrected.
Lina laughed. "Whatever, close enough. Toast round two!"
The party was light, filled with warmth and laughter. Kaela taught Lina how to whistle using acorn caps. Iris explained, in alarming detail, how to boil down frosting into magical fuel (and why it should never be done again). I mostly sat back, trying to pretend my System wasn't still flashing random alerts in the corner of my vision.
NEW FLAG: UNKNOWN PARTY OBSERVATION – PROBABILITY 89%
WARNING: SYSTEM AWARENESS THRESHOLD BREACHED – +1 THREAT LEVEL
SUGGESTION: Don't Panic (Panicking Makes It Worse)
I sighed and tilted my head back. The stars still looked beautiful. The world still felt wide open.
But somewhere beneath it all, gears were shifting. A cult I didn't know existed was watching. Planning. Calculating my steps like I was some piece in a grand game.
And I had the feeling… I was about to get promoted from pawn to problem.
Still, for tonight — just tonight — I let myself believe everything was okay.
Because tomorrow?
Tomorrow was already watching.
END OF CHAPTER 30