Ryan looked at the house. It was going to take about thirty minutes until Rose would get here and bring along the basic 'cure' to help everyone out.

  'Seriously, what sort of maniacs build a secret shaft to an underground shrine, and then just build a fucking chapel in their garden?' he thought to himself. Though, it didn't quite matter - he just had to make sure that nobody would get too hurt. Things were starting to escalate more and more, as if the effect that was placed on everyone was making the others stronger, synergising with itself more and more. As if ripples were coursing through the entire party, making things worse and worse.

  There was just one thing he had to do - rely on the people that Ryan knew were completely unaffected.

  Most people here had something to drink that came from the shed. Whether it was alcoholic or not, it seemed like everything in there was now 'infected' with the shrine's effect. Frankly, he could feel himself be affected by it as well, though maybe not quite as strong as other people. Because of Jester, Ryan had done some research into this sort of magic. It seemed like the more mana it could latch onto and mix with, the more stable and long-lasting it could be, and potentially even stronger depending on the spell's specific traits, which seemed to be the case here. And when it came to debuffs, things that were inherently and instinctively 'negative', one's spirituality stat made it easier to resist falling victim to them. So that meant that he didn't have to worry about most of the Awakened folk.

  'Is that why Nora...?' Ryan thought to himself, feeling his stomach dropping. They were an Awakened, but as far as Ryan knew, they hadn't levelled up a lot. For personal reasons, they didn't have a lot of time doing any magic engineering so they were still below level 5 and probably barely above average, "Holy shiiiit!"

  He started running around, his first target being Gaia. Of course, since Liam and Jade were vampires, they would get sick from literally everything that had been stored in the shed, just resorting to water all night. The fridge had a filtered water tank hooked up to it, so Ryan figured it was easier for people to get it from there.

  "What's going on?" Liam asked nervously, and Ryan just smiled at him, shaking his head.

  "Nothing, just... how about you go show Jade your spot by the pond, okay?"

  Of course, the boy was clever enough to know when someone was just absolutely lying to him, but that wasn't anything that Ryan could concern himself with at the moment. He just had to make sure that Liam was safe. He held his hand forward and summoned Violette, asking her to watch Liam and Jade. The latter of the two was, of course, utterly confused.

  "I'll explain it later, okay? Just... stay out of sight, and if anything's going on, Violette will call for me," Ryan smiled. Jade slowly nodded.

  "If... if you say so?"

  The moment the two turned around, Ryan started sprinting away, giving word to Gaia, "Bring the kegs away, put them into the shed. Then protect it and don't let anyone get inside."

  At the same time, Ryan summoned the remaining three spirits, "Maximus, Jester, Gregor, please collect any drinks that you can and bring them into the shed as well. Morgana, you join them as well, please. Just use some of your familiars if you need to.

  While Maximus immediately did as he was asked, getting ready to jump around and steal cups or bottles from anyone he could, Jester seemed more excited to watch what was going on. People making out, yelling at each other, straight up fist-fighting, or getting lost in almost deafening, uncontrollable laughter - whatever it was, it was exactly the kind of thing that he was into. Of course, since Ryan asked him to, he was still going to help out, but he simply had other priorities.

  As for Gregor... Ryan barely even had to ask him to collect alcohol, but he was worried about what he would do with it, "I swear, if you drink any of it, I'll unsummon you right away."

  The automaton stared back at him, clearly a little annoyed.

  "... If you don't drink any of the poisoned alcohol, I'm going to buy you five bottles of your favourite bourbon, whiskey, and gin each."

  Without Ryan even finished the sentence, Gregor turned around and started running off. Not in the direction of the party, but toward the workshop. Ryan was a little worried about what he was planning, but it would work out... probably.

  Morgana began to float away again, but since Ryan was still linked to her, he had a pretty good view of what she was doing. She was heading over toward a specific spot in the corner of the garden. There was a small mound of dirt that had been gathered, both as part of Gaia's garden renovations as well as the pool being dug out. She had immediately made use of it in her own way, and started raising mice.

  As each and every one of them was one of Morgana's familiars, they weren't really a bother, and they were actually quite cute and well taken care of. Obviously, Ryan immediately had Rose come over and check them out to make sure they were healthy and not infested with something like rabies. But after that, they became a pretty important part of the garden's ecosystem, even helping Gaia out with some of the work here and there. Mostly, that was by eating certain plants they were directed to and loosening up the ground.

  And now, it was time for them to do something else. Morgana's 'familiar' skill didn't only allow her to take control over animals, but also to use her magic through them to some degree. A simple 'freeze' spell was enough to take care of at least the non-alcoholic drinks, and the mice were a good distraction in the first place.

  Though... they were immediately causing quite the upset. It seemed like all emotions were amplified through the effect of that shrine, so this was probably one of the worse things that could happen. People were almost having panic attacks, though that was better than beating the shit out of each other or traumatising other people.

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  As this was taken care of at least to some degree now, Ryan used the outside stairway to get up into his room.

  "What the fuck, didn't you guys see the 'no access' sign- Didn't I lock the door?!" Ryan yelled out, seeing a couple hooking up on his bed. He looked over at the door and - "You broke into my room? Urgh, just- don't touch anything in here, I'll deal with you bastards later..."

  Ryan walked up to his closet and pulled out something from the top compartment. Immediately, he dropped one of the small red pills into his mouth and then ran out into the hallway, first checking that Liam's room was okay. Luckily nobody had broken in there, so he quickly closed and locked it again. The next stop was Silvia's room, and once again, he was met with two people hooking up. Except that this time it was two people that were allowed to be in there, though they, for some reason, didn't lock the door.

  "Ryan?!" Fae yelled out, quickly pulling the blanket over onto herself and Silvia. Ryan turned away; at this point, he didn't even need to know that they were affected. Silvia had been acting particularly 'excited' the moment Fae showed up. But her spirituality stat was actually pretty okay, wasn't it? Did it have something to do with being mixed into alcohol, of all things?

  "Fae, how much have you had to drink?"

  "Huh? I- A couple beers, just- Dude, get the fuck out! I don't know what kind of vibe you got from us, but this is totally messed up!"

  Ryan could hear Fae growing upset, though he wasn't perfectly sure if that was the 'normal' type of upset from being walked in on while having sex, or if it was because of the spell. He also decided to aptly ignore the second half of what they said and talk about it later when this was resolved, "I'll get out in a second! Just both of you, take one of these each!"

  He threw two of the pills onto the bed, still without looking, and Fae seemed confused, "I don't exactly like mixing drugs with alcohol..."

  "It's a blood-rose pill! A spell is affecting everyone at the party and making their emotions run wild. It's mixed into the drinks - if you take this, you're going to get completely sobered up in a few minutes and the spell should stop getting worse. But still, stay in here and-"

  "Spell? What are you-"

  "Fae, Silvia doesn't even care I'm here. I live with her, I know how 'open' she can be with this stuff, but this is a step far even for her," Ryan said, "Just hold out half an hour, okay? Things will get fixed then."

  The changeling looked over at her girlfriend, who had still just been kissing her shoulder. Her face was flushed, and her eyes had taken on a slightly pink- and purple-ish hue, as if she wasn't able to keep a proper hold of all her mana right now.

  "... Okay, I'll make sure we stay in here."

  "Yeah, yeah, don't make it sound like it's going to be hard staying in your room with your horny girlfriend," Ryan sighed, slamming the door shut behind him. A moment later, he could hear it being locked, so he moved on. Luckily, the door to Modak's bedroom was open, so he knew nothing of the sort was happening in there.

  "Yo, Ryan! Come, join! It's sounding like the party is really heating up down there, huh?" Modak asked, high as a kite, and Ryan just let out a loud groan.

  "Yanna, please don't tell me you've had anything to drink. Like, not even soda," he said, and the minotaur, who had been leaning onto Modak's shoulder until now, shook her head.

  "No? What's going on?"

  Unsure what to say in front of all these people, he looked back and forth between Yanna and Modak, "Pick up your boyfriend and come to my bedroom."

  "Huh? But-"

  "Now."

  Realising how serious Ryan was, Yanna didn't hesitate for even a moment. She got up from Modak's bed and immediately picked him up, carrying him princess-style out of his bedroom. Though everyone else was confused, Ryan quickly looked around the room with a bright, fake smile, "High people, please stay in here and enjoy the rest of the night, thank you!"

  Ryan rushed after Yanna into his own bedroom, watching as she looked around confused, "What the- Okay, I think we need to set up some new boundaries right now, Ryan, this is really not-"

  "I'm asexual, why does everyone think I'm coming onto them?!" he yelled out as he stormed into his bedroom, "You two! Change of plans, you gotta go out after all! Just go fuck in the hallway for all I care," Ryan picked up the clothes littered on the ground and threw them at the couple. The two guys annoyedly got up from the bed and put on their boxes, heading out into the hallway.

  Ryan closed the door after them, though he quickly got annoyed again. For some reason those guys were horny enough to break the door in. Maybe it was an accident, though he didn't really care to find out right now.

  "Yanna, did we tell you about the shrine under the house?"

  The minotaur raised her brow, confused, "Uh... roughly, I guess?"

  "Okay, cool. So, the people that lived here that presumably built that shrine or at least used it, also built what seems like a chapel outside, and it has some weird, mind-altering magic carved into the ground that now seeped into all the drinks once we filled that room with enough mana, aka the spell we're using to keep the drinks cold."

  Yanna and Modak both stared at Ryan for a moment, not sure what to say, except, "What?"

  "Yeah, so, that spell heightens the emotions of the afflicted, so we have a ton of people hooking up in the house or fighting. The living room has been absolutely trashed already and someone might get seriously hurt. Anyway, I need your help. Silvia is useless."

  Modak slowly sat down on Ryan's desk chair, trying to catch up to what he was saying, "Wait, so... you, uh... what do you need us to do exactly?"

  "Rose is coming with a cure in... twenty-five minutes, I hope, so we just need to hold out and make sure things don't get too fucked up," Ryan explained, "Basically, I need you guys to help me act as security or something."

  "Security? Seriously?"

  "Well, you're probably the strongest person here, except maybe the unsealed spirits I guess, but still..."

  "No, that's- of course I'm helping," Yanna replied immediately, "But isn't there some other method to make them not go crazy?"

  "Not part-" Ryan was interrupted by loud screeches and yelling, "Urgh, the mice are there..."

  "The mice? What are you talking about right now?"

  "I'll explain later, just... there's nothing we can do but prevent the super bad stuff," he said, pulling out his phone to call someone, "If Modak weren't fucked up, I'd have him try and get Nora back here, but..."

  "Wait, Nora? What about them?"

  "They- Urgh, they were most likely affected by the spell too, and spouted some fucked up shit about vampires, so I threw them out, but it's not like I can let someone like that just run around outside right now," Ryan pointed out.

  "What about Yamada? That was her name, right? Your uncle's driver?"

  "She's not just a driver, but I already tried that. Neither her nor Runar are responding to my messages..." he explained, "I would just go out and follow them on my bike, but I can't go that far away because of the spirits."

  "Aren't you also drunk right now?"

  "No, I took a blood-rose pill, they're detoxifying and basically 'refresh' your blood. I'm perfectly sober," Ryan pulled his phone away annoyed, since Nora didn't answer, "And before you ask, no, it doesn't work against the spell."

  "Then why are you totally okay?"

  "The seed of blessing, I guess? I don't fucking know..." he walked back up to his door, though Yanna was still confused. Ryan looked over at Modak for a moment before leaving, "And you... try to sober up a bit, maybe? The spell doesn't work on you, so I could use your help downstairs. Use that detoxification method on yourself. If you want to try a blood rose pill anyway, just give it a shot."

  Modak silently swayed back and forth, just nodding his head while trying to mentally catch up to what was happening, while Ryan and Yanna ran downstairs to take care of the chaos that was spreading throughout the house.