An hour ago, the funeral of the previous king, King Toren, had come to an end. However, tension inside the small and somewhat luxurious apartment did not disappear.
Orion's gaze was glued to the blue sky. He wondered, had he made the right choice? Could he have done something differently? His father once told him, through his projection, that pondering on the past would only make one's confidence plummet. That, if he wanted to be powerful, regret would be a weight. But, Orion also wondered, wouldn't rethinking his decisions make it more likely that he wouldn't make mistakes or do better in the future? But what Orion knew was that he was no king. He knew that there was a limit to which someone could 'remain' in the past and that his father hadn't taught him the whole quote yet. So, he made up his mind. He had to move forward, not for his father, but for himself.
Elisa walked up to Orion and spoke in a cold voice, "It is time to leave."
Orion turned around and stared into Elisa's blue eyes. Elisa wore a cold expression, but Orion knew better; he could see the frustration, anger, and sadness in her. No matter how angry or disappointed Elisa was, she hadn't spoken a single word about Toren's funeral ever since he had ordered the protectors to restrain her.
"Hm."
Orion grabbed his already-made backpack and checked his space ring and confirmed its contents.
Starlight Blade — Check.
Notebooks and stationery — Check.
Graves's survival 101 kit — Check.
Money — Check.
Phone — Check.
Orion took a deep breath and looked around the apartment one last time before stepping out.
***
Half an hour of travelling later, Orion and Elisa arrived at New Ottawa's IWTA— Inner World Teleportation Array. The two walked into the enormous building and walked straight to the Array sector. As soon as security started approaching, Elisa quickly flashed a certain card, which made them back away immediately.
'Hm? What's that card? I want one... one day, Orion, one day' Orion said to himself while he followed closely behind Elisa.
The two walked faster and faster until they reached the Array room. Stepping inside, both saw a man clothed in a nice-looking suit and smiling like a frog. The man was actually the Head Manager of this station.
"Forgive me for being ignorant, but I did not expect such important guests to come— "
Elisa didn't spare the man a glance as she immediately reached for the command console and selected 'Minora.'— The Headquarters of Great House Blade.
In the next second, Elisa grabbed Orion by the shoulder and leapt onto the array's centre and soon, a deep white light engulfed them both, as well as the 3 protectors hiding in their shadows.
The man stared at the empty array circle and chuckled.
"How rude."
The man's lips twisted into a grin as he reached into his pocket and took out a small circular device. He immediately stuck it onto the primary console, and as soon as he did, the mana of the Array crystal above the silver circle went berserk. The man then tapped onto the space ring on his finger, and his suit turned to ash as only a gleaming black exosuit with red and gold lines remained.
"Get ready."
In an instant, 4 figures emerged and gathered near the man, all wearing the same type of exosuit. The man took a step forward and imbued mana into the mana crystal above and chanted.
"Simple Domain"
Then, he raised his hands and quickly touched his accomplices' backs and said, "Space Dive!"
***
The moment Orion and the others were engulfed in white light, they all felt their organs shift inside them as they plummeted downward at an incredible speed. Soon, they could finally see the scenery of the Inner World, and it was... Breathtaking. The Inner World was unlike what one could expect. Many thought it was a dry and dead land beneath the Top layer, but when videos emerged of the Inner World, the entire population of the Outer World was shocked. The scenery was no different from what one could see if they were in a plane high in the air in the Outer World.
Orion looked up and saw a light blue sky and the Sun. 'Dad said that it was the Elves — Natives of the Inner World— who made an artificial sky using runes. That was at the time when they decided to migrate and hide here, away from the asteroid which decimated the dinosaurs.' Orion then looked below and saw Minora, which was composed of palace-looking mansions, houses, and a busy city.
Orion and Elisa were both standing on a seemingly big white tile, which was surrounded by a transparent barrier and was plummeting down. The Teleportation array is primarily used to skip through the barrier between the layers of Earth, and the rest of the way was handled by this white tile. Orion smiled softly as he took in the beautiful scenery of valleys, rivers, mountains and more. However, Orion's smile froze as he realised that the tile was suddenly coming to a stop. He turned to Elisa and realised that her expression was one of pure horror.
Seconds later, the white tile came to a stop in the sky and didn't move for a while, until...
Crack—!
The tile below their feet cracked, and the barriers which were making the descent stable and safe also cracked. Then, it broke. In the next second, the 3 protectors emerged and gathered around the duo as they all started falling at insane speeds without protection.
Orion panicked and struggled to stabilise until Alex quickly embraced his body while falling and screamed, "CALM DOWN!"
Orion followed Alex's lead and stabilised his fall. They all gathered around Elisa, who took out a small aeroplane made out of metal. She used her Metal affinity to manipulate the constitution and further supplied mana using her core and chanted the spell.
"Enlarge!"
However, as soon as she chanted, a burst of space magic folded the space at the plane and broke the plane into a dozen pieces.
Elisa's eyes widened as she exclaimed loudly, "Get away!"
Immediately after that, the sharp metal pieces enlarged and injured Alex — who shielded Orion — in the shoulder and Julia, who tried her best to get away, in the thigh, while Nicolas obliterated most of the pieces away using fire blasts.
Before they could take even another breath, five figures suddenly blitzed past them and appeared below, falling at almost equal speeds. All wore gleaming black exosuits with red and gold linings. 2 of them took out swords, 1 took out a bow, and the last two had nothing in hand. The only woman of the five, who did not have a weapon, gathered mana with quick efficiency and fired fireballs while the other 2 armed men rushed towards them in between the fireballs using their own individual abilities. The bowman who remained right behind the 2 swordsman drew an arrow and nocked it on his bow.
Seeing the attacks approaching, Nicolas immediately took out a broadsword, gathered an enormous amount of mana and executed a downward slash with all his strength, sending dozens of lightning strikes towards the assailants. Meanwhile, Julia quickly used her life affinity to heal herself while Alex got in front of Orion and sent waterballs to neutralise the magic attack.
The man far below all of them, who remained in the back of the formation, grinned. He pressed his palms together, then spread his arms outward while chanting:
"Simple Domain!"
Right on the heels of that, with a snap of the man's fingers, all lightning strikes and all waterballs disappeared. And at that moment, not only did they feel dread, but they also realised a dark truth. In front of them... was death. A space mage who could use a simple domain — an Archmage. In other words, it was a being of the 4th realm.
Elisa's eyes darkened as she started using up all of her mana. "Buy me time!"
"No chance, Elisa Constantine!"
The Space mage exclaimed as he flew towards Elisa as fast as he could. Elisa had barely enough time to react before the man was already in front of her. Just as he was about to touch Elisa, Nicolas appeared behind him and swung his electrified sword. The man's eyes narrowed as he felt his instincts scream at him, even though he was of the 4th realm and his opponents were barely grazing the peak of the third; thus, within the next second, chanted with a grin. "Reversal", following that, the space around them unfolded, and an instant later, Nicolas found himself dozens of metres away from Elisa. Same for Alex, Julia and Orion.
Orion's eyes widened as he stared in disbelief at the man, who took out one of the small pieces of metal, which originated from Elisa's plane, and plunged it into Elisa's stomach.
As the two fell, Elisa and the man separated while the metal piece remained inside Elisa's abdomen. Before he could finish her, Nicolas covered his entire body with lightning—his hair turning white and his eyes turning blue. In an instant, he stepped on a deformed cloud and instantly appeared between Elisa and her enemy.
"Ten thousand strikes: Ninth form— Nine hundred thrusts"
As Nicolas thrust his lightning-covered broadsword forward, eight hundred and ninety-nine light blue swords appeared to thrust alongside him. The man was about to smile when he saw his female enemy, Julia, appear to his right. Like Nicolas, Julia had also prepared her strongest attack.
"Incarnation of Flame—Rise— burn the living, the dead and the ash. Chaos Burst!"
The man's lips froze before finally doing what he did best—smiling as he said with a dark voice, "How cute."