Half an hour had already elapsed when the black box began receding, revealing Kisuke, Runeas, and the coffin with no apparent changes compared to when they were trapped.
Runeas was the first one to move and walked towards Zeoticus, Venelana, Chysis, Grayfia, and Millicas huddled together. The surroundings were still a mess with furniture broken and pieces of wood and concrete scattered around from Runeas emerging from the lower floors. Zeoticus, however, was reluctant to call any guards and servants to clean up due to how sensitive this matter is.
"Chysis, Zeoticus. Follow me." Runeas commanded with an unusually serious tone that the latter never heard before.
Chysis nodded and said, "Understood."
Zeoticus, meanwhile, looked towards Kisuke, who was putting his arm forward before unknown runes lit up on it and extended into the air before forming a Magic Circle twice as tall as him. Kisuke then directed that Magic Circle towards the coffin, letting it pass through it and disappear on the other side. He wanted to ask where he is taking the coffin, but with Runeas just walking away from it casually, she probably had an explanation and instructions regarding it, "Progenitor, if I may, I'd like to bring my wife along."
"That's fine," Runeas answered shortly.
Zeoticus and Venelana nodded at each other before the latter turned to Grayfia, "Grayfia, I'll leave the cleaning up to you. Make sure none of this goes out."
"I will do my utmost." Grayfia bowed and saw them leaving through the doors leading to the inner halls.
After taking care of the coffin, Kisuke approached Rias', Issei's, and Vali's group with Riveria on the side as if nothing has happened, "Yo~ It's great to see that everyone's getting along just fine~!" Kisuke greeted them with a smile.
The contrasting image of his cheerful demeanor and demolished surroundings gave a surreal feeling to those who were not used to his antics, "W-what's this? He's scary..." Bova Tannin, the third son of the former Dragon King Tannin muttered while hiding behind Crom.
"It's funny to see Bova-san being scared like this while he usually acts like a delinquent.", whispered Lint to Valerie. Gasper also heard her words and added, "He's really scary though!? I want to forget what happened earlier too!"
"You're as ridiculous as ever. You're just going to pretend like nothing happened?" Vali asked with a chuckle.
But Kisuke just shrugged his shoulders and replied, "What is there to pretend? It was already a settled matter and it's not like I'm the one who made a mess of this place."
"That is true."
"Well then," Kisuke turned to Rias but before he could continue, she interrupted him, "Wait. Before you say what you want, let's move to a different place. Your companion here was telling us a very interesting story so we'd like to hear more of it. Besides, you're not here just to apologize to my team, are you?"
"You didn't tell me to hide where I came from, so it's fine, right?" Riveria asked.
"That's fine." Kisuke nodded and didn't deny Rias' words, "Please lead the way~"
In reality, however, Riveria and Kisuke had already talked about what they could reveal to them before they arrived and just pretended that Riveria was just casually mentioning things. While she doesn't know what Kisuke was planning, she guessed that this is in relation to what Line mentioned about the Age of Gods.
While walking through the busy hall, Kisuke looked around once again and reviewed each group. On Rias' team, all of her teammates aside from her Queen, Tsubaki Shinra and Rook, Loup Garou were present. On Issei's side, only Ravel, Xenovia, and Bova were present while only the Pendragon siblings came with Vali.
"Aren't you going to ask what happened with the coffin or what I talked about with your Ancestor?", asked Kisuke to Rias who's walking in front.
Without stopping or turning in his direction, she answered, "You already said that it's settled. And if I'm going to hear about it, it'll come from my father so I'll spare you the effort of explaining it halfheartedly."
"My~ I'm thankful. It's really a pain to talk about it."
Rias led everyone to an inner garden with maids setting up the table for everyone to have a small snack to accompany their discussions. After everyone settled on their spots, Kisuke finally issued his formal apology and explained that they still would've won the match, because Nyx and Seekvaira's barrier went against the rules of the Rating Game. Its isolation effect was so strong that even the Retiring System hardly worked inside of it and no one really noticed it immediately due to how flashy the other battlefronts were. So from the start, they'd already lost the match and Kisuke just played along to gather some information about Vasco and Crom.
Rias accepted it before she started complaining, "You didn't really have to apologize for that, since I don't think it's any better than being declared as winners after wiping the floor with us. Though I would have really appreciated it if you wouldn't have left me alone to deal with the media. It was a literal hell to deal with them when I didn't know exactly what was going on."
"No way~" Kisuke instantly rejected that notion, "The media aside, the reason I left as soon as the match ended and refused to give any interviews is that there are other people there that I really don't want to get caught with."
"It's Indra, isn't it?" Issei muttered.
"Yep~ Nice guess. Were you invited?"
Issei sighed as he nodded, "He did ask me to join him in a war against Shiva, but I refused. Of course, I could only do that because I had the Gremory and Bael Households behind me. Being a public figure also helped."
"I got the same invitation too." Vali interjected, "But I'm an honorary officer of Grigori so he can't really force me either. Though that's probably going to be hard for you with the Belial's current state." Vali then recalled the fox-masked woman who apparently snatched Lilith's coffin and added, "And you being so secretive of your own forces, regardless of their strength and influence."
"As such, the easiest way is to avoid him like the plague. Thankfully, he likes extending his invitation personally, so it's easy to spot him."
Soon after, the main point of discussion moved to Riveria and the world where she came from. Riveria would patiently answer any and each of their questions and the rules of her world appears to fascinate everyone listening.
Meanwhile, Kisuke asked Issei and Vali to follow him for a bit and Rias asked one of the maids to lead them to a private room since she guessed that this is probably the real reason why he came to their place.
After checking the room and setting up a barrier to avoid any information leaks, Kisuke asked the Two Heavenly Dragons and their hosts with a large grin, "Say, would you like to invade the other world with me?"
[It has been a while since we've talked but this is the first thing you say?], an exasperated sigh was heard from Ddraig.