Four hours on the mark later, the girls were finally done with their clean up and understandably, they were extremely tired and the allure of just dropping down and sleeping on the ground was great.
"Great work." Kisuke welcomed them, "You don't have classes today so take it easy."
"Finally..." Claire murmured under her breath and didn't really have any energy to process what Kisuke was saying.
Ophis and Lilith approached them and began conjuring the Magic Circle for their teleportation to return to the floating island of the Ouroboros Academy. But before they disappeared, Kisuke called out to Claire for one final time, "Claire, I'll send you some documents about Shinigamis and Hollows later. Cooperate with Aika to study the properties of their basic techniques and spells."
Claire just waved her hand while yawning, "...Got it. I'll go to Aika-neechan's place later."
Ophis and Lilith both had small smiles on their faces and thought that they'd have to prepare for a long trip.
Kisuke also saw those smiles and thought that he'd have comrades comparable to a large army when he went to that place, 'This is actually more reassuring. After all, if things go the way I expect it to become, I would technically be aiming to destroy that world.'
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A week later, Riveria and Kisuke were standing in front of the portal that would take them to the 'Dungeon' World. Since any strange movements from the other girls would result in unwanted attention, they could only send them off through a screen, [Don't you think the Evies will notice this portal once it's fully activated?] Sona asked what she was most concerned about.
"They probably will. I mean with that kind of outpost on the moon, it's almost impossible for it not to have some kind of radar that could detect a drastic bend in space." Since the Evies have developed a portal that was much more sophisticated than Kisuke's crude attempt to connect two places, it's obvious that they had countermeasures against it. It is one of the main reasons why Kisuke wanted to learn their technology. As for the other reason, that'll be a surprise for Chaos if he really suddenly turned the tip of his blade at him.
[So we just have to pray that they don't pinpoint your base?]
Kisuke shook his head, "No prayers needed. The base is still under an Illusionary Barrier. Even though they could detect the portal, as long as we don't open it for too long or too wide, they'll never be able to find this place."
Sona sighed in relief, [That's good. Have a safe trip and don't forget our souvenirs.]
Within the same room as Sona, each and every one of the girls started wishing them good travels, but they were more interested in the souvenirs that Kisuke would bring them back and even requested specific things.
That went on until Kisuke finally lost his patience and closed his notepad to stop accepting requests.
The girls only giggled at each other but they still gave the two of them a proper send-off.
Now that they were finally ready, Kisuke fully activated the portal that connected to the void. Kisuke and Riveria immediately hopped into it so that the portal could close as fast as possible.
"There they go. Now that Kisuke is away, that should reduce the number of people that are trying to get to him." Sona muttered after ending the call.
"You said it!" Irina seconded, "Only seven years went by but there are already a bunch of idiots that want to challenge the Evies thinking that they aren't a big deal and would be made heroes if they could succeed."
"Those idiots are easy to manipulate so we should be on guard against those approaching them." Akeno held her aching forehead, "The real problem is the increasing number of Evie worshippers. There are already some reports on attempted impairment of the barrier all over the globe and we still don't know how these hunk of metals are communicating to the people here on Earth."
Medusa also chipped in and said, "It's either a special power or an influential faction covering their tracks, but most probably both. Since everyone knows about Great Red's death, this was already inevitable."
"As it stands, we might really have to use our students and alumni as soldiers," Kuroka added with a heavy tone.
Everyone became quiet after that and the frustration was very obvious on their faces. Immediately after, they started discussing the countermeasures that they could make, but in the end, nothing concrete was concluded.
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The moment they entered the portal, Kisuke immediately sharpened his senses. As the portal closes, so is the void around it moving strangely, 'Reinforcement? He's taking away our path of retreat?'
A minute later, the darkness around them seemed to get darker and darker as they went through until it tried to swallow and crush them. The protection that they got from the portal was still holding up but there were already cracks in its defenses, "What's going on? It wasn't like this when I came through.", asked Riveria while preparing to reinforce her defenses.
"Can you hold out?"
Riveria wondered why Kisuke didn't answer her question but didn't dwell on it much and nodded, "I think I can."
"Good. Let's speed up." Kisuke stretched out his hand to her and Riveria didn't hesitate to grab it.
Two minutes later, the crushing pressure of the darkness around them had increased by multiple folds but they could already see the light at the end of this seemingly endless and cruel tunnel.
But the moment they reached the exit, the pressure instantly reversed and they were greeted by a giant ball of land and sea and the vast expanse of space behind them along with the absence of the familiar force that kept their feet on the ground.
While looking at this breathtaking scene, Riveria tried to speak up but no sound came from her mouth.
[Use telepathy. We're more than 300 miles from the ground.] Riveria heard Kisuke's voice inside her head.
She then replied, [What are we doing here?]
[My anchor points are working fine but we were cut off before we could reach them], Kisuke answered while thinking, 'He was way too excited to close our path behind.'