"Knock knock." Cayne said, leaning against the wall beside the door. "Are you guys awake?"
"Yes, surprisingly," Cole said, opening the door.
"Great, let's go check on Alina and-"
"Present." Alina said as she and Linda came out from their room.
"Yes, surprisingly," Kumori cut in, as she emerged to stand beside Hikari, who was loitering outside the rooms.
"Hm," Alina grunted as she leaned on the wall beside Cayne as they all gathered together.
"Where's Korū?" Linda asked.
"Here." Korū approached them.
"So, Cayne, you haven't died yet," Hikari stated.
"Apparently."
"Such faith you have in me, Hikari," Korū grumbled.
Hikari merely grinned at him.
"So… the two of us have asked this too many times these few days but…" Alina said.
"What next?" She and Linda said together, then high-fived each other.
"Uh, find your wizard, maybe?"
"Like, details, details, people. We haven't even talked about how the dragons are going to meet with Night Stalker." Linda said.
"The teleport crystal thingies?"
"What she said." Korū jabbed a finger at Hikari. "Just teleport them there or something."
"Have we even… told Night Stalker that we're working with them now?" Cole asked.
"Uh." Hikari glanced at Korū. "I don't know?"
"I'll do it." Alina said, mindlinking the Alpha of Night Stalker, also updating Alpha Harry.
"Are the dragons gonna teleport now or...?"
"Well, you've got to ask them, don't you? Furthermore, do you remember why we took the pain to take a jet here in the first place?"
"Honestly, no one even told us why we needed to take a jet." Hikari pointed out.
There were confused blinks from Alina and Linda. "Earthlings." They muttered. Cole rolled his eyes.
"Basically when you teleport, you can only teleport from one transfer point to a fixed transfer point on the other side. It's like counterparts." Linda explained. "Meaning, if you go to the nearest point to us right now, you'll end up having to travel through somebody else's territory, because while we have pockets of neutral ground, they are pockets and not paths, and that somebody might not be a friendly somebody. It's easier to travel through Earth than through the inner world."
"Ah."
Korū muttered something and went back into the room.
Everyone watched him with questioning looks.
He reemerged with his phone, looking quizzically at the others. "Whatcha' looking at?"
"Wow, I don't know. A werewolf-dragon hybrid?" Liam joked.
Korū rolled his eyes, not appreciating Liam's sense of humor. "Hilarious."
"You wanna go like, talk to them about transport?" Cole asked.
"Mihoyo-san's gonna say 'just fly there, we have wings for a reason'." Korū snorted. "We can just pass them one of the teleport things and let them fly to America and settle things themselves."
"I've always wondered how they do that without being seen." Alina said.
"No one knows."
"Well then… I'll give them some of my crystals, then we can go find the wizard."
"Mh. This way." Korū headed back to the room with the fox masks, where two of the people, Haruku and another guy, were chilling.
"Ohayōgozaimasu." Cole chirped. "Is that how you say it?"
Korū gave him a confused stare, wondering why he would even say that, considering his pronunciation was more than a little off.
Cole shrugged, "Hey, I tried."
Haruku glanced up. "You're up. I thought you normally woke up later than this."
Cole, Liam, and Cayne shrugged in unison.
"We got tired of sleeping in." Liam said.
"Got- excuse me?" Linda said incredulously.
"How the hell does anyone get tired of sleeping in?" Korū huffed. "You should be grateful you're able to sleep."
Haruku chuckled. "What are you doing down here? I thought people your age would be lying in bed gaming or something."
Alina shook her head sadly. "Teenagers like us have no life."
"Agreed." Linda, Cayne, Cole and Liam all said. It was getting a little creepy.
"...what the hell." Korū sighed. "Come find me when you wanna leave." He went back to the room.
"Is there something else you need?" Haruku asked.
"Well… do you have experience in the inner world?" Alina asked.
"No. Not really." Haruku considered for a moment. "The last time I travelled there was... Sixty years ago."
"Do you remember how things work there? I'll give you a map so that you can find Bloodlust and Night Stalker and everything else easily."
"Basically, don't cross any pack's territory unless you have permission from the Alpha." Haruku looked amused. "Works the same here."
Alina nodded. "Basically. The rogues there are also generally more aggressive, and while you usually won't have any problems dealing with them, be careful not to get sidetracked."
Kumori snorted. "If there's anything about dragons, they can be aggressive as hell and don't get sidetracked by random rogues. Because those would just ignite in two seconds."
"Murder or man slaughter is punishable by law." Alina said, "Or the Council, rather."
"It's not murder if we put out the fires before they get hurt enough to die," Haruku said calmly.
Alina chuckled, then shrugged. "Whatever you say. Do you have transport crystals?"
"No. We lost them to the pack in Tokyo a while ago."
Linda blinked and asked, incredulous. "You didn't go get more? Do you not have a stash for emergencies?"
"No."
"We don't really need it," the other guy, who'd been quiet the entire time, said. "We don't go to the inner world."
"You're very cut off from the outside world, aren't you?" Liam commented.
"...what." Kumori gave him a questioning look. They've been getting a lot of those, lately.
"We just don't visit the inner world." The guy rolled his eyes. "We aren't cut off from the world. We're right in the middle of a city, that's not remotely possible even if we wanted to."
"I'm talking about other packs. Besides basic connections, do you even have assured allies? Know any packs from the inner world that could, perhaps, save you when you need it?" Liam stated of a matter of factly. "There are certain things that Earthlings have that Inners don't have, like easier access to technology, but it also goes both ways. You never know when you would need important connections that you neglected to make."
Cayne blew a low whistle. "Seems like someone can say more than one sentence at a time after all."
Kumori and Hikari were just a little shocked. Seems like singing badly wasn't the only thing he could do well. Liam was apparently showing off a little of his Alpha traits.
"It doesn't matter, to us at least," Haruku explained. "We're just a bunch of outcasts from a dragon Tribe anyway. Just living out the rest of our lives here like normal humans."
"Hmmm…" Liam hummed thoughtfully, then shrugged. "What were we talking about again?"
"Transport crystals," Hikari said.
"Oh, yes." Alina said.