Red Steelheart, a person who used to have 10 Authorities. A monster among prodigies.
After 2 years passed, he was able to take advantage of the Deity Ruins in Aquamarine. There's even that one time when the entire team got a Mid-Rank Deity's Origin Core.
With that, the girls are able to rank up to SS- Rank while Red himself is now at SSS-. Most of it was used to train their techniques in an accelerated time and level up traits with origin power, so they were only able to reach that rank. This, in turn, strengthened their foundation. Though, there's still more waiting for them.
All they need to do is to explore.
"Morning."
"Good Morning."
When Red peeked his head outside the tent, he saw Maria taking care of the tent. Red then pressed the button panel inside the tent before it shrank into a spherical object.
"Today too?"
"No. We're going back for a while. Did you forget?"
Maria sighed. Meanwhile, Red sat down on a portable chair before taking out 3 metal sticks of raw barbecue. After throwing a small red crystal into the branches, a fire quickly started.
"Too troublesome."
"You don't want to go back?"
"It's too tiring. I don't want to meet them, too."
Red started cooking the raw barbecue with the newly created bonfire. After a while, it's finally finished.
"If that's what you want."
"Thanks."
He took a bite and chewed it for a while before he expressed his contentment.
'This is too good. I can now see why I wanted to be a chef back then.'
When he first went out of Aquamarine, he had the goal of being a chef. Though, it never got realized since all he encountered are troubles, troubles, and even more troubles.
When he got strong to the point that no one would belittle him, he became the Supreme Commander of the resistance force. He had no spare time for this.
"Thanks for taking care of our food until now. It's so good."
She went silent for a while before replying.
"The spices and branches are all high quality. My cooking skill is average in itself."
"No, no. Don't say that. We'd be forced to eat bloody food if not for you."
Maria accepted his thanks as she ate her portion happily. Suddenly, they heard the sound of a tent opening.
Anna looked at them for 2 seconds before speaking.
"Good Morning."
"Good Morning."
"Morning."
She readied a portable chair before taking out a circular lunch box from her spacial ring. She then created a fire underneath it and waited for it to get cooked.
"We'll be going back today?"
"Yes. How about you? You have anyone to see?"
"My parents."
Unlike Maria, Anna's relationship with her family is more peaceful. She grew up with their love and only wished for her to be happy in the future.
"I'll introduce you guys to my parents. You never got to see them, right?"
"Only through calls. I admit, what we did back then is a no-brainer."
"Then.. you must take responsibility."
She said this with a hint of shyness. Surprisingly, she didn't have a delay when they talked about these things.
"I did."
"Huh?"
"They talked to me for quite a few times already. Before you even talked to them, they already called me more than once."
When they talked for a few times, it was mostly "I'll never forgive you if something happens to her!" At first, they even went ahead and used their resources just to hunt him down. Thankfully, Anna had a talk with them and withdrew their previous request to all the organizations of Aquamarine.
"I-I see.."
'She talked without any delays this time, too.'
Red pretended to not sense something. As a man who took Lugh's advice in his past life, he knew what not to sense.
In his past life, he had 'quite a 'few' women who chased after him. As he is that time, he couldn't bear to have any relationships due to his fear of them getting involved with his problems.
To this, he consulted Lugh, who is a famous strategist back then. When he told him that he couldn't really reject them for fear of hurting them, he told him:
"Be dense."
"Huh?"
"You watched anime before right?"
"Yes."
"Then, be someone like the protagonist of Inf*n*t* Str*t*s or any other light novels with dense MC. It works out fine for them."
"But, that's fiction though? Will that even work?"
"You have to act. Don't worry, you won't need to act dense forever. After you've solved your personal problem, you can settle it, right?"
"So you're saying that I should act dense to buy time. After I solved my problems and thought of a solution, I'll stop acting dense?"
"You've realized it."
'He made it look so easy!'
Right now, he's in a dilemma called "Romance". In his past life and this life too, he only looked at Scarlet. Sadly, his dilemma followed him even in his present life.
As for what happened in his past life's dilemma, it ended up very badly. During the time he got accidentally sent out of Aquamarine, they died out of enemy attacks.
In this life, he has already given them his help many times. He even fetched them when they got back to society and trained them. They even went to some ruins together.
But..
'Is it just me overthinking? Am I misinterpreting something? Damn it.'
With the help of his [Analysis], he already caught wind of it quite, no, many times already. No matter how he looked at it, it only pointed at one thing:
The three girls with him right now like him.
***
"I'm sorry, Honey."
"Dear.."
"Even after contacting all 7 Major Forces, they haven't seen any traces of them. It's like they disappeared from this planet."
"Disappeared.. from this planet?"
Jade immediately went to the Supercomputer in the most secured room of Frost Dragon Empire. After inputting some commands, the screen showed the data recorded by the satellites.
"January 8.. Here it is."
"What is it?"
Brian chased after her and saw that she's been busy doing something on the Supercomputer. As he didn't know anything about it, he waited until she finished it.
"The Space Fluctuations.. It's still the normal range, but look here."
Brian, as expected, didn't understand most of it, but he saw that the space fluctuations peaked for a second before becoming more stable.
Space Fluctuations are the result of something happening to space, thus they can be called the aftershocks of a big movement in space.
"I forgot about it because we're searching for locations.. Brian."
"Yes?"
"I think our son and our potential daughter in-law went into another planet."