After the two said goodbye, Yuki opened a Portal back to the Immortal Realm, but before she entered it, she took one final look at her daughter before finally going in, disappearing from their sight. When Yuki was finally gone, Mio felt the sadness coming out from Somi because now she was all alone with a stranger that she just met and the worst thing about it, was that stranger was the one who going to take care of her for these three years.
"Are you ready to leave now, young lady?" After thinking for a while, Mio finally asked as she couldn't grasp the right time to ask it and just went for it. If they stay any longer here, the people who are waiting from the outside would get suspicious and possibly check inside the Gate themselves. With that, everyone would see and know that Mio got something weird that they had never seen before, which was a live human being. If it was a Beast, it wouldn't be something weird as there are times when a Gate would reward the Heroes with a Beast that they can train.
Mio wanted to leave as fast as possible because she didn't want any trouble for her, especially for Somi.
"Yes… but can I ask a favor from you? Can you not call me young lady, just call me by my name. I'm sure this would be easier since it would be weird for people to hear the strongest Hero of the Mortal Realm refer to me as a young lady, especially because I'm powerless." Somi said as she tried to look up where she thought Mio's face was, but without her sight, she really couldn't guess where she was, so she got it wrong. She was staring blankly at the air.
"If that is alright with you, then I'll be glad to call you that. But please, still let me use honorifics as it just feels wrong for me to call you by just your name, you're my Master's daughter after all." Mio didn't exactly say yes to Somi's request, as she just agreed to call her by her name, but she would still use honorifics for her as for Mio, it felt wrong calling Somi so casually.
"Well, alright."
"Thank you, Lady Somi, also for your other concern. Please don't worry about that, there are not a lot of people that actually know my identity because it has already been so long. Right now, my identity is a Teacher, just like what my Master said a few minutes ago." Mio eased Somi's concern by saying those words.
Somi pondered about it for a few seconds before shaking her head, she just thought of what Mio just said to her and found nothing wrong with what she said. So she didn't worry anymore as she just asked for Mio to lead the way.
Mio didn't waste any time as she attentively grabbed their hand of Somi, but before she did it, she of course asked for her permission. Only when Somi gave her permission did she hold her hand to assist her in walking and because of their current situation, it took longer for them to exit the Gate, when they finally left, they were met with the Teachers who had been waiting for so long. Mio was met with a teary-eyed Alice, who clearly looked like she had been so worried for her.
"What happened? Why are all of you here, didn't I say to wait for me inside the Academy?" Mio asked in a slightly irritated tone as she already felt a headache forming. This is exactly what she wanted to avoid the most which was the attention of people, so at the very last second, she hid Somi behind her to protect her from everyone's eyes. Though that didn't do much, at least they diverted their attention to her.
"I… we were so worried for you. You were gone for a few hours, we thought that something happened inside. We even wanted to enter, but the Heroes that have arrived forbid us because it was too dangerous." Alice explained with a little difficulty as she was still so tense about the situation. If another hour had passed, she was ready to call her Mother to ask for help just to save Mio.
"What? For me, it only has been 10 minutes or more, not even half an hour passed inside." Mio was confused because there was no possible way for a few hours to have passed, so she went and confirmed it by looking at the sun's location, and when she saw it, she only then believed. More than 5 hours probably have passed ever since she went inside.
"Is that possible? Then doesn't that mean that the Space inside is distorted?" Alice said with a hint of fear in her voice as she was right in her guess. But that just made her even more terrified because the chances of Mio being in danger were higher because of the distorted Space.
Just as Mio was about to open her mouth, she felt her hand being tugged, when she looked down she saw Somi looking up to her.
"Mother didn't explain it, but the Gate that you entered is connected with the Immortal Realm, but only a little bit. If I have to guess, the location of the Gate is just between the border of the Mortal Realm and the Immortal Realm, so in reality, we are still not inside the Immortal Realm, because if we were really inside there. Months, or even years should have passed ever since." Somi explained what she knew as she heard the two people talking about how much time had passed.
"But I don't think Mother realized it too because if I remember correctly, she just made a Gate of our whim. So she didn't really have time to set it up correctly. This may be a bad thing, but it is also a blessing in disguise. Because you are now exposed to the Mana of Immortal Realm, which opened and strengthened your Soul Veins even more." Somi added as she pointed out the things that Mio gained from that.
Mio was shocked to hear all of that information, but she couldn't do anything about it anymore as it already happened. Just as Somi said to her, she was still lucky that only a few hours had passed outside of the Gate. As for what Somi said about her Soul Veins, she was right, she did feel that the Mana inside her body had become even more stable than before.
"I see, thanks for the explanation, Lady Somi. Things are now clearer."
"No problem, partially it was my Mother's fault since she didn't explain anything correctly to you." Somi just shook her head in response and said that her Mother was the one to blame.
"Who is this, I don't remember a little girl coming with you when you entered the Gate?" Alice asked as she finally noticed Somi's presence because there was no Mana inside her little body, she didn't feel that someone was behind Mio, only when Somi talked is whe she realizes that there was a little girl.