More Talks, MA Technology, Reasons You Should Never Trust an Elf & Evolution

A/N:

" " : Dialogue,

' ' : Thought,

[ ] : System, Raphael,

"Italicized text" : Telepathy,

{ }: Parallel Wills,

// // : W System announcement.

< > : Majutsu/Conjuring usage.(Using MA energy for skills, spells, etc.)

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Shiraori POV

Blinking my eyes open, I notice that my vision is upside down and I seem to be held up by some threads, my threads. I look to what is currently my left and see Ariel lying down on the floor with her top half inside a barrel and Dante on my right just laying on a blanket and pillow.. 'Guess I drank quite a lot last night.' I think to myself as I use my Telekinesis and Thread Control to free myself from the tangle of threads.

Stretching my human half, I hear footsteps approaching and look to see Merazophis dressed neatly with a tranquil expression on his face. "I took your words from last night to heart. It's embarrassing but I lost sight of what I have to do but now I have made up my mind. Thank you very much." He says with a bow.

"Well, good for you then." I say while yawning. I feel Dante and Ariel stir and wake up and I greet them. On an unrelated note, Dante taught Ariel Japanese to ease her ability to communicate with the other reincarnators, should she ever have to meet them.

After everyone woke up, we got rid of the empty barrels and Ariel moved out to the city with Merazophis and Sophia while Dante and I stayed with the puppet taratects at a hill formation beyond the outskirts of the city.

Regarding the puppets, Ariel and finally named them, but I don't think she was putting in much if any effort. The names she gave the 10 that follow us were Ael, Sael, Fiel, Riel, Fael, Fel, Siel, Aela, Raela and Ella. You see what I mean, no effort.

Either way, I'm busy just checking their physical condition and looking for places to make improvements on in their outer shells. So far, I've put in a compartment where they can hide four of their arms making their bodies look more human. I've also worked on making the eyes on their faces look more human.

"Shiro." I hear Dante call me and I turn to him, only to see his face looking solemn. "Dante, what's wrong?" I ask as I walk up to him and put my hands on his face. "If I told you that I knew about you and the possible ways your life could have turned out and used that to my advantage, would you be mad?" He asks, causing me to raise a brow.

"What do you mean by that? I ask, slightly tilting his face. "It's just... Here." He says and puts a finger on my forehead and I suddenly enter a trance as memories start flooding into my brain.

Some minutes pass and we are both silent. Me, from the insane truth that he just revealed to me about what my life could have been, and him, from what I assume to be guilt that he felt from keeping this from me for all this time.

"*Sigh* Have you shown anyone else this?" I ask him with my head down. "Honestly, yes. I showed your mother everything up to where you would have killed her." He tells me while holding my hands.

I take a deep breath and exhale before continuing. "That's me in another timeline, right? A timeline where you didn't exist and I became enemies with Ariel and the rest of the puppets were also killed by me. Right?" I ask him as I look into his eyes and he nods, his eyes seemingly getting darker.

"Then there's no need to worry about it right now." I say as his eyes regain some of their spark. "Listen to me, okay. You already showed me that a lot of worlds and stories that I thought were fantastical were actually worlds that exist somewhere out of my reach. So there's no reason why mine wouldn't also possibly be the same. And besides, that could've been me, but it's not. I don't have you in that timeline. I'm not as powerful or as expressive in that timeline. So don't feel guilty for not showing me a worse life than the one I have now, okay." I say and kiss him while hugging him with my scythe-legs.

He reciprocates my hug and starts kissing me more proactively and strongly, pushing his tongue into my human mouth and engaging in a passionate dance. The kiss is so pleasurable that it actually scrambles my detection and connection to my parallel wills and almost destroys my sense of time. Some minutes pass with us just kissing and hugging each other passionately and we eventually part our lips with a string of saliva in between us.

"Thank you. Really, thank you for understanding." He says to me with a smile. "And thank you for sparing me from such a life." I say and turn my spider head to the left to see the puppets all watching us. "Do you mind?" I ask with a raised brow and they all turn their heads away, causing me to shake my head.

"Hehe, no need to be hard on them. They're just curious." Dante says with a laugh. "Fine. But what are we going to do now? Because there's nothing fun or interesting to do right now." I say while pouting. "Why don't you get the flight skill and we'll begin training it. When you get bored of that, we'll move over to your swimming skill." He says as he makes a hole in the ground that measures 30 by 50 by 20 metres and fills it with water using magic.

"I'm sure this can at least keep you busy until they're back." He says as he lays back while manipulating the water and air to be more turbulent, so as to provide the challenge that would cause both skills to grow faster. Taking a deep breath, I jump into the water and begin swimming. 'Might as well then.' I think to myself as I focus on the task.

Dante POV

Some hours pass by as I supervise Shiro's skill leveling and I turn my head to Ariel coming back from the town with Merazophis and Sophia. Of course, I had noticed that Ariel had been in contact with the Pontiff of the Word of God religion, Dustin.

Dustin was an interesting individual in this world. Despite the way the system works, in that it rips out the MA energy in souls, thereby taking all skills, titles, stats and memories from those souls and turning them blank, and then reinserts those souls back into the world Dustin is somewhat excluded from this as he reincarnates with his memories every single time, and has been doing so for centuries. This is evidenced by the fact that this Dustin is known as Dustin LXI, being the 60th reincarnation since his first shot at life.

Moving past that, it seems that Merazophis has also been able to feed during the time that they were in the town which is good for him as it would have caused an unbearable thirst if he kept himself from feeding for much longer.

After they reach us at the carriage/camp, I feel a spatial distortion and Güliedistosiez's presence coming from it which causes me to become slightly suspicious as there should be no reason for him to appear here except maybe Ariel or maybe Shiro's parallel wills that are laying eggs in the labyrinth.

"Ahh, Güliedistosiez" "Haah, Kuro" Ariel and Shiraori say simultaneously causing them to pause for a few seconds. "Ariel, how have to been?" He asks, causing my suspicion to increase. Sighing, Ariel responds. "I'm fine, Güliedistosiez. I've actually enjoyed my time with my travel companions." She says, waving her hands as if pointing each of us out and her hand stops, pointing in my direction, causing Güliedistosiez some confusion.

"Why are you pointing there? There's nobody there." He says and everyone but Shiraori looks at me with questioning gazes. Sighing, I allow Güliedistosiez to be able to perceive me, which causes him visible shock as he had never had anyone in his environment that remained beyond his perception. "Who are you!?" He says with clear aggression in his voice.

"I believe Ariel has told you who we all are, at least to her, we're her companions, Güliedistosiez." I say calmly, ignoring his unnecessary aggression towards me. "Ariel, who is he and why are you traveling with someone as dangerous as him!?" He shouts while asking Ariel, causing her expression to harden.

"You might have been Sariel-sama's companion and friend, but that doesn't mean that you suddenly have control over my life, and besides, he has proven himself trustworthy and strong enough to be my companion so I see no reason to be suspicious of him." She says as she sits down on one of the seats in the carriage. "Now can we get beyond this and just have a drink." She says, pulling out a barrel with a few cups.

Shrugging my shoulders, I reach out and take my drink with Shiro and Merazophis doing the same but Güliedistosiez is still looking at me while in an attack stance. "Okay, I'm getting tired of this shit." I say then turn to him. "If I wanted to kill anyone here, nobody could stop me. As a matter of fact, if I wanted to kill you, you wouldn't have known and trust me, I've had chances to do so. If you want to know when they were, think of everytime you met with Shiro." I say, causing him to contemplate the implications of what I just said, before he calms down and accepts a cup from Ariel.

After drinking for a while, I notice Sophia pass out after sneaking a taste of alcohol from Merazophis' cup. As for Merazophis himself, he was relaxed after drinking and Shiro was starting to loosen up once more, although this time she was just enjoying resting on me.

"How and when did you meet her?" I turn as Güliedistosiez asks me. Looking back at Shiraori who's resting on me and believe it or not, sniffing me, I answer him. "I met her while she was running away from her mother after she tried eating her. Back then, she was just a Smaller Lesser Taratect that happened to be fast while having a human's intelligence and I was a boy who just watched his mother die and had to bury her, but as time went on, she became the only one I would have ever accepted to be my lifelong companion and I'm glad to say that I still stand by that." I say causing Shiro to blush heavily.

"You mean that?" Shiraori asks, looking me in my eyes. "Of course, now and forever." I say as I plant a soft kiss on her lips. "Well, moving past the two lovebirds over there. Why did you come by, Güliedistosiez?" Ariel asks him while glossing over what was essentially a proposal. "I simply came by to check up on an old friend." He said, before gulping down the rest of his drink.

"Well, thank you for your consideration, as you can see, there's nothing to worry about." Ariel says then she takes another swig of her drink. "Ariel, have you still not forgiven them for what they have done? Do you still hate humanity so strongly?" He asks, causing Ariel some pause.

Shortly after, her face morphs into an expression of rage and bloodlust, showing the extent of her hatred for humanity. "Of course I do. I hate them all. Those bastards who sacrificed Sariel-sama and go on with their lives so nonchalantly.This world that keeps living on and draining her of what little is left of her. I hate it all so much that it's unbearable. I want to kill and erase every single one of them so that not even a single smidge of them remains. But it would be against Sariel-sama's wishes." She says while grinding her teeth.

"Whaaat an idiot!" Shiro says from her position at my side causing Ariel to whip her neck in her direction. "What did you just say?" Güliedistosiez asks while Ariel prepares to attack Shiro. "I called her an idiot 'cause she is one. Holding yourself back from doing whatever the hell you want because of some strangers you don't know from anywhere, doesn't that just sound crazy? Seriously, who cares what others say or do? The only important thing for you should be what you want to do. I don't know about you, but I'd it was me, then I'd trample all over those strangers." Shiraori says in a bout of seriousness that I wouldn't have expected from her being drunk, If I hadn't already seen it coming.

Ariel calms down and says with a smile, "Maybe it would have been easier for us if we were as selfish and self-centered as Shiraori here." , as she sits back down. A few seconds of silence ensue before being interrupted by Güliedistosiez. "I see. Looking at it now, they are quite similar." He says, drawing Ariel's interest.

"Who?" Ariel asks with her drink back in her hand. "I was always wondering why D has her eyes on her. It's because she's similar to D with her endless pride and having no restraints." He says, causing Shiro to immediately object to such a statement.

"It's just my frank opinion." He says and I feel a subtle spatial distortion as the a smartphone is teleported in between the three of them. "And what's more worrying is that..." He continues before being interrupted by D. "That's enough."

The abrupt interruption causes all of them to look at the smartphone. "You can talk, but you should also understand not to go too far with your chitchat. You understand what I'm saying, right?" D says, causing Güliedistosiez to pause and nod. "Yeah, you're right. I might have drunk too much."

"Very well. See you later then." She says and teleports the smartphone away. "What was that?" Ariel asks Shiraori with an accusatory gaze. "Who knows? Haha." Shiro responds with her head turned away.

"My goodness. In every age, in every world, it's always the selfish ones that cause big accidents and big changes. I wonder what kind of changes would be brought forth by the both of you in the future." Güliedistosiez says to Shiraori and I, causing us to think for a bit and respond simultaneously. ""Dunno""

Moving past the discussions that happened, we drank for a while longer before hitting the hay. Morning came by and the carriage had stopped at the outskirts of the last town we would see for quite a while. "This is where they would have made the decision to follow us in that timeline. But now they've already made that decision long before now, so I'm wondering how their relationship is going to turn out." I tell Shiro telepathically to avoid drawing their attention.

"However it'll go is how it'll go, we've just got to see the best we can get from it." She replies as she rests her head on my shoulder. "Mera. As we are going into the Demon Country, I want you to understand this. You're mine and mine alone. My words are absolute, understood?" Sophia says to Merazophis while pointing at him, a determined, almost obsessive expression on her face. "Of course, my life and entire being are for the young lady's sake." He responds while kneeling to her in oath.

"Well, at least we know that our resident yandere will stay the same." I say to Shiro and she taps my chest. "Hey, her preference is not for us to criticize. Besides, she doesn't really start anything with him until she's 15, so there's no need for alarm." Shiro says while holding my hand. "Well, seeing as that's over with, let's start heading to the Demon Country!" Ariel shouts out from behind us.

"Now say it one more time 'A' ..." Ariel says and the puppets and Sophia all respond, ""A~I~U~E~O"" A few days have passed since we started heading toward Demon Country and Shiro told Ariel about her success in building artificial vocal cords that the puppet taratects could use to speak so for a while now, they've been training their vocal cords to get used to them. So far, their progress isn't that bad.

As for Sophia, she's there mainly because she hardly speaks, cries or screams, leading to her vocal cords basically being unused and her having a lisp. And since she gets embarrassed about her lisp, she switches to Telepathy to communicate, leading to her vocal cords continuing to go unused.

Another thing we noticed about Sophia was that she started being particularly irritated whenever she saw Merazophis interacting with a girl, regardless of who or what they were, except for Ariel and Shiro. This had led to her gaining the Jealousy skill, which Ariel had advised against her raising due to the effects the Sin and Virtue skills have on their wielders.

"You're really serious about it, aren't you? Is there really a need to do that?" Shiraori asks, referring to a topic I had brought up a few days ago. "Yeah, I'm gonna do it. I have the ability to traverse the Multiverse and possibly even the Omniverse, limiting myself to only a single world for a whole 15 years for something that can be sped up to my advantage is stupid. Besides, it's not like we have any particularly important bond with the others apart from the fact that we all reincarnated from another world." I respond, firm in my decision.

"But speeding up time in such a large space would definitely catch 'their' attention." She says, referring to D and the other High Administrators. "Well, by the time we get there, we'll be much more powerful than they are, so we won't need to be worried." I assure her.

Moving past that, we've upped the difficulty of Sophia and Merazophis' training, mainly with increased gravity and increasing the number of spells they have to multicast. Shiro and I haven't really seen any increase in our power just yet, but we know what's coming so we aren't too worried about it. As we keep moving, we eventually come upon the territory of Wind Drakes. Ariel just waved at them and told them we were passing by.

Some hours pass and night falls, so we choose to stop for a while and take a rest, this time without alcohol. "Who exactly is Potimas?" Sophia asks and Ariel delivers the funniest and most accurate answer immediately. "He's a damn trash bag." She says it with the most accusatory yet calm face ever.

"T- that's not what I meant. I already know he's a bad person." Sophia says with a sigh. "Well, it's as good a time as any, so let's talk about it for a bit but be warned, there's no going back once you've heard about it, understood?" Ariel says as her face and tone grow more solemn.

"Potimas Harrifenas, the Chieftain of the Elves. I'll quickly explain what the elves are first. In this world, there are three humanoid races, the humans, the demons and finally, the elves. The main difference between these races is their lifespan. If human lifespan was 1, then demon lifespan would be 2-3 and elf would be 10. Their physical growth is so slow that even elven children are good at using magic skills, not to mention, they aren't weak physically either." She says, explaining elven physiology.

"Most of the elves live their lives tucked away in a village in the Garam Great Forest which is full of ferocious monsters comparable to some Lower Stratum monsters. There's a powerful barrier surrounding the village and elves rarely leave so other races don't interact with them in general." She says, this time explaining the common knowledge of the elves' location.

"They look down on humans and demons and are completely isolationist. That's all the common knowledge on elves, but you want to know what's deeper, right?" She asks and Sophia nods.

"The elves are the only ones in the world that have advanced technology. Compared to everyone else right now, they've got extremely high tech. If you were to compare it to the world you came from, their tech is probably more advanced." She says, leaving Sophia flabbergasted and Merazophis confused.

"They're using that technology to operate in secret. Now, I don't know why Potimas tried to kill Sophia. We know that he knew that Sophia was reincarnated and it seems that his initial goal had changed. From what we saw from his memories, we know that every living elf is made by cloning his DNA or inseminating female elves with his sperm, and we also know that he puts a small piece of his soul in them when they're born to have control over them. So it's possible he wanted to do that to you as well, but changed his mind when he saw you already had a full consciousness of your own and that you were a vampire." Ariel says, causing Sophia to break into a cold sweat.

"Those machines. Why do the elves of all races have technology like that when it doesn't exactly fit their image?" Sophia asks after calming down. "Yeah, that would be strange to anyone who doesn't know, especially people from your world. The rest of the world is primitive but only the elves have such advanced technology. It's quite out of place from your perspective, isn't it?." Ariel says and Sophia nods in response.

"But the reality of the world is actually the opposite." Ariel says, prompting Merazophis and Sophia to ask, ""Opposite?"" and she nods before continuing. "A civilization doesn't just spring up. It's impossible that a small enclave of isolated people would suddenly become advanced." She says and Merazophis nods in understanding. "So that's why you said that it's the opposite." He says and she continues. "It's not that the elves alone became advanced, it's that everyone except the elves collapsed. Mankind had made a huge mistake, civilizations fell apart, technology was lost for the most part. However, Potimas and his elves were able to preserve the machine technology that was partly the reason for the collapse and they still use it to this day." Ariel says solemnly.

"Don't worry about it, Ariel. You're not alone in your campaign against Potimas. Remember, we've all got a personal stake in this and you can trust that at the very least, we will make Potimas pay for all he's done." I say to Ariel to reassure her. "Now let's hit the hay, we might not get exhausted but you two still do and a good night's sleep is always pleasant." I say to Sophia and Merazophis before making a few beds on the carriage for all of us to sleep.

Morning comes and we notice that there are drones up in the sky, Potimas' drones. Shiraori and I destroy them before they reach a point where they can actually capture any footage of us.

As we keep moving, I stand up and tell them that we should walk from here on out. "Why?"Ariel asks. "Shiraori and I have detected something underground, and we think it'll be best if we investigate it." I tell her, being vague on purpose.

"Fine then, but if it's a waste of time , that's on you." She says as she, the puppets, Merazophis and Sophia jump out of the carriage, then I disperse it and the Fenerush constructs.

Walking forward, I collapse the floor ahead of us, to expose a large space being occupied by a colony of ant monsters. Using Acoustikinesis, I release a multilayered shockwave in their direction that ruptures their innards, killing them. Looking down, I see the extra layers of the colony then use geokinesis to make large holes for all of us to jump through to get to the bottom of the colony.

As I jump into the holes, everyone follows me with Shiraori firing spells to kill the ants in each layer and upon reaching the bottom, she uses a barrage of overcharged Black Spears to kill the Queen. Using Spatiokinesis, I store the bodies of the ants while everyone walks toward the large doors that are clearly man-made.

Ariel walks to the doors and pries one of them open causing alarms to blare loudly. "We're going in to investigate these 'ancient ruins', but I don't know what is in there so stay close to me." She says, mainly to Merazophis and Sophia, then we all follow her beyond the doors.

As we walk down a hallway made entirely of metal, Merazophis tries checking the walls for any deterioration and is surprised to find none. "You said it's ancient but there's no sign of decay, is it magic?" He asks and Ariel lightly shakes her head. "There's no magic at play here, the materials are just really sturdy. Also..." She says as gun turrets come out from panels on the walls. "It looks like this facility is still 'alive'." She says as she speedily slashes the guns into pieces with her threads before they can fire.

"D-did the Demon King do this? I didn't even see anything happen." Sophia says as she saunters past the scraps left of the guns. Using Matter Manipulation and Telekinesis, I take the metal from the door and guns and mold it into a few swords, maces and clubs then hand them over to the puppet taratects so they would have some effective weaponry to use against the rest.

As we keep walking down the hallway, we come across a pair of large sliding doors that seem to lead to a storage room of sorts. I liquefy the doors and use them to make the weapons I had given to the puppets stronger and larger. Walking into the room we see multiple mobile turrets that activate shortly after and begin firing at us.

Before the shots can reach us, I protect Sophia, Merazophis and the puppet taratects' real bodies from the attacks with Force Armor then I scan the turrets and find that the platforms under them are still siphoning MA energy from the planet. Seeing this, I create a sphere with runes in my hand for the sole purpose of pulling out all MA energy present from within machine technology immediately after destruction within a spherical radius of 1,300 kilometres, then I use my own threads to attack the turrets at breakneck speeds with the puppets attacking them with the weapons I had given them.

Shortly after we finish with the last turret, a tank fires a projectile at Sael and smashes half of the head and right shoulder of her shell. As we turn to it, we notice that it's about to shoot at her on the floor and Ariel dashes and caries her away from the line of fire. Shiraori seeing this, sends a quick barrage of Black Spears to attack the tank but they all get dispelled by the Anti-Magic Barrier on it. Taking note of its ability to dispel her magic and attributed attacks, she pulled out her scythe then leaped and slashes it into two, causing it to crumble to dust.

Noticing the changes to her scythe, she frowns as she knows that D is the only one that would have tampered with her scythe. "A Rot attribute weapon. That's something I've never seen before." Ariel says as she attempts to repair Sael's shell only to see it almost fully repaired. She then looks at me and nods on gratitude.

Sensing the self-destruct mechanisms in the area, I put up a Force Armor on everyone else while I amplify the siphoning of MA energy into the runic sphere. "Dante, what's going on!?" Shiro asks, alarmed by me suddenly encapsulating them in a protective spell. "The place was rigged to blow when the turrets and tank were destroyed. But don't worry about me, it won't be able to harm me." I say and shortly after, the place is engulfed in an earthshaking explosion and a pillar of fire.

After the shockwaves subside, I clear all the dust and lingering flames and look to the sky at the massive machine reminiscent of a UFO, the G-Fleet. And despite my clear capability to destroy it in a single attack, I let it be.

*Image here*

""Ah, a UF..""Shiro and Sophia start saying before quickly stopping themselves. Ariel, however was looking up at the G-Fleet and wondering how she would destroy it. "That explosion was the fuel for launching this thing into the sky. Destroying this thing with my Gluttony is going to be difficult." She says, when a wind dragon suddenly comes comes down and starts ranting telepathically. "Hey buddy, What's the big idea, you damn dirty spider chick?!"

Hyuvan, the Wind Dragon, one of the stronger dragons that are direct subordinates to Güliedistosiez and someone who speaks like a second-rate thug, at least that's the perception of people raised as a Yamato Nadeshiko. "We let you pass 'cause you said you wouldn't do nothin', but fat lot of good that did us. What's the deal?" He says in complaint.

"You better 'fess up or things are gonna get ugly." He says, causing Ariel to finally look at him. "Oh really, and what exactly could a puny little wind dragon such as yourself do to me?" She says, slightly annoyed. "I ain't stupid, I know I can't whoop you, spider! But if you lay a hand on me, the boss is gonna have something to say about it, got it?" He says, making me rethink my earlier evaluation of him. 'Scratch that, he's really just a second rate thug.'

"Oh really? That's perfect. I have a feeling I'll not be able to handle this alone, even with them supporting me, so go ahead and call Güliedistosiez for me." She says, surprising Hyuvan and causing Shiro's brow to furrow in offense just for an instant before returning to their resting position. "Wait, you for real, girlie? He could bump you off in one blow, you know?" He asks, incredulous to the fact that Ariel doesn't seem to fear Güliedistosiez.

"I do not enjoy repeating myself, or do you not see what we're up against?" She says, pointing to the G-Fleet in the sky. "Of course I can see it, you palooka. What the hell is it anyway?" He says while looking up at it. "That's what I want to know. I'm not sure if you realize it, but that thing was buried underneath this wasteland, your territory. So do you mind telling me how you hadn't noticed something like that was here?" She asks with some veins popping on her forehead.

Hearing what Ariel had said, Hyuvan could only manage a small "Huh?" after attempting to process the implications of the situation. Practically fuming, Ariel uses her thread to pull Hyuvan down to the ground and lightly step on his head. "Now, I'm going to explain this as simply as I possibly can so even your tiny little brain can understand. We happened to find some ruins that were hidden underground that dated back to an era before the system started operating, so we chose to investigate and that thing came out. Understand?" She says while grinding her foot against him and he shakes his head, showing that he still doesn't understand.

"Ugh, just call Güliedistosiez." She says, exasperated by the sheer stupidity of the dragon. She turns back to face the G-Fleet without any expression when Sophia asks a question that has been sitting on everyone's tongues, bar mine and Shiraori's. "Em, Miss Ariel, what are we going to do?"

"Good question. I get the feeling that I would have far too much trouble trying to bring that thing down. As things are, we really might have to wait for Güliedistosiez to get here." She says in a surprisingly humble tone.

Shortly after she says that, we notice the G-Fleet fly a bit closer to us and release flying objects which I know to actually be multiple of the fighter jet model of robots, the G-Tri.

*Image here*

Before they could get close, I created a multitude of Lightning Spears and fire them while leaving the runic sphere to absorb the MA energy within the ones that got hit.

"I can keep the jets from reaching us, but even I can run out of energy." I say, lying to them to keep up the farce. Understanding what I mean, Ariel nods and turns to Hyuvan, telling him to speed up calling Güliedistosiez.

"Who is this Güliedistosiez that she keeps talking about?" Sophia asks, wondering if she had met the person before. "You remember the guy who was fully clad in black armor? That's him. He's one of the administrators of this world, to be precise, he's the dragon administrator, or basically a god of the dragons." I tell her and her and Merazophis' eyes widen as they think of what I mean.

A few seconds later, I feel a spatial distortion not far from us, but unlike Shiro's and Güliedistosiez's, this one was more rough and unrefined, like one would expect from a human in this world when compared to either of us.

Two men step out of the teleport gate, one of them clad in what is clearly covert garb used by assassins and shadows, essentially the Black Ops soldiers of the fantasy world and the other dressed in what I can only describe as a luxurious pope raiment. I already knew who the second man was, and so did Shiraori and Ariel, as he was none other than the pope of the Word of God religion, Dustin LXI.

"Forgive us. I must apologize for appearing in front of you so suddenly, but this seems to be an emergency situation." Dustin says as the gate closes. "Dustin, what exactly is the pontiff of the Word of God religion doing here now of all times?" Ariel asks, with an intense glare.

"This busy time is exactly why I have come here. You may not like this but could we perhaps call a temporary truce in order to deal with this threat?" He says while looking at Sophia and Merazophis. 'Right, he's the one who gave the order to the members of the Word of God religion to support the Ohts Kingdom to attack Sariella.' I think to myself as I drastically slow down the time of the G-Fleet and G-Tri to the point that they almost look stationary while putting up an illusion of them still moving at normal speeds.

"Okay, I understand that things aren't looking particularly pleasant right now, but what exactly could you do against that?" Ariel says while pointing at the G-Fleet. "Anything I could possibly do, after all we cannot just ignore it." He says. "I see. But I really wonder what you think you could do to it. Even I do not feel like I could take it down myself. I honestly think our only option is to call Güliedistosiez to deal with it. "She says with her arms crossed at her torso.

Immediately after she says that, I feel a spatial distortion that was far more efficient and refined than Shiro's. "That is correct. This is a situation for me to deal with alone, not a matter for you to worry yourselves about." Güliedistosiez says as he steps out of the gate. "Ah, there you are boss." Hyuvan says when he sees Güliedistosiez appear.

"Thank you for informing me of this, Ariel. I am afraid that I have inconvenienced you as a result of my own oversight. Let me take care of things from here on out." Güliedistosiez says, but almost immediately after a third warp comes in, this one just slightly more refined than Dustin's aide. Potimas' had finally arrived.

"Oh good, the rest of you are here." As he said that, every single one person except for me looked at him with murderous expressions. "Now now, don't be so quick to anger. I've come to help this time." He says ignoring the killing intent being focused onto him. 'Then again, it's not like this is his actual body. That's just a type-A Gloria.' I think to myself as I tune out his voice and look up into outer space, seeing the octopus-like device that was launched at the same time as the G-Fleet.

Eventually tuning back into the conversation, I see Potimas bring up a sphere that is projecting a 3-D hologram of the blueprints of the G-Fleet. "What is this?" Güliedistosiez asks him with a balled up fist. "Is it not obvious? These are the schematics of the floating weapon codename "G-Fleet"." Potimas responds seemingly nonchalantly.

Dustin grimaces as he asks Potimas why he would have the schematics of the G-Fleet and Potimas just chuckles. "Do I really have to spell it out for you to understand?" He says with a mocking expression plastered on his face. "I see. As expected, you are the one at fault for this." Ariel says as she takes a heavy step toward him.

"Do not rush to conclusions. I may have created the schematics but I didn't create it. I did not even know it had been made until I came here. Otherwise, why do you think I would have come here." He says, rolling his eyes mockingly. Ariel senses the mockery and grinds her teeth against each other in frustration.

"Long ago, I gave the schematics to a certain nation in exchange for funding and supplies for my research. At the time, I thought that they would simply use parts of the designs to create other weapons, but I never imagined that they would complete it to this extent." He says and huffs in depreciation.

"Seriously, who would such a thing as that? It's simply unrealistic. I wasn't even completely serious when I created those plans. Frankly, it is nothing short of shameful for me to see it take form like this." He said, sounding uncharacteristically embarrassed.

"So is this the reason that you intend to assist us?" Güliedistosiez asks. "No. That is merely my personal feelings on the matter. I have another reason to help. If we leave that thing to its own devices, then it could very well destroy the planet and even I wouldn't be thrilled about that." He says, causing everyone's expressions to turn serious.

"Is that true?" Güliedistosiez asks dubiously. "Sadly, it is. I would be much happier if it were a joke. You see, the G-Fleet in and of itself doesn't possess such destructive capabilities. The problem is that the bomb which is most likely loaded on it does." He taps the sphere as he says this, bringing up the schematics of the bomb in the shape of a sphere.

"This is the GMA bomb. The more MA energy it is filled with, the more powerful it is." Potimas says. The phrase 'MA energy' causes everyone to react. "Hmm, what's the difference between this bomb's minimum and maximum power?" Dustin asks, causing Potimas to look at him like he was an idiot.

"Hmph, is there even any reason to discuss it's minimum power? That would be a state where the bomb doesn't have any MA energy at all. It would not function without fuel, in other words, it wouldn't explode. I thought that was quite obvious." He says insultingly, causing Dustin's genial expression to become flat.

After he said that, the already tense atmosphere became suffocating. Ignoring Dustin's fouled mood, Potimas continues, "As for its maximum , it is as I had said earlier. I'm the worst case scenario, it could very well destroy this entire planet. However, that is a theoretical maximum as it would be impossible to extract that much MA energy. According to my simulations, the damage would probably be limited to destroying the continent at most, but then again, that's basically the same thing as destroying the world."

Squinting his eyes, Güliedistosiez asks him why he believes the bomb is on board the G-Fleet. "It's because that too was a schematic that I had given that nation. The plans for the G-Fleet along the plans for the GMA bomb. The G-Fleet is designed to carry the GMA bomb. That way, if it has insufficient fuel, it can draw energy from the GMA bomb. Essentially, the GMA bomb serves as a backup fuel source. And if these people went as far as to build the G-Fleet, I highly doubt they would have left out such a crucial component." He says, his voice firm.

"And according to my observations with an MA energy measuring device, it is all but certain that there is a GMA bomb on the G-Fleet." He says as he looks at the G-Fleet before continuing. "Fortunately, it doesn't seem as if the G-Fleet is going to drop the GMA bomb right away. As you may imagine, from the GMA bomb's power, the G-Fleet is designed to drop the bomb from outer space, high enough that the G-Fleet will not get caught in the ensuing explosion. Since it hasn't reached that height, it is safe to assume that it is not actively attempting to drop the GMA bomb. However, it is possible that it will passively drop the GMA bomb. If it is in any of the preregistered several emergency situations, such as it being shot down." He says, causing everyone to go from slight relief to greater distress.

"You said several, didn't you? What are the other conditions?" Dustin asks, only to be met with a casual response that sunk the atmosphere even more. "If it enters a confrontation with a dragon. It was originally created as a countermeasure against dragons, you see. Is it really that surprising?"

With furrowed brows, Dustin asks "Is that really true?", with suspicion and a glare, to which Potimas just shrugs and says, "If you doubt my words, then why don't you find out for yourself?" After he says this, Güliedistosiez closes his eyes to contemplate the truth of Potimas' words.

"Well, whether you believe me or not, there is something that I would like you to do." Potimas says, switching the hologram to the schematics of another weapon, this one looking like an octopus. "This is another schematic that I gave those same people. It is a defective weapon, however, as it has no use except for the G-Fleet, so I assumed it would not be made." He says with a depreciating laugh. "This is the G-Meteo, a disruptive weapon that is meant to pull in asteroids from the moon's and drop them on this planet."

After a short pause, he turns to Ariel. "Ariel, did you see anything get fired up into space?" He asks, causing Ariel to squint her eyes while Shiraori widens hers. They look at each other as if communicating telepathically before turning to face Potimas. "I did. I don't know if it was this thing or not, but something was definitely shot up there." She says, causing Potimas to sigh.

"I suspected as much. If they made the G-Fleet , then I feared they might have made this as well. *Sigh* So they really did, did they?" He says with a pained look. Growling, Ariel shakes her head. "What were you thinking when you designed this thing?" She says tiredly. "It was so long ago that I've long forgotten, but I was probably just blowing off some steam after a long stretch of research." Potimas responds, causing another vein to pop on her forehead.

"All right, first things first, I'm going to kill you." She says and he puts up his hands in mock surrender. "Just so we're clear, I designed those weapons but I didn't actually make them. The blame lies with those who actually built these things." He says, causing Ariel to huff in disbelief. "So you're trying to say it isn't your fault that the world is about to be destroyed? That's a bit of a stretch, don't you think?" She says, rightly accusing him. "I certainly do not. I simply provided the knowledge, what they decided to do with it is none of my business. I've done nothing wrong." Potimas says, doubling down on his claim to innocence.

The tension in the air shoots up so high that if someone focused, they could see the electricity clash, but before it could explode, Güliedistosiez intervened. "Enough. Debating where the blame lies is pointless." He says and Ariel huffs before relaxing her previously balled up fist while somehow looking more irritated than before.

"For now, let's summarize the situation. Firstly, the weapon floating in the sky is called the G-Fleet and it is equipped with the so-called GMA bomb, which has the power to destroy an entire continent. And the G-Meteo, a weapon that can catch asteroids and drop them onto the planet is already flying in space. Does that sound right so far?" Güliedistosiez says, and everyone nods at his summary.

"These weapons' goals are currently unknown. However, since they've been activated without purpose, it is possible they will begin destroying things indiscriminately. The G-Meteo, in particular, may already be trying to drop asteroids onto this planet. Is that correct?" He asks Potimas and he nods grimly.

A few seconds of silence pass, with Shiraori contemplating the situation and her eyes widening in realization for an instant before returning to her usual deadpan face. "Whether they plan to begin wreaking havoc or simply stay on standby, we cannot leave them be. Now, let us begin our plan of attack for each weapon. Potimas, you want me to deal with the G-Meteo, right?" He says and Potimas nods with what should easily be seen as a suspicious amount of enthusiasm. "I am glad you understand, Güliedistosiez. Now that the G-Meteo is in space, you are the only one that can destroy it. Then the role of dealing with the G-Fleet will fall to our remaining number." He says as he turns his eyes to Shiraori, Ariel and I.

Güliedistosiez thinks for a while then asks if he really can't help.with attacking the G-Fleet before he moves on to the G-Meteo only for Potimas to shake his head and remind him that the G-Fleet was made as an anti-dragon weapon that would self-destruct if it end up in a confrontation with a dragon, causing him to fall silent.

"Besides, either way it goes, we cannot waste time waiting for you to return." Potimas says as he switches the hologram to live footage of the G-Fleet, or more accurately, the illusion I placed over the G-Fleet and the area around it, showing it lowering its altitude to only be a few metres above the ground, opening a hatch and letting out thousands of robot turrets and tanks down a long ramp.

"As you can see, the G-Fleet's forces have already begun their advance and judging by their current speed, they will reach human habitation within 12 hours." Potimas says and Dustin pales at the thought. "There's no time to spare, then." Güliedistosiez says and Potimas nods, saying we must attack them simultaneously. Güliedistosiez looks at Potimas, trying to gauge his motives but Potimas keeps a poker face.

"May I see those schematics?" Güliedistosiez asks with his hand out and Potimas complies immediately. After checking each of the schematics, he returns the sphere to Potimas. "He does not seem to be lying." Güliedistosiez says, causing everyone's suspicions to heighten even more.

"I am sure I cannot convince you to trust me completely, but I swear to you that I fully intend to focus on dealing with this situation with all my might. I would not want this planet to become devoid of life, after all." Potimas says and Ariel, Güliedistosiez and Dustin exchange glances and resign themselves to the situation.

"Very well. I will go deal with the G-Meteo while the rest of you contend with the G-Fleet." Güliedistosiez says, nodding his head reluctantly. "So? What's our plan of attack?" Ariel drawls in annoyance with the situation. "Obviously, our top priority is dealing with the GMA bomb, so we'll have to infiltrate the G-Fleet. The infiltration team will disable the GMA bomb while everyone else will keep the G-Fleet occupied from the outside. Once the GMA bomb has been disabled, we can entrust the rest to Güliedistosiez or take it down with our own hands. Is that acceptable?" Potimas says, proposing a simple but effective plan to which Ariel and Dustin agree.

"Dustin, how many forces can you gather here?" Potimas says and Dustin responds quickly: "30,000 elite human soldiers." After which Ariel teases him. "If you can mobilize that many soldiers at the drop of a hat then how'd you manage to fail at invading Sariella?" She says, snickering.

"There's no need to worry. The troops I intend to dispatch for this are my emergency defense forces and are unrelated to the army that was sent to Sariella." Dustin replies and Ariel points out how that would leave his homeland defenseless while laughing evilly with her hand over her mouth only for him to flatly tell her that this is considered an emergency so he will use them here.

"Well, summon them at once and have them intercept the route that the G-Fleet's forces are taking." Ariel says, still on her mischievous streak. "I take no orders from you and besides, I would have told them to do that anyway. Now, if you will excuse me, it will take some time to summon the troops but I will attempt to return posthaste." He replies angrily before teleporting away with his aide.

"I will bring elven reinforcements as well. However, I myself intend to participate in the infiltration of the G-Fleet, as I am by far the most qualified to handle the GMA bomb." 'No, you're not.' "Ariel and the both of you, you will enter the G-Fleet alongside me. That is acceptable, I assume." He says, to which Shiro and I just nod.

"I see. So a small elite team, then?" Ariel asks and he nods. "Alright, however if you dare to pull any tricks, I will kill you, understand?" She says and he agrees again but not before slipping in a taunt. "Certainly. If you think you can handle this without me, then go right ahead." He says, making her even warier of his intentions. "Give me that." She points at the projector in his hands and he hands it over to her without argument before teleporting away to get his forces.

"I shall take action as well l, Hyuvan." "Yes, sir." Güliedistosiez says to Hyuvan, who had flown away when the meeting began. 'Well, that's my cue.' I say as I speed up time under the illusion to get the G-Tri planes, turrets and tanks to the positions they are in within the illusion and then stop time for everyone and everything except Shiro, Güliedistosiez and myself.

Sensing the change in the environment as all sounds and vibrations stop, Güliedistosiez immediately becomes alert and swivels his head back and forth, looking for the culprit. "There's no need to look around so frantically, Güliedistosiez. I'm the one who stopped time." I say and he turns to me with surprise before it turns into aggression. "I knew Ariel couldn't trust you!" He shouts as he tries to lunge at me but he gets stopped by webs that entangle him at high speeds.

"Rah, let me go." He says as he rips through them only for them to be replaced with more, stronger threads. "Man, he is really feisty. But at least he's shown me that I need to get more powerful to affect an administrator with just the skills and abilities that can be gotten from the W System." Shiro says from behind me and Güliedistosiez's eyes widen.

"How can your threads hold me? Answer me!" He shouts in surprise, as Shiro's threads are successfully binding him despite him being an administrator. "That would be thanks to me teaching her to use my runes, which aren't a part of the system or the Majutsu that you administrators use." I say amusedly.

"Now calm down. I know that this all looks bad, but we've got no bad intentions for this world. As a matter of fact, we want to help accelerate the repair of this world." I say and he squints suspiciously. "Why should I believe you?" He asks as he finally stops struggling. "Because of this." I say creating another orb of runes, this one being a bomb, made specifically to destroy the G-Meteo.

He looks at the sphere in my hand that's the size of an average plug with confusion. "And what is that supposed to be?" He asks. "This is a bomb that I have made to destroy the G-Meteo in a single shot. I know that Potimas is going to betray us in an attempt to get rid of me, Shiro here and Ariel and I also know that you do not trust him either. So I'm giving this to you so you can use it to destroy the G-Meteo as quickly as possible and return to attack the rest of the G-Fleet's forces while we take care of Potimas." I propose to him and he stays silent for a while.

"Alright, then. But before that.." He says as he turns to Shiraori. "How are you that powerful, even Ariel isn't as strong as you, yet she still thinks she is despite being beside you for most of the past month. So how are you that powerful?" He asks as she has reached the peak of the system, possessing every skill that is not Sacrifice, a unique skill granted by D or one of the fourteen key skills; the seven sins and seven virtues.

"Think about the state we are in. We are moving where everyone and everything else is in a state of chronostasis. And this was done by Dante, my boyfriend. So what's there to stop him from creating an isolated space where time is massively accelerated for me to train?" Shiro says, causing Güliedistosiez to look at me with a flabbergasted expression.

Ignoring his surprised Pikachu face, she continues. "As things are I not only possess every skill I need, I've also trained them to their max level and as a result, my stats have reached the limit of the system. Right now, all I need is a good enough injection of energy and I'll break through the limits. As for grandma not noticing my power, I also owe that to Dante's runes." She says, showing a set of masking runes on her upper arms and wrapping up her explanation.

"Fine, say I agree to this plan of yours, what is to say that you don't stab my or Ariel's backs?" He says, and my response is quick and simple. "Our consciences." I say, shutting him up. "For one I knew of the events of the past from the get go, and Shiro had gotten Taboo to LV10. We know Ariel's motives and we support her, any benefits we gain are secondary. Do you think that if we didn't care for her that we'd improve the puppet taratects or tell her that we'd join her without too much consideration?" I ask him and he remains silent. "And besides, defeating you in a head-on battle is far too easy for me, so why'd I ever need to go through all this just to beat you?" I say and the reality of the situation dawns on him as he thinks about everything that has happened between us till now.

"*Sigh* Fine, I agree to your proposal." He says in resignation. Seeing no falsity in his words, I tell Shiro to release him, then I hand over the bomb to him. "Take my advice and throw it into the G-Meteo when you're within 200 metres of it. You don't have to worry about a violent explosion, this bomb collapses its target and then disintegrates it " I tell him hoping there's at least an iota of trust for us in his mind while also keeping in mimd that he can easily destroy the G-Meteo then I and Shiraori return to our positions pre-timestop.

After he finishes ruminating, he nods and returns to his position, then I resume time. Güliedistosiez turns to Hyuvan and tells him to obey Ariel's orders and help to the best of his ability then tells Ariel that he will return soon after destroying the G-Meteo while also telling her to be careful. "Don't worry, I'll be fine, although I can't be held responsible if things get too crazy here." She says and Güliedistosiez nods. "Even then, do not die before I return." He says while gently patting her head with his free hand with an uncharacteristically serene smile on his face but Ariel calmly removes his hand.

"I'll be off then." He says and she tells him to be careful as well, then he teleports away. "Whew, you guys goin' up against that thing or what?. Hey, spider lady. It wouldn't hurt you or nothin' even if you gave us the day off, y'know?" Hyuvan says only to be hit by a menacing stare. "Don't worry, I will work you so hard, even a corrupt noble would be horrified." Ariel says, a devious grin plastered on her face, causing Hyuvan to whimper in fear.

Three hours pass and in that time, we relocated then evacuated Sophia and Merazophis to the Great Elroe Labyrinth within Shiro's babies' territory, mainly to make sure they are out of Potimas' reach. Sophia wasn't too thrilled to be surrounded by spiders but she'll be fine.

As for the puppet taratects, I applied some runes to the weapons I had given them, mainly Sharpness, Impact and Durandal enchantments to increase their damage output and durability then I applied Damage reduction runes to their puppet bodies.

During that time, Ariel summoned her own backup, all her Queen Taratects, five of them with Mother among them. "It has been quite a while, hasn't it, Dante?" Mother said to me and I smile and nod. "That it has. I hope you've been doing well." I replied. "Well, between my children and grandchildren basically filling the labyrinth, I am quite alright." She said before turning to Shiro and I saw her nod and bow to Mother respectfully.

After the short interaction, we turned to Ariel who just shrugged and said; "I figured this wasn't the time to be stingy with my forces, so I brought out my best.", pointing to the 5 Queen Taratects in an imposing line. Not far from the taratects was the dragon-wyrm army being led by Hyuvan, getting ready for the assault.

"Pardon the wait. I have returned with the Word of God army of 30,000." Dustin says as he returns, seeming to flaunt the numbers of his army. Not that he was all that convincing, seeing that there are multiple dead mages who traded their SP and HP for MP to successfully use a huge Large-Scale Teleport to bring the army here. "Give thanks for the sacrifice of the brave men who gave. their lives to create a gate to this place for the holy war." He shouts and the army bows their heads for a short prayer. 'Well, at least he's determined.' I think to myself, seeing as he sacrificed multiple valuable mages capable of using Spatial Magic. 'But then again, it's not like their presence is going to be consequential to the destruction of the G-Fleet or G-Tris or even the tanks, maybe they might be able to damage the turrets, but I won't count on it.'

"It appears that I am the last to arrive" Potimas says as he teleports in with his army of Glorias. The Gloria is a 5 metre tall robot that has an upper half that somewhat resembles a human's, that is made of ancient metal, wielding several weapons made of the same material. His army numbers just about 2,000.

Looking around, Ariel scans over all the armies, of course with some animosity towards Potimas and his army. "Looks like we're all ready." She says, then directs her gaze to the G-Fleet. "So, Shiraori, , Potimas and I are going to launch a direct assault on this thing while Dante attacks its ground and air forces, right?" ""Right."" She asks and we answer simultaneously.

Seeing that Güliedistosiez still hadn't returned, Shiro and I understood that he still didn't trust us and therefore hadn't attempted to use the bomb I gave him, leading to things being the way they are now.

"So, how do we get inside?" Ariel asks Potimas and he brings out what looks like a shoulder mounted missile launcher, one much larger than its Terran counterpart. "We'll use this to make a hole in the outer wall. It's a single-use gun, but it's extremely powerful. It should be able to make a hole in the G-Fleet's exterior without a problem." He says, a devious glint in his eyes.

"So who's going to carry it?" Ariel asks. "It'll have to be you, or one of the two of them. This body of mine could probably lift it, but it isn't quite powerful enough to take aim properly." He says and Ariel nods before tossing it to Shiro.

Shiro looks at Ariel with a raised brow and Ariel explains herself. "You can use Spatial magic to put it away and take it out whenever you want, not to mention you've got a better physique for it than I do. It's a no-brainer." Shiro listens to her then shrugs, accepting the situation.

With a hand and a scythe-leg on her chins, Shiro thinks about a way for her to reach that high without the G-Fleet's Anti-Magic Barrier keeping her away. Eventually, she turns to a wind dragon and beckons it over. It approaches her with confusion, and she jumps onto its back and secures herself on it.

"What the hell are you doing?!"  It shouts out in protest. Meanwhile, Ariel and Potimas nod, seeing what Shiraori was pointing out with her actions. "That's a good idea." "Agreed. Perhaps Ariel and I should ride some dragons as well." They say, agreeing with Shiro's logic, while it keeps trying to throw her off, but she doesn't budge.

"Shall I take charge of matters on the ground, then?" Dustin says as he walks up. "Might as well, but I feel like our forces should just do our own thing. Especially since their abilities and methods of operation are different." Ariel says and Dustin agrees.

"I'll tell the queens and puppets to listen to your orders, but them obeying is their choice." "Seconded. I shall grant you the authority to give orders, but it is my soldiers' prerogative to listen to you or not." Ariel and Potimas say, temporarily giving Dustin authority to relay orders to both their armies.

"Very well. I only intend to provide minor adjustments as it is no doubt better to let each force to act at their own discretion." Dustin says, accepting his role. "The G-Fleet is slowly making its way toward us and has deployed a ground force that has reached approximately 100,000 in number." Potimas says from the side, causing silence to impregnate the atmosphere.

Everyone starts to consider the danger of this battle as the total number of our forces is only slightly above 40,000 with the weaker humans being the majority of those forces with 30,000 of them. "Well, our main goal is to get rid of the bomb. As long as we succeed in doing that, we won't have to worry about anything else. Even if we're unable to destroy all their forces, we can just leave them to Güliedistosiez." Ariel says, lifting the heavy atmosphere.

"Dustin. Focus on slowing the enemy down and buying as much time as possible so we can avoid unnecessary sacrifices." She tells Dustin and he nods, then she turns over to the wind dragon and tells it to carry Shiro and have the rest of its kin fight the G-Tris so that they don't get a solid hold of the air. It protests the decision, asking why it and its kin must work more, but Ariel pleads with it and it eventually agrees to the proposal. She finally turns to Potimas and warns him not to betray us one more time and he responds with a snort.

Walking up to Potimas, I look him in the eyes for a few seconds before speaking. "I already know that you are upset with us and would do anything in your power to get rid of us, but for your own sake, let things be and don't try to muddy up the waters, otherwise I will make you dearly regret doing so." I say to him, then pass by him as I levitate to attack the G-Tris.

Shiraori POV

The G-Tris are quite loud, if nothing else. Dante has been shooting them down with his Power Deagle and his Spiral Energy Bombs, as well as elemental spear attacks, but even with his actions, quite a few have come close to hitting me.  "Whooee! That one made my blood run cold for a second."  I hear Hyuvan's lighthearted voice, but he's actually being serious. Hyuvan has been doing some high-speed maneuvers and death defying dodges to evade the G-Tris' attacks while retaliating with wind magic.

I look down and see multiple craters, created as a result of Dante firing attacks at the UFO's ground forces. Looking around, I see Ariel and Potimas on other dragons, being led to the UFO and I nod at them and Ariel reciprocates.

Moving my eyes away from them, I see the situation is not entirely advantageous for us, but Dante is working as a very effective game breaker, helping us take out the planes and the ground forces, thereby preventing multiple wyrms and dragons from dying to the planes. The main problem is that the UFO is still sending more planes so their number doesn't stay down for long, but on the bright side they are only being sent to replace the destroyed planes rather than being sent in swarms, meaning they're most likely being controlled by a computer that would be overloaded if it took the swarm option.

As time passes I notice that the dragons' conditions are actually starting to improve and it seems like they're also being buffed. {It's most likely because of Dante.} Body-in-charge tells me and I look at Dante, this time seeing subtle outbursts of energy coming from his body.

Taking down some more planes, Hyuvan and I notice that we are being attacked a bit more frequently than earlier and we speed up our movements and attacks to clear the air as quickly as possible, but it seems that the machines had been given pretty good learning software as their attack strategies and patterns have changed three times now.

They have turned what started as a planned battle into a chaotic melee, so wide area spells can't be used without hitting allies. They've raised their altitude as well so that there is less air so as to lessen the effects of Wind Magic and to tire out the dragons. But they've all been unable to account for the biggest wrench in their plans, Dante.

For every one of them that had gone higher, a powerful 3 metre wide laser would blast into them and be reflected into any other planes close within a kilometre of them. For those trying to use go in-between the dragons, bomb's would be teleported to their positions that would cause the planes to instantly implode, leaving the dragons unharmed.

Suddenly, Hyuvan speeds up even more, jostling me a bit, but it seems even he was surprised by his own speed. {It's Dante. He's buffing your and Ariel's dragons so you get to the UFO faster.} Information-in-charge tells me.

As we sped up, we come across a crowd of planes that is flying in front of us, when suddenly they start to explode. I look into the smoke and see a dark figure jumping from one aircraft to the next at high speeds. It's then I notice that it's Ariel that is doing that. She's jumping on one aircraft, neutralizing it, then using it as a foothold to jump into the next one.

{Hmm, I guess we could do that. It would speed things up and lessen the danger for the dragons.} 'Agreed' I think, communicating with Information-in-charge, then I begin slowly moving to set myself up for a jump, specifically one to a plane, surprising the dragon. "Hey, white lady. What the hell are you doing?" "Try and stabilize yourself, I'm going to jump to that plane." I tell him while pointing to a plane a few dozen metres away.

"What the hell?! Are you crazy?!" He shouts in protest to my instructions. "Just do it. I might not look it but just like Grandma over there, I can beat the absolute living daylights out of any dragon that isn't Güliedistosiez, so you worrying about me isn't really needed. So just balance yourself our for a few seconds." I tell him with a stern voice.

"Alright, damnit! But I won't be held responsible for anything that happens to you up there." He says before he balances itself just well enough that I could jump off and seeing the opportunity present itself, I take it and leap from the dragon's back to the top of a plane and slash it in half, then jump to another one before the one I am on finishes disintegrating.

A few minutes of jumping around and destroying planes pass and the area between the dragons is finally clear of planes. Ariel and I notice this, then we look at each other and nod, before creating a giant mass of wind then blast it at the other planes, destroying them, before we finally begin the second phase of our attack on the G-Fleet.

With the number of aircraft so drastically reduced, Dante increases the number of his attacks targeting them, relieving us of the burden of the planes attacking us. After the spell, I landed on Hyuvan's back  and in an attempt to hype himself up, he ends up getting carried away with his high-speed maneuvers.

As time passes, an ominous premonition starts to slowly creep up on me Despite Dante being in the fight, it feels too easy. The difference in the difficulty of the battle from before we unleashed the wind attack at the planes to now is stark. So much so that it seems like the first phase was a distant nightmare. There's one thing that Dante told me during the 4 years that I trained in his Soul Marble; that if anything seemed to be going too easily, it meant that something far worse than whatever I was facing before the ease was on the way.

That was why I knew that the UFO was preparing something big, something that could be devastating if unleashed. Using telepathy, I shout to every single wyrm and dragon;  "Take evasive action—now!" And just a moment later, the sky is filled with light as the UFO fires a huge laser beam. But rather than it hitting the wyrms and planes, the huge laser beam suddenly splits into smaller laser beams that hit every plane within the range of the beam as well as a great number of tanks and other robots on the ground without touching a single elf, Wyrm or human.

{That was close. Guess we should thank Dante for that.} 'You said it.' I think to myself. I really want to slap myself for letting my guard down. The fighter jets and tanks are only distractions, the UFO is our main opponent, but it used the great number of enemies that it produced to lure us into a false sense of security, not to mention it released that laser almost 20 minutes earlier than expected. Seriously, if Dante hadn't intervened, most of the wyrms would be dead.

"Holy shit, that was too close!"  Hyuvan says in relief. Before we can bask in relief, the UFO releases more fighters, but due to the others being taken out by the first shot, there aren't as many to impede our progress. As I look at the UFO, I notice a highly unwelcome sight, its main gun is now turning towards our troops on the ground.

"White one."  I hear a voice that grates my ears just hearing it.  "What is it, shitty elf?"  I ask Potimas.  "Use the weapon I gave you against the enemy's main gun. That should be enough to destroy it." He says, preluding his first showing of betrayal in this battle.  "We won't be able to break in if she does that."  I hear Ariel say as she enters the telepathic conversation.  "Don't worry. It's more than powerful enough to destroy the main gun and the outer wall along with it."  He says matter of factly.

"Okay then."  I say as I take the bazooka from my back where I had tied it down with my threads, then I loosen my hold on Hyuvan and get ready to jump, while aiming at the cannon. Taking a quick breath, I push the trigger and jump off Hyuvan who had already begun flying toward the charging cannon, almost simultaneously, then the bazooka starts lighting up. 'It really was single-use.'  I think to myself as the bazooka explodes, almost destroying my human half.

'At least the shot hit the gun and blasted a hole into the hull as well, glad to see that hasn't changed.' I think to myself while I recover from the explosion. Thankfully, my spider half is unscathed so my mobility isn't impeded.

I multicast Healing spells on myself to speed up my recovery, when suddenly Hyuvan catches my body from below then pits me onto his back. "Hey, white lady, you okay?!"  He asks, alarmed.  "Hang in there, I'll get you to someone who can use healing magic."  The alarm doesn't leave his voice until I respond.  "It's okay, I can heal myself. You just get me there." I say pointing at the UFO with a spider leg.  "You sure?" "Yeah, I'm sure."  I say and he speeds to the hole in the UFO.

When he gets close to the hole, I jump into the UFO and meet Potimas with a smug smirk on his face that is wiped off immediately he sees me. "Hmph, so you survived, huh?" He says brazenly, causing a vein to pop on both my heads while Hyuvan was protesting his actions but Potimas remained defiant. "So you did that on purpose, that right?"  Hyuvan says with the weight of a final warning in his voice and his claws readied for an attack. But Potimas remains lax and unapologetic, then Hyuvan attacks him and unfortunately misses.

"Oh dear, that almost hit me" He says, emphasizing the 'almost'. {'Hmph, damn narcissist.'} I say as I watch him dust himself off, showing that he dodged Hyuvan, a dragon specialized in speed's, strike without much effort.  "You were lucky. I won't miss next time." Hyuvan says while readying another attack and Potimas puts up a hand to stop him. "Are you sure about that?If you were to dispose of me now, it would become quite difficult to deal with the GMA bomb." He says, using himself as a hostage, but Hyuvan isn't buying it.  "Difficult, but not impossible, pal." He says with a snarl.

"However, no one but I will be able to do it quickly. Who's to say that the bomb won't be dropped while someone else is trying to figure it out, or that they won't accidentally set it off in the process? Now ask yourself, is it really in your best interest to harm the one person who can disarm it without such risks?" He says, causing Hyuvan to growl unhappily. In all honesty, if I hadn't agreed to let things play out the same way they did in the other timeline, Potimas would be dead by now and we'd have dealt with the bomb. Granted, that would have put Dante and I at the peak of suspicion when involving Dustin and Güliedistosiez.

Potimas continues fanning the flames, mocking the entire dragon race with his words, but he mentions something that surprises me. The wind dragons and wyrms that were in the area had been given a mission to literally clear the air, as the people from the past had released a very powerful poisonous gas in the area that basically made the place devoid of and incapable of nurturing life.

This mockery continues to infuriate Hyuvan, but he is able to restrain himself from attacking Potimas again. But what he says next surprises me despite the fact that it was still expected.  "I ain't mad about myself and my kin, pal. We had a job and we did it. But you owe the white one an apology."  But Potimas just scoffs at him and doubles down. "Don't be ridiculous. We've been enemies from the very start. There's nothing wrong with trying to get a leg up on your enemies."

{You know what, just hit him with one of Dante's runes so that he'll shut the hell up.} Body-in-charge tells me in annoyance and I agree, immediately slapping Potimas with a Agony rune, which results in Potimas screeching out in pain while the Suppression rune that I was using to hide my power disperses. {Hmm, looks like we still can't use any really strong runes just yet.} Magic-in charge tells me as the rune disperses.

A minute passes with Potimas writhing on the floor with Ariel laughing at him and in that time, I notice that the Anti-Magic Barrier that the UFO possesses only affects its exterior and does nothing to its interior, freeing me up to finally use my skills comfortably and finish healing up my human head. I also hear the dragons saying something about me being a demon and not getting on my bad side, which just makes me chuckle lightly. A few seconds later, the Agony rune's effect expires and Potimas gets up from the floor looking at me with a manic death glare. "You! I will make absolutely sure to kill you!" He shouts in rage. {He also recovered too quickly. Maybe our current stage of power is a lot less adequate than we thought.} Magic-in-charge tells me and I agree.

Taking several deep breaths, Potimas manages to cool his head from a manic rage to a compressed but calm hatred and anger toward me. "It has been many an age since... No, this may be the first time I have been treated so disgracefully. I swear  that I will kill you in the most gruesome manner possible." He says, his eyes blazing infrernoes of anger. {Ha, you can't even kill us, let alone do so in the most gruesome manner. Only Dante is capable of either.} Body-in-charge says while laughing hysterically along with my other parallel wills.

"Unfortunately, now is not that time. As I said before, I shall gladly make an attempt on your live if given the chance, but right now, resolving this situation takes precedence. Until said situation is resolved, I shall let this incident slide, so consider yourself fortunate." He says causing Ariel to start snickering again. "And when are you going to stop laughing like some buffoon? Consider our situation. And next time, discipline your spawn properly." He says, vitriol dripping from his voice, but I think he forgets exactly who he is talking to.

Suddenly he sinks into the floor, or rather is pushed into the floor. "You're the one that needs to be disciplined, don't you think?" Ariel says, standing on his back. In what seemed like the blink of an eye, she grabbed him and slammed him into the ground with what looked like a perfectly executed judo flip, and pinned him to the ground, causing a crater to form underneath his body.

Unfortunately, this caused no physical damage to his body, but it caused even more damage to his already badly bruised ego. "If you try to pull any funny business, I'll kill you on the spot. Understand?" Ariel says to him with a glare, but Potimas being Potimas, he just doubles down on his plans to kill us. Ariel, growing tired of him, gave her last warning while putting more weight on her foot, causing his body to start cracking the floor beneath him.

Of course, with a cyborg body, he doesn't feel physical pain, which is why I used the Agony rune that directly forces pain onto the soul. She gets off him, pulls him off the floor and shoves him ahead of us to guide us to the bomb. "I do not care for your stupid ego, Potimas. You only have worth to us because you are the only one who we know is fully knowledgeable of these machines. So be useful or I'll destroy you. Got it?" Ariel says, causing me to raise a brow. {Guess not losing one of us to her has really shown how she was.} 'You said it.'

"Hyuvan, take your kin and make sure we keep control over thee skies. Nothing too much, jus make sure our troops on the ground keep the advantage." I tell him and he nods, before speeding away to destroy more fighters. "Okay, let's get moving. It seems that this 'G-Fleet' has sent a welcoming party to us." Ariel says as she scowls at sounds of the small army of robots approaching our position.

Some time passes and we are in the process of destroying the army of robots, with Ariel simply smashing them to pieces, blasting them with spells and breath attacks and chomping on them using Gluttony every once in a while, and Potimas using what I can only describe as a gun shaped cannon to take out multiple robots in a single shot that is as powerful as the main gun of the tanks and then there's me, using my threads and scythe as a Kusarigana (Chain Sickle) to destroy any of them that get in range and blasting the ones at long-range with spells.

"You know, Shiro. I've been wanting to ask you this since you slapped Potimas. How'd you get as powerful as me?" Ariel asks me in the middle of destroying some more robots.  "Dante helped me out. Most of the time when you and the vamps headed into cities and towns to get supplies, he would train me and help me gain and level skills, while in a barrier where time is heavily dilated. So in reality, I was training more than everyone else on this journey."  I respond telepathically, keeping Dante's capabilities secret from Potimas.

"Do you think he'd do the same for me?"  She asks and I shake my head, telling her that it's a privilege that I have as his girlfriend. "Well looks like I can't get that unless he chooses to help me, huh." She says out loud, disregarding Potimas who has been trying to listen in to the conversation.

As time goes on, the robots keep coming in, the suddenly some tanks come rolling into the battle and aim their barrels at Ariel, almost as if the UFO's system judged her as the greatest threat here, which with her Gluttony, she is. And as if to prove that, the instant they shot at her, she opened her mouth then chomped down quickly, consuming the shots instantly. She then dashes at them and starts totaling every single one of them. Not to be outdone, I jump at the rest and begin smashing them with fist and elbow strikes.

As this goes on, I begin to notice a black haze gathering on the blade of my scythe. I swing my scythe around, subtly targeting the robots and tanks and the haze spreads destroying every single one of them. I also notice my MP reduce as the haze erupts from my scythe. 'Damn you, D. But don't worry, I'll use this same weapon that you're using to mess with me to beat you black and blue.' I think to myself in annoyance.

"Well, if Shiraori is taking this so seriously, I guess I'd better put my best foot forward." Ariel says as she speedup smashing through the incoming wave of tanks and robots. Smirking, I follow her and do the same. We make eye contact with each other for a second and she nods at me then her face splits into a grin as we rip apart every last one of them within a few minutes.  "That seems to be the last of them. Let's go." Potimas says, briskly striding forward while trying to hide his alarm.

Time passes and after sparse encounters with robots and tanks that ended quickly, we come across an extremely heavy-looking door and we know the room containing the bomb is on the other side of the door. "The GMA bomb is just on the other side of this door. I will begin locking the bomb's functions at once, but I do not know what defenses might await within. I must prioritize locking the bomb above all else. If there is any danger inside, I assume I can count on you two to deal with it." Potimas says, then opens the door by hacking into the UFO's system.

The door opens soundlessly to reveal a barren room with a pillar in the middle of it. I of course, knew that this was no mere pillar but a high-performance robot that could be seen as an upgrade to some of Potimas' works.  "Grandma, keep your guard up, that pillar is another robot."  I tell Ariel while I ready my scythe.

"It can't be." Potimas says, his voice genuinely surprised. Hearing his voice, Ariel finally gets into a fighting stance. On cue, the pillar begins transforming, as it opens up like a flower, forming countless muzzles before unfolding legs and standing. "A Gloria. But I definitely didn't give them those schematics so where did they get this information?" Potimas says, his expression grim. "Potimas, explain." Ariel says shortly.

"That machine was developed based on the schematics of a different weapon of mine. However, I had never shared those schematics with anyone. I do not know where they saw such a thing, but judging by its appearance, I believe it is not a perfect reproduction. However, it is impossible to tell how close this one's capabilities are to the original." He says, still a bit shaken. "How strong would the original have been?" She asks him. "Enough to destroy a upper-class dragon. The fakes, of course." He says with a casual tone, but his face is dead serious.

"And this one might even surpass the original. This is the worst situation possible. I never imagined it would come to this." He says, his voice downcast. Ariel impatiently ask him to explain it to us, while I look around the room and notice what is off with it. "Where's the bomb?" I ask with a subtle shiver in my voice.

"Ha, it appears the white creature has figured it out." Potimas smirks, then shoots a mocking looks at Ariel, who snorts at him in response. "What is that supposed to mean?" She asks, almost dismissive of Potimas' behavior. "The bomb. It's nowhere out in the open, but it's still in this room. And seeing as there's nothing else in here but that robot, it's almost certain that it's in there." I say, tightening my grip on my scythe.

The robot, despite transforming, hasn't made a single move since then, so we've used the time we have to plan out an attack strategy. Ariel however, is still skeptical about the presence of the bomb in the robot's body. "Potimas, are we absolutely sure the bomb is in this thing?" Potimas simply reaffirms it's presence by revealing that the body he's using has the measurement apparatus within it.

Now, if I had been capable of using Dante's spells that he created with his runes, dealing with this would be a million times easier, but unfortunately, I can only use the lowest class enchantments like the Strengthen rune I used on my threads to hold Güliedistosiez or the Suppression rune I used to mask my power. As for runes stronger than that, the only ones I've been able to form are the Agony rune I got Potimas with and the Concealment rune. Actual strong runes could just turn the robot to dust while dispersing the energy harmlessly, but I'm still too weak to use them.

Looking at the robot, Ariel and I hold grim expressions then we ask Potimas about the possible extra dangers that we could face, should we try destroying the robot. "It could possibly be set up in such a manner that destroying it would cause the GMA bomb to explode. Which, in that case, would destroy the G-Fleet along with it, but thinking logically, no one would ever construct things that way. Unfortunately, we cannot say for certain that it's not the case." He says and we all sink into silence.

Facing the issue, I can see now why myself from that timeline had basically given up hopes of taking this thing down with Ariel and just tried leaving it to Güliedistosiez, and honestly, I understand her. If this bomb blows up, he is one of the very few beings in the blast radius that could survive, not to mention, he's also pretty good at using Spatial magic or conjuring as Dante refers to it. He could theoretically teleport the bomb away if he was here, but he isn't.

While I'm thinking of some way for us to take care of the bomb without having to call Dante, some of my hair falls onto my face, so I tuck it behind my ear, when suddenly, a smartphone appears in my hand and I hear a voice, HER voice. "No one's coming to help." I thought of this instance in the other timeline and the same thoughts came to me, that D was puppeteering me as well as the events around me.

'If you're going to say something worth my time, then say it. Otherwise don't disturb me, you bitch.' I think to myself knowing very well that she can hear me. "Oh, don't be so angry, besides, you've been quite entertaining." She says emotionlessly yet somehow joyful. "For entertaining me so well, I chose to give your weapon some extra perks. Nothing too much, just making sure it's abilities improve to correspond with your growth, and seeing how much fervor you've been using it with, I'm glad to see that it's to your liking." She says, still with the same tone.

"Now then, as I was saying, no one is coming to help. See, I thought it would be more entertaining this way so I stopped him." She says, referring to Güliedistosiez. 'Hmm, looks like he didn't trust us after all.' I think to myself about the sphere that Dante had given him.

Dante had lied to him about the function of the sphere, saying it was a bomb. To be exact, he omitted the details of its true function. The sphere was going to actually decompose the materials of the G-Meteo and whatever asteroid it was connected to into atoms and rearrange the particles to create a decoy of Güliedistosiez, deceiving D and allowing him to come here and help us. Not that it matters now.

"Any way, you're on your own, as you can see. Do your best to bring home a win, 'kay?" She says and the phone in my hand disappears. My face immediately scrunches up into a prominent scowl, which Ariel notices. "What's wrong?" "We're on our own here, we can't try calling Güliedistosiez for help." I say to her while, of course telling her that Dante would probably step on soon via telepathy. "What do you mean we can't call him for help? Did something happen to him?" She asks with concern and puzzlement and a flicker runs across Potimas' face.

"He's fine, it's just that he's in an unavoidable situation." I tell her, finality in my voice. She understands and drops the questioning. Potimas looks at her as if asking her what I'm talking about but she just shrugs.

"So it's safe to assume that we have to deal with that thing by ourselves." She says, pointing to the massive machine in the middle of the room and I nod. Silence pervades the area for a while until suddenly, Potimas speaks up. "I had hoped to avoid doing this, but I suppose I have no choice. There is one way and if it is successful, we can silence both the GMA bomb and that fake Gloria." He says and Ariel tells him to elaborate.

"The body I am currently using is equipped with hacking functionality." He says as the index finger of his right hand turns into a cord. "I will insert this into that thing so that I may hack into its controls. If I am successful, I should be able to deactivate both the fake Gloria and the GMA bomb." He says with clear disgust in his voice everytime he mentions the 'fake Gloria'.

"However, the hacking will take some time, and I will be vulnerable while I do so. If it attacks me while I'm working, I will be unable to defend myself and of course, the cord will disconnect and the hacking will fail. I will extend the cord from here and begin hacking into the fake Gloria. In the meantime, you two will protect my body and the cord." He says and, immediately the cord begins slithering inside the room.

"You protect him while I protect the cord." She says to me and I nod. Our senses sharpen to the limit as we begin a battle with the fate of the world hanging in the balance.

As the cord enters the room, the robot's multitude of arms point their guns at it and begin firing balls of light at the cord, but they don't reach as Ariel zooms in front of the cord and chomps, using Gluttony to consume all of the bullets that seemed like a wall of light. For a while, she continues to consume the energy coming from the intense barrage of bullets while she zooms around the room placing threads to hamper the robot's movements.

Suddenly, some of the muzzles point toward Potimas and I and fire. Using the door to the room that I had ripped off in combination with the effects of the Shieldmanship aspect of the Deva skill as well as Magic Power and Energy Conferment, I put it up as a defense and it holds, with the bullets bouncing off harmlessly.

Ariel continues to avoid the bullets and spread her webs to slow the robot down and after a while the cord finally reaches the robot. It glows for a second, then plunges into the robot's body with Force. The robot tries to fight against it and cut it, but it is currently bound by loads upon loads of thread. Despite it's near motionless state, it still tries to fight, letting of random sprays of bullets that do nothing but hit the walls and my shield, leaving Ariel and the cord safe.

Shortly after, I feel that familiar, uncomfortable feeling of being drained and I know that Potimas has activated his Anti-Magic Barrier. Now, I would have just dropped the shield and attacked him if I wasn't being shot at, but unfortunately, here we are. "Shiro!" Ariel shouts as she dashes behind me to take the bullet and it hits her or rather, it hits the shield on her.

And then I hear his silky smooth voice. "That's strike three, Potimas." And he rips a hole in the middle of the shitty elf's torso and sends red electricity throughout his body and soul. "What took you so long?" I ask him as I walk to him and kiss him. "Nothing really, I was just taking my time to witness his atrocities." He says, pulling away from the kiss.

*10 minutes ago*

Dante POV

'Potimas, you bastard. When I get my hands on you, I'll make absolutely sure you pay for this shit.' I say, looking at what is very clearly a brain leaking out from multiple destroyed Glorias. Yes, actual elven brains. Potimas felt that the artificial intelligence that controls his other machines was inadequate so he took members of his kind and removed their brains before inserting them into the control center of the Glorias.

Remembering reading about this particular part in the novels originally, I thought about how much I would have wanted to kill him. But the anger I felt toward him then is miniscule when compared to the rage I feel now. I fully understand that the elves aren't looked upon favorably for good reason, but this is far too evil for a sane person. 'But then again, it's not like the fucker was ever truly sane.' I think to myself while taking time to remember the history of this world and the fallout of the atrocities that Potimas had performed.

First, there was the initial creation of these machines and their direct effect which was quite literally killing the planet. Then, there was the fact that he noticed this but still chose to vastly propagate this technology. As if that wasn't enough, he silently approved of the sacrifice of the woman he had a child with to create the W System. Then he tried killing that child, multiple times at that, if his current relationship with her is anything to judge.

Then he provided a chemical weapon that basically destroyed all traces of life from such a vast area. Then he continues to use that technology, the same one that had already caused the world to sharply deteriorate and made it take more energy, causing it to be pushed to the edge of destruction. And now this, an abomination to life as a whole, an attempt to pervert the nature of life to his own sick tastes.

I take a deep breath and exhale. Then I feel it, the activation of his personal Anti-Magic Barrier. I stop time and release attacks targeting every single bit of machine technology out here including the Glorias, reducing them to scraps. Then I fly into the G-Fleet and destroy every other machine before going to the room where they are and I see Ariel already dashing in front of Shiro, ready to take the bullet for her. I put up a Force Armor on her body and make a flat Force Shield in between them and the modded Gloria and resume time for everything but the Gloria.

*Ping* The bullet bounces off the armor and Potimas' eyes widen. "That's strike three, Potimas." I say as I rip a hole in his torso from behind him and channel Agony-empowered lightning into him, causing him to scream in pain.

"What took you so long?" Shiro says as she walks up to kiss me and I return the kiss. I look at Ariel, who is checking her torso, still surprised she wasn't hurt.

"Thank you, Ariel. I know just how dangerous what you did was, so even though you didn't get hurt, thank you for protecting Shiro." I say while hugging Shiro with my right arm and channelling lightning into Potimas' soul with my left. "You're welcome and thank you. She says and I nod in acknowledgement.

Dropping Potimas to the floor like a used rag, Shiro and I walk up to the Gloria and she slashes it a few times, then I release it from chronostasis. It immediately crumbles to dust leaving behind a sphere, the GMA bomb. Bringing my runic sphere into my hands, I make it absorb every bit of energy from the bomb, leaving it empty.

*Crash* I hear the sound of metal being smashed, I turn to see Ariel demolishing Potimas' body, before consuming it with Gluttony. Seeing this, I take control of the G-Fleet and lower it to the ground.

Holding Shiro's hand tightly, I begin reminiscing about our experiences from our meeting to this moment and I can't help but smile. My reminiscing is interrupted by Ariel calling Shiro. "Shiro. Do you mind if I call you that?" She says and Shiro tells her she doesn't mind it.

"I defended you because in top of being my kin, you're also one of the few true friends I've had. So please, don't feel indebted to me. I..." She says, before being interrupted by Shiro who now has her in a tight hug.

"Don't worry. You're also one of my friends, not to mention you're family, so I'd help you out either way." Shiro says before releasing the hug. "Tell you what, when Dante and I are back, we'll head straight to Demon Country, okay?" She says and Ariel nods, before pausing to think. "What do you mean by that?" Ariel asks in confusion.

"My Divinity Expansion skill is almost at max level, not to mention, I am at the limit of power I can reach within the W System. The energy in Dante's hand is mainly for the both of us to undergo evolution beyond the system. The evolution is going to take a while, so can you be patient for me, for us?" She says, and Ariel, holding back tears, nods and tells her not to be too long. Shiro chuckles and hugs her, then walks to me.

"So, you ready?" I ask her. "Ready as I'll ever be." She replies. I activate the final function of the sphere and it expands an egg shape with the both of us inside. We create threads and shape them into a cocoon that stays within the rune barrier. The runes are then embedded in the outer wall of the cocoon, then they flood us with energy, severing all connections to MA energy and the W System.

I start losing consciousness, but before that I hear some notifications.

[Notice. Vast amounts of Soul, Physical, Essential and Causal energies have been detected.]

[Energy is being steered toward evolution.]

[Notice. Extreme amounts of Transcendent Essence have been detected.]

[Energy is being steered toward evolution.]

[Transcendental Evolution commencing.]

That's the last thing I hear as I lose consciousness.

Chapter End.