Ethereal Ascendance: A Journey of Transformation

"The 'System' is very powerful. Its main purpose is to train humans from different worlds until they become strong enough to kill gods..."

Earlier, Irene was too excited and her words were all mixed up. But now that she's calmer, her story finally starts making sense.

From their talk, Nicola finally learned a bit about the "System". Like how Irene's powers were actually quite normal, and there were many other people with the "System", not just her. The System chose them automatically from different worlds. They worked in teams too - quite a few teams.

This means Irene probably has teammates!

"I don't know how you got into this 'System', but if you want to go back to your world, Galadra of this world promised to send me back someday. I'm sure he won't mind taking one more person!"

Thinking about how she got attacked by the "Beta Shock Bomb" earlier, Nicola knew she had to hurry back, so she made this suggestion.

Right now, Irene was using her powers to hide where they were, so Galadra couldn't find them.

"I can't just leave the 'System' as I like! Even though I have some special rights and can make a deal with the 'System' to leave automatically if I find my original world, until then, even I can't break the System's rules. If I do, I'll be punished or even killed!"

Irene shook her head as she answered. Then she turned her head like she received some message, and suddenly looked worried.

"This is bad! Because you weren't there, this world's Galadra gave Nicora some Cycle of Rebirth authority and is trying to convince her to send Cyrae back..."

She turned back to Nicola and spoke quickly: "My time in this world is almost up! You must remember what I'm about to say: 'Cyrae' is a very special name. We're not sure yet if all our problems come from this world, but I brought you here not just to meet you - there's something more important. We must stop Cyrae from going back to Earth! Don't let Nicora send her back. You better go stop this world's Nicora now, or it'll be too late..."

But before she could finish, Irene's body started becoming see-through, then disappeared right in front of Nicola.

Seeing this, Nicola couldn't understand what happened for a while. After several seconds, she tried asking the air:

"...Irene? Did you turn invisible? Or did you teleport?"

But there was no answer. She was alone in the room, and she could feel her connection with Galadra coming back too.

"We're facing threats from the Ancient God Religion, and behind them are demons not from this world! Even though Cyrae inherited some of Elara's power, she's still too weak compared to those demons! Since she misses her old family so much, maybe she's not really fitting in this world. So let's take this chance to send her back to her Earth!"

Because Nicola shared the same soul frequency as this world's Nicora, when Galadra was talking mentally with Nicora, his "voice" also flowed into Nicola's mind. This was just like how Nicora accidentally heard them talking before.

"Actually, when I first got transported to that world, Galadra told me about this too. The enemies we had to face were just too strong, so at first I totally agreed with sending Cyrae and other travelers back to Earth for safety. In fact, I was supposed to be the one doing this task..."

Back in reality, Nicola explained everything to me.

The biggest threat in Cyrae's world was the Ancient God Religion, but because their Nicora was awakening too slowly, Galadra had no choice but to spend lots of energy looking for help from other parallel worlds, which is how they got Nicola.

They say the 'Beta Shock Bomb' in Fernando's hands might be from the Ancient God Religion too. Only the four Elemental Angels working together could fight against the enemies behind the Ancient God Religion!

The problem was, nobody expected that after Nicola got knocked out by the bomb, Irene, who came to that world with the "System", would secretly take her to that small room to meet. This made the weaker Nicora end up with the task instead.

Later when Nicola got back to the scene after Irene's warning, Cyrae had already been sent away, so she couldn't stop it.

"With that world's Nicora's power then, she probably just barely touched Liana's source. To be honest, even with borrowing the Cycle of Rebirth authority to send Cyrae back to Earth, I think it was too much for her abilities then. Something could have gone wrong..."

Since nobody really understood why Irene wanted to stop Cyrae from going back to Earth, and since they couldn't stop it anyway, plus thinking Nicora might have failed, Nicola didn't push the matter when she found Nicora passed out on the ground, totally drained.

Of course, we all know now that Nicora actually succeeded - she just sent her back to Earth eighty years ago...

"Strange, why couldn't I be sent back to Earth? If me going back would cause something bad, it looks like nothing serious has happened!"

Cyrae, who was right here, immediately asked when she heard Nicola's words.

But nobody could answer this question...

You see, Cyrae had been hiding on Earth for decades, and besides getting revenge for her father, she hadn't really changed Earth's history much. But if it's about her later replacing Cyra and coming to my Eldoria Continent, well, that hasn't happened yet, so it's even harder to judge.

"At least now we know that Irene must be the same Irene who got lost in the space portal!"

After Nicola finished talking, I thought for a bit and shared my thoughts with Reed.

Since coming back from Earth, we thought we'd never find Irene again, but surprisingly, we learned about her from Nicola.

As for Nicola, she didn't know at first that Irene was adopted in an elf village at the empire's border. She only learned about how Irene disappeared from me and Reed just now.

But when we heard that Irene joined some mysterious "System" to find her way home, it reminded me of Emperor Reider who we met before! He also had a "System" - could it be the same one as Irene's? Or are they connected somehow?

And also, would Irene really be able to come back to this world?

"Anyway, it's great that Lady Nicola is back safely! Now I can properly report back to Lady Elara!"

While we were all still confused about everything, outsiders like Serena and the First Angel Legion were even more lost. For Serena, finding Nicola and bringing her back was part of her mission. Even though there were some complications, this was definitely the best outcome.

"So does that mean we all have to go back to Edenmere now?"

To be honest, when Serena said she needed to take us back, I really didn't want to go.

Even though we'd been away from Edenmere for a long time and finished everything we needed to do, so we probably should go back and report. But Adrian couldn't come with us to Edenmere, and I didn't want to separate from him.

"Don't worry! Because of all the cooperation with the Astralrealm Kingdom, I got news that Lady Elara came down here a few days ago to handle diplomatic stuff with various countries! So we don't need to go back to Edenmere yet - we can just fly to the capital Norvale to meet her. You can tell her everything you want then!"

Looks like Serena saw right through me. She kept looking between me and Adrian meaningfully several times before smiling and explaining the situation.

Oh, we're going to Norvale? Then Adrian can come too!

I nervously patted my chest, then remembered there were still two people whose situation wasn't completely sorted out.

"Meet Elara? Sure! I actually have some things I need to talk with her about!"

Surprisingly, Nicola agreed without any objection, just thinking for a moment.

Looking back, this was so different from her attitude before she was taken to that other world! Even though she still seems a bit cold towards Adrian, it's way better than before when she'd attack at the smallest thing.

Maybe something happened during these past few months that changed her?