The Author's POV

Manticore building, Friday

-Fwaaa!

As black smoke rose in the air and enveloped my room, I stared at my right hand where a slick black ring rested on my index finger. Its design was rather dull as it looked like any regular ring that could be found on the market, however, if one looked closely, one would be able to see a red hue pulsating from it.

Staring at the ring on my finger, I softly mumbled

"Nice..."

[Human, you better keep your promise]

'Yes'

Nodding my head, I once again looked at the ring on my finger as I curiously asked.

"How does it feel being a ring?"

[hmph, if not for your deal, I would've never done this. How humiliating]

Yes, the ring on my finger was in fact, Angelica. Since I couldn't bring Angelica with me in her cat form, I decided to make her turn into a ring.

The reason I asked her to be a ring was because her cat form would be a burden to me.

If a situation arose where I had to run away, Angelica wouldn't be able to catch up to me and Kevin as she couldn't use her powers lest she wanted to let the demons around us know of her presence...and considering the fact that she had no core in her body, the situation would not be good for both her and me.

That aside, the primary reason why I didn't want her to be exposed was because it would ruin my plans as well as give away my location as demons had a way to tell if another demon was near them.

...until the part of my plan that required for her to expose herself played out, she had to hide as a ring.

Only with her would everything that I had planned for the past two months come to fruition. Therefore, I couldn't stress enough how important it was for her to remain as a ring. If even a little detail of my plan went wrong the chances of me surviving were slim to none.

To be honest, I still preferred her cat form, however, this would do for now.

Prior to now, I had thought about turning her into a ring before, but after a bit of thinking, I decided against this idea as that would mean I would have to carry her with me at all times, including class...which would just be annoying.

Especially considering the fact that she tended to nag all the time.

...please no.

'I know you hate it, but please bear with it for a bit. I promise I'll hold my end of the deal'

[You better, since we've signed the mana contract, you must naturally hold onto the end of your deal, lest you wanted to die...]

'I guess that's true'

As I conversed with Angelica for a couple of minutes, after I explained everything that I wanted to tell her, I then proceeded to touch my waist where a thin black sword quietly rested.

Bleak Star

The new sword that I had ordered a month and a half ago with Amanda.

Because it was freshly crafted it only arrived a week ago and so I didn't have much time to play with it. But as soon as I laid my hands on the sword, I knew that it was a cut above the other swords that I had used before.

Especially with how it felt on the grip of my hand.

The sword was neither too thin nor too thick and only weighed around two kilograms. To me, this was practically nothing as I could curl 100kg dumbbells without any problems now.

From the weight to its design the sword was perfect.

Moreover, I especially liked its effect [Psyon coating] that allowed me to coat the sword with elemental psyons.

As I've said before, I didn't have much time to experiment with the sword, but after learning about psyons from Donna for the past few months, I found a really interesting trick.

By mixing fire psyons with wind psyons I could create electricity and thus in doing so, I found out that by coating my sword with those two psyon, I could have lightning coating my sword.

This trick, coupled with the Keiki style, would prove devastating as lightning was both strong and fast, which was exactly what the Keiki style was about.

A fast and devastating attack that focused on killing the opponent in one single move.

-Clank!

As I was in the middle of admiring my sword, entering my room was Kevin's tired figure. Currently, his condition didn't look the best as he looked extremely tired and worn out. This was especially made apparent from the glaring black circles beneath his eyes.

Noticing his condition, I couldn't help but say

"You look a bit tired"

Staring at me, Kevin haggardly said

"I've constantly been challenged every day by the exchange students, of course, I'd be tired"

Shaking my head, I gloated at his misfortune.

"This is what happens when you show off too much"

"True but it had to be done"

I guess that was also true.

Since he was publicly challenged, Kevin had no other option but to accept their challenge or the people from the other academies would think he was a coward.

After he beat his opponent a couple of days ago, almost all of the academies have been trying to challenge him to try to gauge his true skills.

...it was an annoying cycle that Kevin had to go through as the protagonist.

To be honest, if it were me, I wouldn't have minded being called a coward if it saved me from the trouble of constantly getting challenged, but since Kevin had his own pride, he wouldn't stand for it and thus why was constantly accepted all challenges that came to him.

...also, it's not like he didn't benefit from this.

In fact, Kevin benefited a lot because he managed to get a lot of sparring partners during this time. The only problem was that most of them were weak as the truly strong people refused to challenge him.

In the end, the only thing I could offer Kevin was my pity and sympathy. Taking a seat on the couch of my room, I asked

"Did anyone see you when you came into the building?"

Shaking his head, Kevin flatly said

"No, I made sure that no one noticed me, cameras and instructors included"

"Good...so does that mean you're ready?"

Staring at me, Kevin sighed and nodded his head. Extending his hand in my direction, he said.

"Yeah...give it to me"

Squinting my eyes I pretended to be confused as I said

"Give what?"

Rolling his eyes, in an annoyed tone, Kevin said

"Don't pretend you don't know, I already told you beforehand, give me the D ranked core"

*Tsk*

Clicking my tongue I took out a spherical object that pulsated a purple hue from my dimensional bracelet.

"Must I really give you my c-"

"Give it"

As I took out the orb, staring at it for a couple of seconds, I tried to protest but after being cut off by Kevin's cold voice, I could only reluctantly give it to him.

...goodbye 50+ million U

"Thanks"

Grabbing the core with his hand, Kevin thanked me. Observing the core in his hand for a couple of seconds, as he made sure that everything was sorted, turning his attention back to me, Kevin solemnly asked.

"Are you ready?"

"Yeah..."

Standing up and staring at Kevin in the eyes I nodded my head. Nodding his head back, just as Kevin was about to open the portal, recalling something, he asked

"Right, before we leave, do you have at least a year's worth of supplies?"

"Yes, I do"

Hearing Kevin's question, I nodded my head and showed him my dimensional bracelet.

In fact, I had two years' worth of supplies with me. With food not getting spoiled inside of dimensional storages I could pretty much store all the food that I wanted without worrying about it rotting.

Ever since the first dungeon fiasco, I made sure to always keep with me at least a couple of months worth of food supplies inside of my storage space.

In order to store that much food, I had bought an extremely expensive dimensional bracelet that could hold 10x more than my previous bracelet. With my now expanded storage place, I pretty much filled it with anything I could possibly think of.

Drones, tents, food, water, books, clothes...basically anything that could prove to be useful.

Of course apart from those I made sure to bring the red book with me as it was the best cheat I could have when traveling with Kevin. Just the book alone could increase the chances of my success to increase by a large factor.

...it was that important that I brought it with me.

In the middle of my thoughts, remembering something, staring at Kevin I asked

"What's the conversion rate?"

"one-ten"

Frowning, I carefully asked

"So, for every ten days we spend there a day passes here?"

"Yes"

Placing my hand on my chin, the frown on my face deepened. After a bit of thinking, I nodded my head and said

"Alright, considering that today is a Friday, it means that we have about two days and a half to three days and a half to spend...moreover we can probably skip a day, buying us another ten days"

"I'm sure Miss Longbern wouldn't mind our absence too much, so that means we will have at most a month's time..."

...would that be enough time?

Honestly, I wasn't too sure. According to my calculations, yes, but you never knew what could go wrong.

Frowning as I brushed the bangs of my hair to the side, I mumbled

"Oh well, even if we spend more time, what's the worse Donna could do? Kill us?"

...well it didn't matter.

I had already typed out a message to Donna that would be sent to her in three days' time explaining our absence.

Unless I returned before then, the message would be directly sent to her, helping me avoid a troubling situation where a long search for Kevin and I would happen.

Pretending to not have heard my muttering, Kevin asked something that he had wanted to ask for a while.

"By the way, you still haven't told me why we're going to Immorra. Moreover, what are your plans once we arrive?"

He had wanted to ask this question before, but he never got the chance to ask.

...now that they were in this together and were about to go to Immorra, it was only appropriate that he knew what he was signing up for.

Hearing Kevin's question, I nodded my head and said

"Well, let's go there first and I'll explain to you my plans. It will take a while to explain so its better if we talk about it there rather than here where time flows faster"

"Alright, that makes sense"

Hearing my explanation, Kevin nodded his head. Since time flowed faster here, every minute they wasted here was like ten minutes there.

Might as well go there first before talking about the plans.

"huuuu..."

Thus, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath, Kevin extended his hand forward.

-Riiiiiip!

As Kevin's hand touched the air, as if grabbing matter and space itself, Kevin tore the air apart as a black void appeared before him.

Small ripples of residual magic slowly started appearing in the area Kevin was in as the mana inside of Kevin's body was quickly getting depleted. As more time passed, the ripples became more profound and noticeable, taking on a misty aura.

The mist gradually grew into an open vortex filled with darkness. As I was watching, I noticed that small translucent lights filled with different colors started to appear, filling the swirling darkness like a starry sky.

With the core in his left hand, Kevin suddenly clenched his left hand into a fist.

-Crack!

Subsequently, as if made of glass, the core shattered into a million pieces and a tremendous purple hue suddenly engulfed Kevin's body completely. Unbothered by this, as his body shined, Kevin looked at me as he shouted

"Quick, enter the portal! I can only hold on for ten seconds"

"Okay"

Solemnly nodding my head, I stared at the black portal that was opened by Kevin with unprecedented solemness.

Glancing at the black ring on my finger for a split second, I exhaled and took a decisive step into the tear.

"Huuuu..."

This was it I thought.

...this was the moment I would leave earth and enter a completely different planet, Immorra.