Damn. As I thought, the anti-Lucia cannon wasn’t ready yet. I only fired one shot, yet the formation inside of it disintegrated. Of all the outcomes I theorized, disintegration of the formation wasn’t one of them. I couldn’t test the cannon in the pocket realm because it’d probably destroy the world, so it’s not my fault it isn’t perfect. Anyway, let’s record the results. I’m pretty sure those two test subjects were sky-realm experts since they were standing in the sky. “Anti-Lucia cannon, prototype one. Results: two sky-realm experts were flattened. Despite being in near proximity, Softie remained uninjured—the formation concentrating and limiting the attack radius worked perfectly. However, every formation inside the cannon disintegrated two seconds after firing. The physical structure remains stable. The old formation is perfect for a one-time-use attack: suggest adding more foundation and stabilizing formations for repeated use.”

I tapped a jade slip against my necklace, and the sound file that I had just recorded was transcribed into the green mineral. Then I put the slip away into a filing cabinet in one of my interspacial rings. After making sure the anti-Lucia cannon wouldn’t explode, I stored it away as well before directing my flying ship towards the mattress that Softie was standing on. She was frozen in place and hadn’t moved despite the time it took me to put everything away. Please don’t tell me the shockwaves from the cannon killed her. That’d ruin the whole purpose of me coming here to save her.

“Granny Ilya, I’m scared.”

“…Mirta?”

“Yeah?”

“How are you here?”

“When two people love each other very, very much—don’t hit me! Don’t hit me! I’m sorry! I was wrong!”

What the heck was Mirta doing here? I’m sure I left her behind. Unless she had one of the orbs to enter with? “Have you been going through my stuff again?”

“Of course!” Mirta puffed her chest out. Then her eyes widened, and she ran back, dodging my fist. “I mean, no! Of course not!” Mirta cleared her throat. “A-anyways, this place is a lot scarier than you said it would be. There’s so much violence.”

Is there? Claw’s fighting a few sky-realm experts up there. Softie was fighting these two puddles over here. And there’s a lot of people that I don’t know who’re fighting people dressed in rainbow robes. Are they all earth-realm experts? I’m guessing they’re from the main branch of that phoenix sect Lucia exterminated with her tribulation. “Eh. This is relatively tame.” It’s not as tame as that so-called battlefield which was a glorified dueling arena, but compared to the amount of bloodshed caused by Lucia when she went around subduing sects, this is nothing in comparison. Speaking of Lucia, she really got lost, huh? If she were here, this fight would be a one-sided slaughter.

“S-Sister Ilya, is that you?”

It looks like Softie didn’t die. That’s a relief. “Hey. Long time no see.”

“Be careful! There’s an immortal here! He killed my opponents in an instant,” Softie hissed at me and waved her hand down, gesturing for me to get off my boat. “Tell Lucia to stay inside in boat. She can’t reveal herself in front of him.”

Immortal? Lucia? “You’re wrong on both counts. I killed those two sky-realm experts.” I pointed at the one big puddle of watery blood. “And Lucia’s not with me.”

Softie’s eyes widened. “Lucia’s not with you? Is that okay? Won’t she get lost? Where is she? How is she doing? Is she eating well? Has she become an immortal?”

She’s not even going to ask about the anti-Lucia cannon’s effects? “Gee, it’s nice to see you again too, Softie. I’m glad to see you care so much about me after I rushed here to save you.”

Softie’s face flushed red. “S-sorry, Sister Ilya. I lost my composure for a second.” Her eyes shifted behind me, where an elven teen was climbing off the side of the boat because she was too afraid to jump off. “It’s great to see you again, Sister Ilya. Who is that?”

“That’s … a stowaway.” When did Mirta get so attached to me? It must’ve happened because her grandmother visited me a lot to ask questions about enchanting. It turns out, enchanting is awfully similar to creating formations. I suspect Lucia’s bone-carving skill is also some sort of formation-creating ability that draws out the remaining lifeforce in the bones and converts it to a different form of energy. “She’s an elf.”

“An elf!” Softie’s eyes widened. “You have to hide her ears.”

Hide her ears…? Oh, I remember now. “Hey, Mirta.”

“What’s up, Granny Ilya?”

“Elf ears are actually an extremely rare alchemical ingredient. They’re used to create beautifying pills.” Mirta made a strange face. Well, who told her to come to the Immortal Continent with me? “You can’t let anyone know or….” I performed a snipping gesture next to my head.

“That’s okay.” A serrated greatsword appeared in Mirta’s hands. Unlike that time during the Godking’s Brawl, her sword wasn’t taller than her anymore. “If anyone tries to cut my ears off, I’ll cut their penis off!”

Softie muttered, “As expected of someone from Lucia’s homeland….”

No. Stop that train of thought right there, Softie. Not all of us are sadistic castrators. In fact, I’m pretty sure only Lucia and Mirta have those tendencies. Speaking of which, when did Mirta learn something like that? “Mirta, do you even know what a penis is?”

“Of course! It’s the whistle that calls the stork!”

I’m surrounded by idiots. Elves, please, work on your sex ed. No wonder why the elven population has been steadily declining.

“This! How can this be happening!?” Blood flew out of the sky and landed by my feet. The volume was suspiciously close to a mouthful. It seemed like people still vomited blood at the gentlest of agitations. Oh, right. We’re in the middle of a battlefield right now. Well, we’re closer to its outskirts, but still. Claw’s gotten strong, huh? He’s kicking those three sky-realm experts’ asses. I wonder how many people he’s beheaded to get this strong. Anyway, let’s help him out.

“What are you doing?” Softie asked when I crouched down and used a spoon to scoop up the blood that had fallen from the sky.

“Helping Claw out. Look, this is the blood of the person he’s fighting.”

Softie looked up and then looked back down at the spoon. “Right…? And?”

“So, I have this neat little contraption that I made to disable Lucia: I call it the Headache Inducer 2000.” To enter jade slips, one can either use their thoughts, or if there’s a special formation on the jade slip, all that’s required is a smidgen of blood to unlock the knowledge inside. I opened my interspacial ring and took out a piano-sized object. “Basically, there’s over fifty thousand jade slips in here, and each one can transfer knowledge via blood. If I put some blood into this opening here”—I poured the spoonful of blood into the contraption—“and press this button”—the blood inside the opening exploded into a fine mist, coating all the jade slips inside the Headache Inducer 2000—“the contents of fifty thousand erotic novels are instantly crammed into the brain of the blood’s owner.”

“Ah! My head! My loins! My—”

The expert in the sky’s voice was cut short once Claw cut his head off thanks to the moment of distraction I provided. The head fell by my feet, its bloodshot eyes staring up at me. I picked it up, ignoring Mirta’s pale face. Oh, neat. “I can probably make a nice necklace with this.”