Along the northern shores of the Shearwood province, 2 hooded figures could be seen walking along the shore in the cold winter night. They left a trail of footprints in the soft wet sand while falling snowflakes seemed to melt and disappear above the 2 hooded figures.

They've been walking through the night since their fight came to an end. Relying only on moonlight, Kiefer and Isana strolled towards the Wanda province. Kiefer had originally intended to make his way towards Latiase, the second city in the province of Rashael, but changed his mind after conversing for a short while with Isana.

Isana claimed that the high elves were not yet extinct but were instead being protected within Wanda, their small city protected by a spacial barrier. Only those exceptionally skilled in magic would be able to make their way in.

Kiefer cast aside his desire to study zombies and undead in Drigor and chose to head in the opposite direction instead, hoping he would be able to learn more about mana than the library in Latiase would be able to provide.

During the trip, Kiefer had explained to Isana his history and his goals and she in return tried to teach him ice based magic along with her special dimensional pocket.

Kiefer caught on quickly, dissecting and analysing all the information Isana had given him while trying to apply it to himself. Although how Isana had explained it was pretty much unclear, Kiefer still managed to figure out the gist of it.

The caster rips a hole in spacetime, linking it to an alternate dimension that occupies the same space as the caster, but is unperceivable to anyone else. Isana warned him that it will cost a big deal of mana to open the pocket each time, and the space you can get inside depends on your maximum mana pool.

When Kiefer further questioned Isana, she was unable to answer his questions such as “Can a living thing survive in there?”, “Where does the alternate dimension lead to?” or even “How much can you store in there.” Not satisfied, Kiefer was determined to find out the answers one way or another.

Kiefer requested that Isana find something to fill her pocket till it’s full. Reluctantly, Isana flew off into the distant sea, then came back an hour later. She then proceeded to unload an iceberg the size of a small mountain a little off the shore from where they were. Kiefer could only stare at the tsunami caused by the iceberg approaching him, before casting his dome shield in the last second to avoid drowning.

With the water subsided, Isana came back down by his side, smiling and asking how she did, but Kiefer just kept quiet, ignoring her while deep in thought.

Tired from the day’s activities, the fight with Isana and the long walk along the beach, Kiefer finally decided to take a break, demanding his sack back from Isana and setting up camp. He put up a tent and was about to get inside his sleeping bag when he had to stop Isana.

“Sorry, but this tent has a maximum occupancy of two.” Stated Kiefer as a matter of factly, staring at Isana’s emerald eyes.

“Well, there’s you, and me! That makes 2!” Isana replied in a cheerful tone, only to be stopped by Kiefer again.

“Sorry, but my companion here counts as the second occupant.” Kiefer remarked, while pointed at his chest where a soft coo-ing sound could be heard, after which, he shut the tent’s flaps in Isana’s face.

Pouting her lips, Isana turned around and faced the sea, yelling back,” Fine! but for tonight only. Tomorrow we are definitely getting a room together.” Kiefer ignored her and soon fell into a deep slumber, still trying to figure out how to open a dimension pocket.

Morning came around quickly, almost making it seem like a time jump to Kiefer. As he opened his eyes, he was glad to see that it was only him inside the tent. Shearwood must have awoken earlier and left the pocket in his breastplate. Kiefer made his way outside, stretched and started packing up the tent when he heard rustling coming from the forest behind him.

Putting his shield dome up, Kiefer stared into the forest, only to observe the beautiful Isana emerging from within the depths. She was carrying a live Fientral in each hand, grabbing them by the scruff of their crystalline necks. The Fientrals looked absolutely terrified, whimpering and staring at Kiefer with puppy eyes as if pleading him to save them from this dragoness. Shearwood’s head could be seen hanging out from within the valley between the 2 mounds on Isana’s chest.

“Good morning!” Isana greeted Kiefer, full of spirit. “Ready for breakfast?” she asked, raising the Fientral in her right hand.

“Perfect!” Kiefer thought, with a smile on his face. “Having her around might not be so bad after all. Only problem is I don’t know where her allegiance lies and I can’t trust her entirely yet. Sher might, but I don’t”.

As they prepared for breakfast, Kiefer stopped Isana from snapping the neck of the 2nd Fientral. He had plans for it. Asking Isana to open her pocket dimension again, Kiefer tossed the 2nd Fientral inside, then continued with preparing breakfast. Seeing his actions, Isana just shrugged. Though it cost a massive amount of mana to open the pocket dimension each time, her mana pool was so ridiculously large that It had not mattered to her how many times she opened it.

With breakfast over, Kiefer then requested Isana to open her pocket dimension (PD) again, but surprisingly, Isana refused. She was craftier than Shearwood and knew how to get what she wanted.

“Each time you want me to open my PD, you have to promise to hold my hand on your own accord for the next hour.” Isana demanded. She had something Kiefer wanted, and Kiefer was something she wanted, and in her eyes, that was a fair trade.

Kiefer was taken aback. The first titan he managed to subdue did not ever have any requests, so he had just taken her for granted. Now comes along a second titan, a smarter and craftier one and he, for the first time, had to compromise. Unwillingly, Kiefer agreed, still thinking about how much better Sher is compared to Isana.

With the PD opened, Isana took out the remaining Fientral, still alive and whimpering. Kiefer’s face immediately lit up, knowing that yet another unknown has been solved. Kiefer retrieved a rope from his sack and tied a leash around the Fientral, which followed behind him meekly, occasionally looking back into the forest where its home used to be.

“Isana, could you describe to me again what happens when you open a PD?” (Kiefer)

“Mmmm, nope!” Isana replied cheerfully, holding Kiefer’s hand and swinging it in a state of bliss.

“Haaah… fine.” Kiefer sighed. “I’ll hold your hands for another hour if you tell me what I want to know.” Kiefer bargained.

“Mmm, nope! You let me hug your arm, with no pauldrons and no gauntlets, for 1 hour, and I will tell you.” (Isana)

“This girl… she’s getting greedier knowing I need her” Kiefer cursed internally, but still putting up a fake smile. “Fine.” Kiefer said, removing his armour and allowing Isana to store it in her PD.

“I first focus my magic at a point in front of me where I want to open the PD. Then, a black dot appears, which then extends into a vertical black line. The black line then splits into 2 starting from the middle, eventually forming a black circle with white space in between. I just put my hand into the white space and think of what I want to take out, and then it lands inside my hand. Then I just pull it out.” (Isana)

“Thank you Isana” Kiefer muttered, back into his deep thought.

“Hey hey… which do you prefer? Darling, sweetheart, baby, or Kii?”(Isana)

It was obvious Isana wanted to call Kiefer by a nickname, but she also knew that Kiefer wasn’t exactly interested in her, so she had mixed up 3 terms he would absolutely hate, with the one she actually wanted to call him by.

“If you let me call you with any of those from now on, I will stop hugging your arm and just hold your hand.” (Isana)

Walking was difficult and awkward with a woman dragging your arm, so Kiefer ended up agreeing to being called “Kii”, before continueing to analyse and think of possible ways to open his own PD.

The man, dragoness and serpent had been walking for almost a day with the sun starting to set. They could finally see the port town of Shearwood in the distance. Thinking they would increase the pace, Isana started dragging Kiefer’s arm when Kiefer suddenly let go and just stood still, with a determined look on his face.

Looking up at him, Sher immediately recognised that face and shot out of his armour and dove straight for Isana’s valley. “Sana sis! We need to get away from here as far as possible! I know that face. Master is going to do something scary!” Sher urged her sister.

Not knowing what to do, Isana, together with Sher and grabbing the Fientral, raced to a safe distance of around 500m behind Kiefer. Kiefer was completely oblivious to his surroundings as he raised his right arm.

Kiefer began to collect his mana at a point roughly 3m ahead of him, feeding the point with more mana as time went on. The silvery haze of particles soon became a small ball of liquid, and then became a crystalline drop of silver mana. Kiefer kept compressing it, like he would for creating the subatomic singularities in his gravity field.

With increasing pressure, the crystal resisted for a second, and then instantly collapsed on itself, imploding into a tiny blackhole. The instant the blackhole was created, Kiefer anchored himself to the ground as sand, water, trees and air all began swirling into the blackhole, never appearing again once past the event horizon.

Concentrating on his mana within the blackhole, Kiefer forced the blackhole to elongate, putting up a mana barrier around it to prevent any more mass from entering the blackhole. Picturing what Isana had described, Kiefer opened up the elongated black hole from the middle, finally revealing an empty white space.

As soon as the blackhole was opened in the middle and the PD established, it stopped emitting gravitons and stabilised, allowing Kiefer to walk forwards and put his hand in. Noticing his mana was terrifyingly low, Kiefer decided to try one last thing before closing the PD. He stuck his head inside and took a deep breath, looking around. A space completely white in all directions, enough oxygen to sustain life, and the boundaries could not be determined. He stepped inside his own PD and then stepped back out. Without enough mana to open a second PD to continue with his experiments, Kiefer decided to end it for the day.

“That confirms my theory, and maybe even theories back on earth. Blackholes really do rip a hole in the fabric of spacetime and could very well lead to other parallel dimensions. I have to publish this somehow once I get back.” Kiefer murmured to himself, as Isana and Shearwood cautiously made their way back.

“Kii, are you done? What did you do?” Isana asked with a worried face. She only saw Kiefer summon a black object that seemed to suck everything into it, and then watched as Kiefer disappeared, and then re-appear in the same spot. Looking around, she was glad she took Sher’s advice to run to a safe distance, as everything around Kiefer was a mess. Trees uprooted, sand piling up in mounds in random places, water puddles starting to freeze in the sand and the sea level having receded significantly, and the huge hole in the ground that Kiefer was standing in, with a radius of 50m.

“Everything is fine girls,” Kiefer assured them, with an expression that is over the moon. “I managed to open a PD. Man you were right Isana. It took almost all my mana to just open one. Lucky it doesn’t require any mana upkeep to keep it open.”

Suddenly, without any warning, Isana burst out laughing. Sher and Kiefer just stared at the dragoness as she finally collected herself and spoke up,” My dear sister, you have definitely found yourself an interesting master. Such a genius, to think he would be able to open a PD by himself. And he’s not even one of us 4 elder titans!” Isana explained, beaming with pride, looking at Kiefer. “My dear Kii, you surely outdid yourself this time. Make sure you don’t pass out from mana exhaustion.”

Shearwood snuggled back inside Kiefer’s breastplate, and nodded silently at Kiefer, indicating he could take her mana without restraint. During the long walk towards the port town, Kiefer slowly converted Sher’s mana, and finally filled it back up after stepping into town. He could feel the crystalline silver sand grow to become a small sphere, a little smaller than a marble within his chest. Surrounding the marble was a thin film of silver liquid flowing non-stop and beyond the liquid was the familiar haze.

The 2 figures wearing seraplor mantles slowly walked alongside the port with a Fientral in a leash, watching the shipmasters pack away their sails and men loading their vessels, preparing for the journey in the morning. Isana and Kiefer stood out quite well, looking like a rich noble couple with an expensive, exotic pet. One was a silver haired beauty while the other had black hair and manly features, looking quite handsome. They did not talk much, just walked through the town before deciding to stay at a local inn for the night.

Isana was adamant about sharing a room and a bed, but seeing as she helped with him opening his PD, Kiefer selected a single room with 2 beds to compromise. Paying the innkeeper a total of 10 silver, they made their way to their room only to discover that there one large bed instead of the 2 as promised. After clarification, it would seem that Isana had bribed the innkeeper to choose a room with a single bed. Kiefer, tired from the day just gave up and removed his armour.

The night passed without much incident, but with both Kiefer and Isana exhausted without getting any sleep that night. Isana had repeatedly tried to attack Kiefer and Kiefer was constantly repelling her advances. Eventually, Isana gave in and left Kiefer alone, allowing both barely 4 hours of sleep.

With dark bags under their eyes, the 2 of them got dressed and headed down for breakfast. Both ate breakfast silently, refusing to answer Sher’s question on why they looked so tired. The innkeeper lady just looked at them and chuckled, thinking that they must’ve had an exhausting night.

Walking up to the inn’s counter, Kiefer asked the innkeeper in a low voice, “Do you know any shipmasters heading towards Wanda’s northern port? I need a ride and the sooner the better. As you may have already known, money is not an issue for me. I just need one that is fast.”

“There is actually a man on the west side of the port. He’s transporting spice and herbs to wanda. If you hurry you might catch him. It’s a medium sized transport vessel. His name is Sharon and he is usually dressed oddly. You can’t miss him. He’s supposed to leave in about an hour’s time. However, your pet might be a problem.” She replied, looking at the Fientral sitting obediently next to Isana.

“Thank you. We best be on our way” Kiefer said, as he urged the dragoness and the dog to move quickly towards the west end of the port.

“Isana, throw the dog in your PD.” Kiefer whispered as he glanced around looking for Sharon. And that’s when he saw a bulky man, with large hairy arms, a square chin, long blonde hair and a moustache… in a dress, and Kiefer shuddered. “Well, there’s no mistaking it. That’s most likely Sharon.” Kiefer thought, dreading the interaction he would have to go through.

As he approached the man(?) on the deck of a moderately sized ship busy helping sialors haul up the anchor, Kiefer yelled out in a loud a crisp voice “Sharon!”. He watched in horror as the man turned towards his voice in slow motion, hair trailing behind him in a perfect flow, like in those hair product commercials.

“Yes?” he asked in a squeaky voice, as he walked towards Kiefer. It became even more horrifying up close, with trimmed eyebrows and powdered face, Sharon blinked while staring down at the puny couple.

“Um… w-we require a ride t-to Wanda and were told you could b-be of assis- assistance.” Kiefer stuttered, keeping his guard up. Isana looked at her flustered Kii and chuckled, covering her mouth with her hands.

“Sure! It’s 3 gold per person for the trip. Although, we can’t guarantee your safety in case of pirates.” Sharon replied, with her(his?) unusually high pitched voice, as if trying to imitate a female’s voice.

“That’s no problem!” Isana cut in, pulling out Kiefer’s academy identity card. “My husband and I are both accomplished magus. We should be able to protect your cargo for the duration of the trip.” Kiefer glared at her, but decided it would be best to play along.

“Yay!” Sharon exclaimed as (s)he skipped and clapped her(his?) hands, before turning towards the sailors and yelling in a deep baritone voice “BOYS! We got ourselves a few mages!” Hearing that, the sailors all cheered and seemed to move about quicker in higher spirits than before.

“Come aboard then, I’ll show you your quarters. Although I must advice, please keep nightly activities to a minimum ok?” Sharon winked at Kiefer, only making him shudder even more. He was back to speaking in his high pitched voice again. “The trip will last 10 to 15 days, depending on wind conditions.”

Following behind Sharon, Kiefer settled into his small room, while Isana ran off into the town before returning 10 minutes later. She had gone to let the Fientral go inside the forest behind the town. Kiefer opened his PD again, but this time without all the destruction of the blackhole, threw his gauntlets, mask and sack inside, leaving only his pouch of coins outside, before closing the PD. Once again, his mana had been almost completely drained.

As the ship set sail, Kiefer and Isana went up to the deck and looked out into the cold sea, wind blowing against their faces. Kiefer started replenishing his mana from the surrounding, not using Sher’s mana since there was plenty of time. Sher was snuggled up inside his breastplate and he did not want to disturb her.

The ship itself was a simple design, with living quarters for the sailors at the lowest deck, followed by cargo hold in the middle level, and then the captain and guest’s quarters on the highest level. Kiefer only had to open his door to see the open ocean scenery. The wooden hull was painted bright red, not exactly a subtle colour, with barnacles growing along the side. There were 3 large masts and great white sails and a crowsnest at the top of the middle largest mast. The ship was operated by 25 sailors including Sharon.

The ship sailed silently for half a day towards the setting sun, with occasional yelling from Sharon or the sailors. Silently, Kiefer wished there would be some action on the trip, if not 15 days alone with Isana would be tiring.

Kiefer’s mana was full by nightfall and he decided to open his PD again one last time before heading to bed. Isana had been moving around the ship bothering the sailors on their jobs, curious like a kid who just discovered a new toy. However, just as Kiefer was about to open his PD, his mana pulse responded with a feedback. 5 groups of 6 people had triggered the feedback response from Kiefer’s mana pulse and he dashed outside expectantly.

Enhancing his eyesight, he could barely make out 5 small fast vessels approaching from 2 km away. It would seem that Kiefer’s wish had been granted as there was a pirate raid on the first night. Leaving Sher tucked away in a blanket on his bed, Kiefer jumped off the ship before the sailors could stop him.

He did not have his gauntlets, but was not afraid at all, at least not against 30 human pirates. Seeing Kiefer jump off the boat, Isana smiled as well, and followed suit. With each step in his sprint, Kiefer covered 20 metres, creating silver mana platforms in the air just above the water surface to use as footholds.

Within minutes, he was standing above the water, with Isana by his side staring at the pirates. The pirates had not expected to be confronted so fast, and not by 2 magus at that. Kiefer yelled out loudly while enhancing his vocal chords, “Tell me where your main ship is and I will let you all live.”

Surprised and afraid, the pirates quickly turned their small boats around and paddled quickly, hoping they could use armaments on their main ship to fight on equal grounds, while inadvertedly leading Kiefer to his goal. The ship was a war frigate, probably stolen and pillaged from a navy. It was even bigger than Sharon’s cargo vessel. Smiling, Kiefer followed behind the fleeing pirates for a good kilometre.

Once within range, the cannons started firing on Kiefer who was still standing in the air. Isana had chosen to skilfully dodge the cannonballs hurling towards her, but Kiefer just stood still with his shield dome up. Like hammers hitting a gong, loud ‘GONGS’ rang out into the night sky in the middle of the ocean as cannonballs hit Kiefer’s shield and deflected off.

Within 20 minutes the firing stopped and Kiefer stepped onto the starboard of the massive frigate. The pirate’s captain ordered the attack and instantly, Kiefer had whipped the charging pirates off deck, crushing their ribs due to the impact from his mana whips. The whole fiasco lasted an hour, with Kiefer taking the deed to the ship from the leader and choosing to let him go on one of the small attack boats. Kiefer had hoped that one day, the leader might build up a fortune again, for him to milk.

Placing the entire Frigate inside her PD, Isana and Kiefer head back to Sharon’s vessel, only to be greeted by stunned faces of all the sailors who have been alerted after their 2 mages had chosen to throw themselves overboard.

Kiefer simply smiled, and set foot on the ship’s deck and whispered to Isana, “That was a rather lucrative venture.”