Eris took a moment to recover from the trials. I leaned her up against the wall to rest and waited until she seemed good enough to answer some questions.

“Who was that faceless light reforcer to you?” I withheld my urge to ask about the third trial. It wasn’t my place to pry and wanted, to have her decide on whether or not she wished to let me know.

“He…, I can recognize his magic even without a face.” A glint of hatred escaped her eyes as she looked up. “He has been the one charged with killing me. There were only a few times where it happened to be another reforcer sent in his place.”

“How many times have the two of you confronted each other?” This guy may end up being the reforcer we encounter. I won’t let Eris succumb to the same fate.

“Too many…, I have lost track after four hundred deaths…” The number of times she died at the hands of that same reforcer was insane. Someone that continuously came for your life, unable to do anything about it in the end. I found it surprising that she didn’t acquire an intense amount of despair as a result, in constant fear of his arrival.

“I won’t let him or anyone else kill you.” It won’t be the same outcome for them, not while I’m by your side.

A cute giggle escaped her mouth and the previous hateful expression was replaced by a glowing smile.

“Don’t laugh…, why are you laughing?!” A sense of heat filled my cheeks as I broke eye contact, lowering it to the side.

“Thanks, I needed that.” Her laughing receded with that and it was nice to see her mood shift for the better.

“Well, don’t keep us in suspense. What did Balthazar provide as rewards?” Seeing as Eris wasn’t planning to get up, I joined her and sat down while Alexa remained standing.

“I’ll show you, it will be easier.” Eris lowered her sight to the red pendant in the palm of her hand, closing her eyes briefly as to focus.

Several items appeared in front of us. An assorted pile of many different magic-type beast cores. The reward that stuck out though was the pile of books to the side.

“What are those for?” I pointed at the books, each one roughly an inch thick. Without waiting for her response I picked one up to read the title. ‘Skill book - Fire Magic’

“Those are helpful skills to master, relating to the element of magic a person may possess.” Sure enough, this one contained fire spells with another book listing ice magic spells.

“The details in these books are infinitely superior to anything you would find in stores.” Alexa gushed about their rarity.

“Not bad at all. These will help out a lot!” In addition to all of the cores and books, her pendant acted as an extra storage unit like my ring.

“Here you go Alexa, this should help with your magic training.” Eris materialized a skill book into her hand from her pendant. I caught a glimpse of the title, light magic.

“Oh…, thank you so much!” Alexa accepted the skill book and bowed her head in appreciation.

“Mmm, there’s more that I want to hand out to the others too. Where’s Tessa?” The mention of Tessa caused both of us to go quiet.

“She’s currently downstairs recuperating from an incident. Everyone else is undergoing training on the bottom floor.” Iris chimed in to answer. My guess, she treated Eris as a new inheritor and as another person to serve.

“Tessa’s hurt? What happened!” Eris became protective when it came to her and glanced between all of us for answers.

“Rhea told me she seems to be doing much better now. And uh, I’ve figured out what the minotaur core granted, during our sparring match earlier.” I could tell Eris’s attention was split, most likely contacting Tessa via ring to check on her. I waited for her to finish and take in the situation.

“I see… At least no one got hurt in the end.” She said that but then took a closer inspection of my arm. She squinted at the dried-up blood staining my long-sleeved attire.

“Have you just been walking around with an open wound?” Eris leaned over reaching out a hand to my injured arm. Taking but a short moment to heal and close my wound.

“Thanks for that.” I massaged the previous bite mark with not an ounce of pain remaining. Her healing power amazed me every time.

“So, what’s the plan, are we staying here?” Eris relaxed back against the wall.

“Let’s spend a night here then head back home. There are still enough MREs to hand around for everyone to eat. When we take the teleporter out, we will have to backtrack to our vehicles before heading home.” I figured it wouldn’t hurt to spend a night here, considering all of the accommodations Iris could handle for us. My main reason for wanting to head back was to expand on the dojo plan and money-making ideas that Seric thought up. Though knowing that we could rely on this place as an emergency living space was a big relief.

“Oh, now that I’m here, controlling the teleportal is possible. Let me know where you would like to end up and as long as it is within range, there will be no problem at all!” Iris continued to offer wonderful news about the various pros of this place.

“How far can it reach, are you able to teleport us into our home in Avalon, and is it possible to be teleported into here from the outside?” I felt like it was too good to be true but it couldn’t hurt to ask.

“That would be possible in the past, however, the current range is ten miles. Teleportation into here is impossible with the forcefield active and even without it, would require another teleportal station.” As I thought, it happened to be a one-way only use. The mention of a forcefield started to make sense. It had to be the reason why our communication rings didn’t reach the others back home but still worked for our people here.

“That sounds about where we were dropped off the last time we used it.” I stood up and extended a helping hand for Eris. She gathered all of her belongings back into her pendant and affixed it to the neck strap of her dress, then took my assistance up. I figured that was enough excitement for today and asked Iris to handle our sleeping arrangements.