The group officially grew by a few members. When they first met, Sophia almost immediately invited Chloe to join them, and the pink fox was a big fan of the idea. Her requirement was that her mother, Fey, would be okay with that, as well. She needed a slight bit of persuasion, but all worked out well in the end. Not only that, but Mira also decided to stay with them, adding another new member, a rather important one at that, namely the overseer of magic.

“Should we head back to the capital?” After most, or at least some of the details about their new group recruits were taken care of, Sophia wanted to return to their mansion.

“Sounds good to me.” Maya liked the plan.

“Yup.” Chloe and Steph did, too.

“Already?” Fey didn't seem to be a fan, though. "I just got here, and honestly, I'm a little tired from traveling so much.”

“It will take like ten seconds, you know?” While saying so, the tiger opened the portal to her extra dimension again, after having removed it a while ago before Fey and Mira had appeared. Even without them, the portal made the living room more than a little cramped.

“Ohh!" Fey's interest was instantly piqued. “You also know how to make those domain portals? Impressive! It was quite something when Mira showed them to me not too long ago. Wait, you have your own domain?!”

"I have a domain?!" Sophia sounded even more shocked than her.

“Sophia is the one who invented those portals.” The teal fox smiled at the other full. “As I briefly mentioned before, after seeing her using them, I made my own version based on her idea because I loved the concept!”

"That's quite the feat!" Fey glanced at the blonde again. “You really seem most talented with magic. I look forward to seeing more of those things from you.”

“Yeah yeah, sure.” The tiger didn’t care about that right now. “What’s this about me having a domain?!”

“Did Canir not tell you about it?” Mira took over. “Every overseer eventually gets access to their own domain. Or dimension, how you like to call it.”

“E-Eh?!” She didn’t like the sound of that. “I’m no overseer, though?!”

"You qualify for most of the needed prerequisites already, though."

“H-Huh?!” She hated that news even more. “W-What are they…?”

"A blessing by an existing overseer, access to your own domain, good enough control over magic to bend reality with it, and the only thing you’re missing, a certain massive level of total authority.”

“Urgh…”

“So unfair!” Steph was envious. “Wait, Sophia’s dimension, domain, whatever is just a massive white space, while yours is a fantastical jungle filled to the brim with magic and overgrown plants! You can’t really compare those!”

“That’s because I changed and designed mine to my tastes.” Mira smiled at the dog-girl. “It just starts out with the all-white blankness.”

“Ohh!”

“Hmm?” Sophia tilted her head. “Canir’s place was the same, though? Wouldn’t he, out of all people, have the fanciest domain ever?”

“He has multiple ones. You probably only went to his temporary or work-in-progress ones so far, if I had to take a guess.”

“Ah, I see.” The blonde nodded a few times. “By the way, what is magic to bend reality…? Can I do something like that?”

“I don’t know, can you?” Mira tilted her head. “Wouldn’t you agree that stopping time would fit that description?”

"A-Ah.” The tiger awkwardly scratched her cheek. "Wait, you know about that? Even Canir had no idea that I could do that until I told him.”

“Other overseers aren’t affected by the magic of that type. Because you have the same authority as he has, you can influence each other, though."

“Ohh! Wait… Does that mean time wasn’t stopped for you whenever I did it?”

“Exactly.” She nodded. “Don’t worry too much about it, though. It doesn’t bother me at all. I don’t care that much about the concept of time, so, for the most part, it doesn’t really matter to me. Also, my own domain isn’t affected by it in the first place.”

“Wow.” Sophia had no better words.

“Am I able to learn how to stop time, too?!” Sounding very excited, Steph looked at the overseer who gifted her magic.

“Eventually, you should be able to. Right now, I blocked your ability to use magic on that level. For your own safety." The teal fox paused for a moment. "It is quite overwhelming magic that can go wrong very fast and easily. Imagine stopping time on accident and being trapped there because you panic and have no idea how to things return to normal as you weren’t ready for the experience.”

“T-That would be the worst!” The dog-girl started shuddering just thinking about it.

“T-Tell me about it!” The tiger got loud. “That’s exactly what happened to me! I really could’ve done without it! That was easily the second-most scary experience I had in my life!”

"That's terrifying!" Steph stared at her. "Huh? Wait, what was the scariest thing, then?!"

“When Fennyfenny and I almost blew up this continent. Luckily, Canir prevented the worst, and we only created that nice lake I showed you the other day, but it still left quite a scar…”

“YES!” The wolf in question strongly nodded a couple of times.

“Yeah, that was quite something.” Mira looked at the duo while slowly shaking her head. “It did come with some benefits, though.”

“Really…?” Sophia tilted her head.

“I got to yell at Canir for hours afterward~.” She started smiling. “He’s the one most responsible for that mess because he never explained anything to you. It’s more entertaining that way, after all.”

“Urgh, I just heard that in his voice…” The blonde didn’t like that. “Wait, was that the real reason it took him so long to visit us after it happened? He mentioned something about having had to recover for a while after it.”

“Yup~.”

“Your training on how to hold back and properly use magic will be much more intense than I had previously anticipated.” Fey didn’t like anything she had just heard.

“M-Might really be for the best…” Sophia couldn’t disagree.

"A small ray of hope has finally appeared…” Maya was almost moved to tears.

“Anyway,” Mira returned to the topic. “That’s also why you’re still affected by Sophia’s ability to stop time. You aren’t overseer enough yet.”

“And that’s a good thing!” The cat-girl stared at the dog. “Sophia and I need some privacy every now and then!”

“Except for the part where Mira isn’t affected by it.” The tiger looked back at her.

"A-Ah.”

“If you want real privacy, Sophia might want to start dressing up her domain. Inside that, even I would be affected by the time-stop effect. It’s basically Sophia’s very own world, and her word is absolute there. Even more importantly, only allowed people can enter it. If you go and say no one is allowed to enter my place for the next two hours, it’s impossible to do so during that time frame.”

“I LOVE the sound of that!” Maya looked quite happy about this new information.

“Ohh!” The tiger also looked excited about it. “That means we have to make it comfy in there! How about we place a whole house inside, after all?”

“Sure!” Initially, the cat-girl had been very against the idea when Sophia first had it, but things had drastically changed in the last 30 seconds.

“Yay!”

“You two really are something.” The overseer was enjoying their exchange.

“Ehehe~.”

“Are my other overseer abilities blocked, as well?” Steph got back to the earlier topic. “I would love to play with my own domain!”

“No, I didn’t do anything with that.” She shook her head. “It can't cause any harm, after all. There's no way to tell when you will become able to enter your domain, though. Everyone was extremely surprised when we heard that Sophia had unlocked hers. It’s originally supposed to happen much later in the life of an aspiring overseer-to-be.”

“Ah, I see.” The dog-girl sounded a little disappointed.

“Don’t worry, you can do whatever you want to in mine!” Sophia smiled at her. “I’m not an aspiring overseer-to-be, but that shouldn’t matter!”

“That’s a start!”

“It’s also possible to connect domains with each other.” Mira explained a little more about it. “The domain itself is still owned by the respective overseer, but you can switch from one place to another if allowed.”

“Ohh! Sophia, can I have a corner for myself that we then later use as an entrance to my domain? You can do the same in mine once I unlock it!” Steph was getting excited.

“Absolutely!” So was the older sister.

“My list of things I never expected to hear just keeps on growing…”

“It’s great, isn’t it?!” Chloe sounded a lot giddier about it compared to Maya.

“Yeah, sure, let’s go with that.”

“That being said,” The tiger tilted her head while facing Mira again. “You said that only people I allowed to can enter my domain. No one had any issues with using my portals, though?”

“It happens unconsciously for the most part. If they’re your friends or at least good acquaintances, they’re allowed by default unless stated otherwise.”

“How handy! Wait!” She suddenly paused. “I was planning to show my portals to the king because I think it could revolutionize long-distance traveling."

“Oh.” The overseer’s face turned complicated. “That’s a little… Ah, no, wait a moment, you could use the same I did for the human army. As you’re the one who invented the portals, I’m okay with telling you. If you connect the portals inside your domain, they’ll fuse together, and the outside portals link directly to each other. That way, it could work.”

“I know.” Sophia looked right at her. “That’s what I was planning to use. I felt pretty uncomfortable about having people I don't know use my extra dimension, or domain now, so we came up with this solution while playing around with my portals.”

“Ah, I see. It should work, then. Also, the uncomfortable feeling came from the fact that we instinctively want no outsiders in our domains.”

"Interesting." She had nothing else to say.

They chatted about the portals and domains a little longer, but once the details were taken care of, the group finally decided to return to the capital after having gotten sidetracked for quite a while.