Ethereal Ascendance: A Journey of Transformation

"So you actually infiltrated this city without being discovered?" Selene couldn't help asking.

"We probably weren't directly seen," Adrian recalled what had happened earlier.

"But we killed a cave dweller by the pit, if its corpse was found it would definitely raise alerts. They probably aren't clear if we were transported over or not."

"How long have you been here?" I asked curiously, seeing how familiar he was with the area, it seemed like more than just a day or two.

"About a week probably," Adrian said helplessly. "After we arrived, through various investigations, we found out the locals call this place Val City."

"At first we wanted to find a chance to get close to that spatial hole, to find a way back. But there were never any more spatial exchanges there afterwards, and the number of beasts in the pit lessened a lot too. We thought the other side had given up on transporting things over. Until we discovered all of you..."

"Yes, it looks like they were suspecting someone was infiltrating, but they didn't give up. They probably just changed locations, otherwise we wouldn't have ended up here either," I nodded and said feelingly.

"Have you made contact with the dark creatures here too?"

"Yes, these magic beasts are generally only sensitive to light and dark elements. Our bodies basically have no light elemental traces, so with some minor disguises we won't be found out," Blanche generously shared with me the experience she'd gained mixing in this city. I secretly frowned to myself, this experience was basically useless to me as an angel.

"If it wasn't for your appearance, I'd have thought I'd be stuck here forever," Eleanora suddenly chimed in. Her words said 'we' but her eyes were full of hope staring at me, seeming to have great expectations that I would save everyone and escape this place.

But how was that possible, even though we came, we were just two more victims. Thinking that we might even drag them down, I felt extremely awkward.

"Alright, let's summarize," Alfreed suddenly spoke up. Everyone immediately stopped their chaotic discussion and quietly listened to him start analyzing.

"Based on our experiences and Miss Feliciana's descriptions, we guess the other side has some kind of two-way spatial positioning device. Its effect exchanges space between the Dark Continent and the Astralrealm Kingdom, transporting beasts over. This kind of device should be a pair, one on each side to locate space. The controlling one should be on the Dark Continent side."

"The Kingdom side device should be small, carried by beasts mainly for positioning. The size of this side's device isn't clear since there are control parts, it's estimated to be bigger. But it should still be movable."

"The Kingdom side device seems to move to Tethys town now. There's something strange about the Kingdom side device's current position..." Saying this, Alfreed suddenly lowered his head with a confused expression, seeming to have encountered something difficult to explain.

"Previously in the Kingdom, we encountered beasts appearing then immediately transferring to the next spot within a day, hard to track and encircle. But from when the church got reports to when Miss Feliciana left town, several days passed. And during this time there were at least two spatial exchanges in that original location. Could the beast carrying the device stay there?"

"No, it might be dead," I suddenly recalled a key piece of information I hadn't shared earlier. At the time I didn't know what happened so thought it was unrelated to us being moved here. But it seems very relevant now.

"You mean the incident of Cain killing the beast?" Selene also noticed and uncertainly asked me.

"Very likely! The beast he killed very possibly carried the spatial positioning device!"

I grit my teeth, blaming that village ruffian of the same rank for causing trouble!

That beast narrowly escaped countless pursuers and with great difficulty arrived near the town, but happened to bump into Cain and died.

Then the device stayed in that area. So when the Dark Continent side activated spatial exchange, the whole town got moved over.

If he hadn't killed that beast, it would have left town in a day tops. By the time we arrived, we wouldn't have gotten caught up in this.

"How could a beast carrying the positioning device be killed by a mere 3rd rank villager? Shouldn't beasts with such an important role be quite strong?" Hayden asked puzzledly.

"It's hard to say in this situation," Adrian thought for a bit and answered. He was very experienced and quickly understood the various key points.

"After all, it was probably already injured after countless encirclements. And traversing hundreds of kilometers of mountainous terrain in just a few days, its strength must have been greatly depleted. How much it had left is impossible to determine. Unluckily running into something beyond its capability is also very normal."

"Then why not have someone else carry it?" I raised another doubt. If they could exchange space, they should have been able to switch carriers right? If the beast carrying the device on the Kingdom side was too injured to go on, swap it out upon arrival!

"That was probably related to us being transported here," Adrian didn't think of this point either at first. After I brought it up, he contemplated briefly before having an epiphany.

"After we were unintentionally teleported here, their alert level rose. There were no more spatial exchanges at the deep pit, and it probably took them a few days to move the device out of the city. Calculating the time between when darkness first appeared at Tedress Town and when the beast could have moved there from the Hinnib Valley, it fits pretty well."

"That's just too unlucky!" Hearing this, Eleanora couldn't help but complain.

"..."

Everyone was speechless for a time, not knowing what to say. That was the number one target in the Kingdom army's sights. If it really just died such a muddled death without a sound, utterly unknown to the victim, it did feel somewhat ridiculous thinking about it.

"But why were they so ostentatiously travelling south? What was their goal?" Selene felt a bit confused.

"Carrying such an important device, shouldn't they have tried to keep their movements secret? Yet they kept openly transporting beasts over to their deaths."

"Could it be some plot and we've totally fallen into their trap?" For a time, Adrian and the others were all stumped, unable to figure out what was going on. This really was a very bizarre and difficult to explain matter.

"Forget it if we can't figure it out, it's the Kingdom side's headache anyway. The most urgent thing now is to consider our own situation," Alfreed was the first to break the silence. He was more practical, redirecting everyone's attention back to the present.

"Then the remaining question is just one - where has the transfer point on this side moved to?"

He directly asked the question everyone desperately wanted the answer to.

"If we can find that spot and get within the transfer range, next time they activate an exchange we can return to the Astralrealm Kingdom."

"From Feliciana's description it seems to have been moved outside the city, but the area outside is so vast it'll be difficult to locate..." Blanche said.

"But we can roughly infer it's to the south of Val City and probably not too far away." Adrian was also considering it with his head lowered. He quickly picked out clues from the messy information.

"From the time it took Feliciana and the others to travel south and back north, we can calculate an approximate range."

"when we were transported over it was night and we flew up into the clouds. If we'd been able to see the ground then that would have been good," Selene said this with an extremely regretful expression.

"I do have some suspicions about a location," Regarding the transfer point's position, I'd actually inadvertently noticed something earlier and kept it in mind.

"That was on the way here, I saw a squad moving toward what looked like a volcano..."

I described in detail what I'd seen to everyone. Sure enough they all felt that lonely mountain was highly suspicious.

"But just based on the direction a beast squad was travelling, isn't it a bit arbitrary to assume that was the transfer location?" Eleanora cautiously gave her opinion.

"What if they were just passing by? And don't you think the range of a mountain is a bit too large?"

"But that mountain now looks undoubtedly the most suspicious," Alfreed shook his head, indicating it was worth the gamble, and also affirmed Adrian's inference method.

"And the range might be adjustable. Even if we get the location wrong, we can still find clues from Feliciana's flight path. That's much better than doing nothing and waiting around in the city."

"Alright, the target is set now."

Since they'd discussed it to this point, as the team captain he decisively made a plan then and there.

"It's definitely impossible to reach that mountain today, we can only make plans again tomorrow. But the city gates close during the day, since daytime here is like nighttime in a human city. So tonight we need to find a way out."

"I might be able to fly you all out..." I suddenly thought of an expedient method. After all, that was how Selene and I entered. But suddenly looking at the room's headcount, six fully grown people besides myself, I also felt somewhat awkward.

"Can you take two people at once?" Alfreed's eyes lit up, but looking at my build he frowned again.

"That's...a bit difficult..."

Although I really wanted to add that it wasn't related to physique, with my strength after expanding my wings I should have no issues lifting two people. But flying wasn't just about brute force, it depended on the lift generated by the wings.

When flying even just Selene's slight weight as a young girl, I could feel immense air resistance. Here there were three grown men who surely weighed far more than Selene. I felt carrying even just Alford alone would be strenuous.

"But making six trips one by one would take too long and be too risky, very easy to expose us."

After considering, Alfreed decided to stick to the original plan and attempt to slip out the city gates.

"Alright, quickly go rest now. We take action tonight so you need to conserve energy." After settling on a plan, Alfreed issued orders.

But instead of dispersing, everyone crowded around me again chattering and questioning.