Ethereal Ascendance: A Journey of Transformation

"What? How... This can't be!"

I was really shocked this time. My mouth dropped open, unable to say anything for a while.

The key thing is, how did he know? None of us would have told him about the cross over, right?

"Actually, it wasn't hard to figure out. The space portal appeared exactly where my high school classmates supposedly had their reunion accident. And 'Reed' was our top student - hard to forget that name! I talked to her privately. She didn't deny she was my classmate who traveled to another world. But she wouldn't tell me details about the others, except that most had died. She used 'privacy' as an excuse..."

So he first got suspicious because of Reed. Wayne Peng didn't hide anything. He told me step by step how he investigated, ending with a bit of pride as he revealed the truth.

"So those angels who appeared with her - could they be my old classmates too? It was just a guess in my head, until I saw your reaction just now. That confirmed it."

Looks like he tricked me into revealing the truth! It was too late to deny it now. I could only ask helplessly:

"Since you found out, didn't you report it to your boss?"

"I told you, I only suspected until now! Besides, even if you are my old classmates, I don't think you mean any harm to Earth or H-country. I just want to do my duty to protect the nation!"

His logic made sense. But now I'd have to deal with Wayne Peng asking about everyone's identity. It was awkward facing an old classmate like this.

But since we'd probably never meet again, I decided to give in.

"No way! You're really Flynn?"

Wayne Peng clearly couldn't believe it. He looked me up and down again. Then he quickly turned to Cyra behind me, like he suddenly understood something. "Then is she..."

"Cyrus!"

I confirmed what he was thinking without hesitation.

"Nooo!"

His wail made everyone else look at us.

"Damn, why did I have to have a crush on her back then! And she looks so cute now too..."

Wayne Peng seemed really shocked. It took him a while to calm down, but he was still muttering to himself.

"Of course, besides me and Cyrus, there's also Reilly, Henderson, Jaxon..."

Just joking - if I'm going down, everyone's coming with me! I mercilessly added fuel to the fire, listing all our classmates who came here. But when I got to the end, I felt sad.

Wayne Peng was mostly asking out of curiosity, not bad intentions. When he heard about the classmates who died, he finally sighed too. He patted my shoulder and said:

"I should go back now. But you have to keep living in this world. Work hard and do great things, for the sake of those who died too!"

"What do you mean 'do great things'?"

I couldn't help laughing. But thinking back, wasn't what I did on Earth already pretty great, or even crazy?

"My lips are sealed! Don't worry, I'll keep your secret forever."

He was still promising as he entered the portal.

"What secret?"

Adrian came over and asked, confused. He was curious after seeing me talk to Wayne Peng for so long.

"Nothing much, just catching up with an old classmate," I said, shaking my head.

"Oh, he's your classmate too?"

Adrian was surprised to hear that. He turned to look at the portal again.

Holding Adrian's hand, I slowly explained the twists and turns as we walked to where everyone was gathering.

Like on Earth, a crowd had gathered to watch as the portal between worlds was about to close on this side too.

Most were from the First Angel Legion and the Empire.

The Ilandra Dominion Empire had been beaten badly by Earth in the war. They'd just gotten out of that shadow. Before leaving, Katarina arranged a whole regiment to watch the portal's every move until it closed completely.

"The abandoned Earth military base has many houses we can use. By Elara's orders, we angels will stay here to keep observing," said Serena, the First Legion commander. She came over to briefly report the plans.

I'm a ten-winged angel now, equal to Elara in power. Serena, with only eight wings, suddenly became much more respectful to me.

"It shouldn't take long, right?" I said, thinking but not sure. The portal was shrinking faster as it got to the end. It would probably disappear completely in two or three days.

"But we still can't find Lady Nicola..." Serena seemed hesitant, but finally brought up this tricky topic again.

Nicola's official title in Edenmere was "Inheritor of the Founder". She might not have much real power, but her spiritual influence was big.

They say Elara asked about Nicola's whereabouts many times. But last night, I heard from Number 14 Feliciana that Nicola never went to Earth. All the clues were gone.

"I'll try to figure things out..." I rubbed my head, troubled. Looks like I'll have to ask Galadra for help again!

But the most important job now was stopping any last-minute problems with the portal closing. We had to put the Nicola issue aside for now.

It wasn't easy having the angel legion and imperial army - a weird combo - stay in the same place for long.

The empire was already on bad terms with the angels. Edenmere kept asking them to pay alliance debts to fight the monsters from the north. Lately there was lots of proof the empire was secretly dealing with monsters too...

The two sides kept having conflicts, at the Earth military base the past couple days. We barely made it to the third afternoon, when the portal finally shrank until we couldn't see it anymore. All the trouble was finally over!

Me, Serena, and the imperial army commander all breathed big sighs of relief. We could finally say goodbye to this cursed place!

"Get out of imperial land, you shameless invaders! You're probably the True Church's dogs!"

The portal was gone. The imperial army was leaving for a nearby base. But before going, they made rude gestures and yelled nasty things at us.

"Say that again and I'll chop your head off so bad it can't find its way home!"

This broke all the angels' taboos. A little angel couldn't take the insults, and was about to rush over and fight.

Luckily Serena kept good military discipline. A few orders stopped her.

"Forget it, let's all go back..." Serena sighed and was about to head home.

But right then, a huge thunder crashed down from where the portal was, with a massive boom.

It hit the ground! Suddenly there was fire and flying rocks. Thick smoke went everywhere. The whole First Legion, me, Adrian, and everyone else were in a mess.

"What's going on?!"

My mind was blank. I got up all dirty and dusted myself off.

At least it was just lightning. But how could there suddenly be thunder in such clear skies?

"Look, there's someone inside... No, it's an angel!"

Luckily no one got hit directly. At most they just got dusty like me. One angel suddenly noticed something and pointed at where the lightning struck.

In the middle of the big crater made by the lightning, we saw an angel with ten wings slowly climbing out. Unlike us, she looked clean. I recognized her right away.

"Nicola?!"

Is this Nicola from our world?

She looked the same, but the number of wings was wrong - though maybe she leveled up like me recently.

The biggest question was, she seemed to have many wounds, like she'd just been in a tough fight.

"Feliciana? Are you okay?"

Nicola recognized me too and ran over. But she stopped halfway.

She saw Adrian next to me. She finally seemed to realize something and happily shouted:

"I'm back? Great, I'm finally home!"

"What happened?"

I had so many questions. It seemed Nicola went through some big things I knew nothing about.

"Listen to me!"

Nicola took the water bottle Serena handed her and drank it all in one go. Then she wiped her mouth, cleared her head, and started telling her story:

"At first, just as that portal was about to suck me in, I saw everything change suddenly! Later I found out Galadra... well, the Galadra from another world, forcefully pulled me into their world. It was a parallel world. I saw how things turned out totally differently there - many of our classmates survived. They all became angels, including us two, and Cyra..."

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End of Vol 5.