"You don't need to worry too much about that. It's perfectly normal for there to be two very similar worlds," Eriri said casually, not intending to explain things in detail to Kuribayashi and the others.
Her dismissive answer, however, seemed perfectly reasonable to Kuribayashi and Kurokawa. It was the only conclusion they could come up with.
With a wave of her hand, Eriri closed the world portal that had been open for some time. Now unable to see the other world, the two soldiers didn't press the matter further.
"Alright, let's leave the small talk here. You two can go back to what you were doing," Eriri said with a cheerful smile, glancing briefly at Kuribayashi and Kurokawa before turning to Rory. "Rory, show me around your world."
Without waiting for her reply, she grabbed Rory by the hand and started walking down the road.
Judging by Rory's complete lack of resistance, she clearly had no intention of refusing.
The moment they turned around, the Flame Dragon that had been frozen in place by Eriri vanished into a cloud of ash once more.
Though Kuribayashi and the others were somewhat numb to shock after all Eriri had shown them, watching the Flame Dragon silently dissolve into nothing still left them deeply unsettled.
In the face of such overwhelming power, all their advanced weaponry felt utterly meaningless.
Seeing Eriri and Rory walking off together, chatting and laughing, neither Kuribayashi nor Kurokawa made any move to stop them. They had no thoughts of bringing the pair back to the base either.
They understood very well that they had no authority to detain someone like Eriri. More importantly, her level of threat was simply too high. Bringing her to the base might endanger not just the facility but their entire world.
Dozens of meters away, a blue-haired girl named Lelei sat quietly on a carriage. Watching Eriri and Rory walk off into the distance, her eyes shimmered with curiosity.
She felt a strong urge to follow them, to learn more about them.
But reason held her back. For now, there were more pressing matters to attend to.
With the Flame Dragon threat gone, the villagers who had fled now had a decision to make:
Return to their original homes, continue on to the military base near the Gate, or head to another city to start over.
...
Roughly ten minutes later, a pink convertible was cruising steadily along a well-paved road.
Eriri sat in the driver's seat, while Rory, in the passenger seat, glanced around in fascination.
Just minutes earlier, Rory had expressed her curiosity about the military jeeps Kuribayashi and the others were driving.
In response, Eriri had casually summoned her own sports car from her storage space.
The moment Rory saw it, the elegant design and vibrant color completely captured her attention. The military jeeps were instantly forgotten.
To help Rory store her massive axe-scythe, Eriri had even given her a spatial ring.
While the ring was an ordinary item to Eriri, Rory treated it like a priceless treasure.
The ability to store items in a magical tool was something Rory had never seen before. Perhaps the main gods possessed such wondrous items or powers, but as a demi-god, she had yet to encounter anything of the sort.
To ensure their journey wouldn't be interrupted, and since the issue with the Gate had already been explained, Eriri ended the livestream in the chat group. This drew much dissatisfaction from Fujiwara Chika and the others.
But Eriri had no intention of continuing it.
As the landscape whizzed past, Rory turned to Eriri with curiosity written across her face. "Eriri, how does this thing called a car even move? It's amazing! And it's so much more comfortable than a carriage."
"Well, normally cars are powered by something called gasoline, like the ones those soldiers were using earlier. But mine's custom-made. It runs indefinitely using my own energy," Eriri explained casually.
Rory tilted her head and tapped her chin with her index finger, confused. "Gasoline? Does our world have something like that?"
"Of course. Gasoline comes from petroleum. Your world hasn't discovered its uses yet, so the reserves here are abundant. That's one of the main reasons the world beyond the Gate finds this place so attractive. Over there, oil is already a scarce resource."
"I see!" Rory nodded with understanding.
Still, she didn't dwell on the topic for long. After all, her duty was to guide the souls of those who died in battle to Emroy, the god of death and judgment she served.
Over her 900 years of service, she had grown detached from many worldly concerns. She no longer felt rage toward the invaders from the other world, nor did she try to stop their entry. As long as they didn't cause irreparable harm, she left them alone.
That didn't mean she had become emotionless. On the contrary, her feelings remained very pure. In fact, she often found herself troubled by the nature of the god she worshipped—a being who embodied both death and war.
Changing the subject, Rory asked, "By the way, Eriri, you said your car runs on your energy. Is that energy similar to divine power?"
As a demi-god who had interacted with various gods over the centuries, Rory had some understanding of divine power, even if she herself hadn't yet awakened such abilities. Once she fully ascended to goddesshood, she expected to gain control over this mysterious force.
"You could say that. The divine power of gods in this world is basically the same as ordinary energy," Eriri replied.
"Oh? But didn't you just arrive in this world today? How do you know what the main gods are like?"
"Meeting gods isn't hard at all. In fact, the god you serve—Emroy, right? A young, gothic-style loli with black hair and dark lips?"
Eriri's gaze drifted toward a distant point. Her sight crossed through space itself, settling inside the temple of the god of death and judgment.
There, seated quietly on the central throne, was a black-haired girl in a gothic lolita dress. Her features were delicate, and her lips were a striking shade of black—exactly like Rory's when she entered combat mode.
By observing the appearance of this god of judgment, Eriri quickly understood why Rory wore gothic lolita priest robes and why her lips turned black when she entered combat mode. It was all simply a reflection of her deity's preferences.
Eriri's comment left Rory stunned. "That's impossible. Isn't the main god supposed to be a towering figure? How could she possibly be a little girl?"
Thanks to Eriri's earlier explanations, Rory now had a very clear idea of what the term "loli" meant.
"Hmm... I think I get it now. What form did Emroy appear to you in?"
"Since she's essentially a war god, when I saw her, she was clad in a pitch-black full-body suit of armor, and her figure stood nearly three meters tall," Rory recalled.
As she thought back to her encounter with her god, Eriri's words seemed increasingly hard to believe.
But at the same time, she didn't think Eriri was lying to her. The contradiction made her thoughts swirl in confusion.
It wasn't that Rory had a particularly deep emotional attachment to Emroy, but rather that seeing the imposing image of her god suddenly replaced with that of a tiny loli left her mentally scrambling.
That said, Rory knew well that body size and age had no necessary correlation. After all, she herself had lived 961 years yet still looked like a young girl.
"So that's it," Eriri said with a smile. "It seems Emroy never showed you her true form. She probably thought her loli appearance lacked authority, so she chose a more imposing disguise."
Even as she spoke, Eriri kept her gaze locked across space on Emroy's temple, casually examining her from afar. The god in question remained completely unaware of the scrutiny.
From the aura Emroy exuded, Eriri could tell she was about mid-tier Level 3 in power.
Rory, on the other hand, was around mid-tier Level 2 and seemingly at a bottleneck. She probably wouldn't progress until she officially became a goddess.
But now that she had met Eriri, her destiny could very well change. She might not even need to wait a thousand years to abandon her mortal form and ascend.
With Eriri's help, surpassing Emroy and the rest of the gods would be child's play.
Eriri had also noticed something else: the gods of this world appeared to share some connection to the Gate.
It seemed the gods had partial control over the Gate's opening and closing.
Once Eriri removed the original Gate—the one even the gods couldn't detect—its projection, the one known to the people of this world, would likely shut down and vanish.
But she didn't plan to let that happen.
Instead, Eriri intended to make the projection Gate a permanent fixture, one that even gods could no longer interfere with.
Why? Simply because she thought it would be more interesting.
Two worlds permanently linked—who knew what might happen in a few years?
Perhaps beastmen and elves would start appearing in the modern world. Eriri found that idea incredibly exciting.
Of course, this could only happen if the gods of this world didn't decide to intervene personally.
Even if their power was only at Level 3, they were still far beyond what either world's inhabitants could handle.
To keep things on track, Eriri decided it was time to give the gods a little warning.
After all, once they realized they no longer had control over the Gate, who knew what rash decisions they might make?
With that in mind, she turned to Rory and said, "Rory, how about we go visit your god's temple? I think it's time you saw the true face of the deity you've been serving for over 900 years."
"Uh... what?" Rory blinked in surprise.
But then she remembered who she was dealing with. Her confusion faded, replaced by growing curiosity.
To be honest, she was quite eager to learn what Emroy actually looked like. Especially now that Eriri had described her as a little gothic loli.
After a few seconds of consideration, Rory nodded with anticipation. "Not a bad idea. I really do want to see what my god actually looks like."
She didn't even think to offer directions. If Eriri knew what Emroy looked like, she obviously knew where to find her.
"In that case, let's go!" Eriri cheered, raising her fist toward the sky in an adorably triumphant pose.
Rory mimicked her, also raising a tiny fist and letting out an enthusiastic "Oh!"
Despite being over 900 years old, the scene made her look oddly cute.
...
Meanwhile, in the temple of the god of death and war, Emroy sat on her throne, listlessly playing with her pale, delicate fingers. Her smooth, bare legs dangled freely, swinging back and forth.
Her feet, just like her hands, were unshod and flawless. Both her fingernails and toenails were painted black—matching the color of her lips.
The fact that Rory would shed her mortal body at the age of 1,000 to become a full god hinted at something fundamental:
In this world, most gods were essentially spirit entities. They had no physical form of flesh and blood.
Because of this, their external appearance often shifted based on their mood or whim.
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