I yawned as I made my way to school again. I’d barely gotten any sleep in after yesterday’s strange discovery. It was like the portals all over again. I just couldn’t let it go.

Way to take a day off to relax. I really must have been a workaholic.

“Hey… you alright?” Frank asked me.

I looked at him, contemplating what to say. “Yesterday… I had a look at my family tree.”

“Oh?”

“It didn’t make sense. Like someone forged the whole thing.”

“Oooh, shit. Is it finally time for Detective Frank to shine?”

I sighed.

“Hey, you know, maybe we could continue with the break thing. You don’t look like you got a whole lot of relaxing done yesterday.”

“Yeah, I haven’t.” I grimaced. “And I don’t think I can with so many things bugging me lately.” I waved my hand in a circle. “The portals, my true form, now this…”

“Aaah, I get that. You won’t sleep until you’ve caught the culprit, eh?”

I grumbled in affirmation.

“Well, alright. I got myself a proper shield now, so we could go exploring some portals.” He pumped his fist. “This knight is ready to protect milady!”

My lips curled up in a smile.

“Thanks,” I said with sincerity.

From the corner of my eye, I spotted Casey making her way to us.

“Hey guys,” she greeted us before turning to me with a frown. “You okay? You look even more tired than yesterday.”

Frank ducked down and put an arm around Casey’s shoulders before whispering, “There’s a mysterious conspiracy going on! Renee’s grandma was probably an alien demon gangster from a parallel universe!”

Casey frowned.

“Frank…” I sighed. “I just said the family records were forged. Not that there are alien demon gangster grandmas involved.”

“Forged?” Casey asked, now facing me.

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“Yeah. Unless all of my ancestors were pretty much identical, it had to have been forged.”

“What do you mean, identical?”

“Like… they lived the same amount of years, they had the same job, had exactly two kids at exactly the same age…” I listed off.

“Huh… now that is very suspicious. But if it’s not alien demon gangster grandmas, then what?” Frank asked.

“Probably literally anything else,” I said, deadpan. “Anyway, Casey.” I turned to her. “We were thinking about going exploring some of the other portals today. Are you up for that?”

“Hmm…” Her frown deepened. “We could, but we’re gonna take some precautions this time.” She glanced at Frank.

“Don’t worry! I have a shield now! Everything will be fine!” Frank put on a winning smile.

“I don’t think that’s enough, Frank.”

I looked between my two friends, remembering the dream once again.

“How about we first… go and try out magic,” I suggested. “In real life, I mean.”

That caught their attention.

“Well, I already tried it and it went horribly.” I shrugged. “But if that dream is anything to go by, Casey should be pretty good with it.”

“Oooh! That’s right! Magic! How could I forget?! Sign me up! This is gonna be fun!” Frank said in excitement.

I smiled wryly.

Considering I hadn’t seen Frank use magic in my dream, I expected his magic talents to be the same as mine. I didn’t say anything though, just in case I was wrong.

“Magic sounds fun,” Casey agreed. “I don’t really know how it works though, you’ll have to show me.”

“Of course, milady! I know all about magic in RLO! Feel free to call me sensei!” Frank proudly proclaimed.

I ignored him and said, “We can go to Trevor's hillside together. That’s where I’d tested magic myself.”

“Sounds good! Can’t wait!”

“Yeah, let’s do that.”

With everyone in agreement, we settled into the rest of the school day. Which was as tedious as ever. From the corner of my eye, I saw both of my friends fidgeting and getting lost in thought from time to time, just like me.

It was good to know I wasn’t the only one with a lot on my mind.

The day ended with a PE class. Just like before, the teacher only made me do some stretches and light exercises.

Although now that I’d had the pleasure to experience being a master swordswoman foxgirl slaying skeletons by jumping around them, it didn’t feel right to slack off like this.

I eyed the portal in the gym hall as I sat at the side. Not for the first time, I wondered just what lay inside there. Not like I could just stand up and go open it, though.

Frank seemed to have noticed me looking into empty space and probably guessed what was going on in my mind as sent me a wry smile. I returned it.

Back to the topic of slaying skeletons, I couldn’t help but also remember utterly failing to do anything against the fish zombie monster. I still felt a bit of phantom pain in my arm, thinking of the wound I’d gotten, and couldn’t help but shudder at the thought.

I didn’t like that.

Sure, it was a high-level creature from an end-game area, but that didn’t mean I had to cower from it.

I wanted to get stronger. Strong enough to defeat even the end-game octopus cyclops boss in that colosseum. I wanted to train myself to be able to handle any foe. The odd natural talent of my not-true form wasn’t enough; I needed to gain actual experience and practice using my katana.

…

What an odd thought.

Just a week ago, a thought like that would have sounded insane to me.

Getting stronger? Practicing swordsmanship? What planet are you from?

But if any of these portals led to different worlds that were even more dangerous than end-game RLO areas, then I needed to be ready.

Because I sure as heck wasn’t going to just leave them be, now that I knew I could open them.