Night and Lanya were sweating a bit as Arima exposed everything. They were sure that he didn't know anything about the Life Judgment, but he was getting so close that it scared them.
"That Judgment must be something like this… At some point, with a certain trigger event, Life Hunters are required to undergo a ‘trial’. I can't accurately predict what would happen in the case of a failure, but if the succeeding result is what I think it is, then fail most likely means death," Arima declared and Night gulped.
"So, here’s what I think. After the trigger event and the judgment, the concerned Life Hunter will see every ‘line’ converge toward him."
Night and Lanya both bitterly smiled. With that sentence, they knew he had gotten it right.
"Fusing with our doppelgangers, that’s what the Life Judgment is about," Arima bit his lollipop and concluded. "This would explain why there isn't a single Life Hunter out there. Because Life Hunters were most likely born in this Plane through a special occurrence.”
“Thus, each time they passed the Judgment, their counterpart would disappear from existence to fuse with them, leaving no chance for Life Hunters to exist within other Planes. That's why Chulainn said it’s easier for Life Hunters to become a Plane Guardian; since they are already unique," Arima ended his speculation and the two listening deeply sighed.
Lanya smiled at Arima. "You got it right… But the thing Night and Karma wanted to hide from you is not this."
"Yeah, I know," Arima smirked. "You most likely want to hide what is the trigger event and more importantly, ‘what’ the judgment is. As for the trigger event, considering it’s something every Life Hunter has to experience no matter what, I can make a pretty reasonable guess. But I admit that I have no idea for the other thing. A judgment could be anything, after all," he uttered and Lanya chuckled.
"Yeah, sure," Night grunted and sat down on a couch.
"It’s just freaky how you managed to deduce all of that," Chulainn's voice resounded as he teleported on Arima's shoulder. At the same time, Karma entered the room.
"Elimination process, that is all. I still had to think for a good ten minutes to come up with all of this," Arima replied and Chulainn clicked his tongue.
"If it was someone else, I would’ve squashed him to death but it's actually very convincing in your case and it annoys me," he complained and everyone lightly laughed.
"Life Judgement apart, Arima, what about Chronepsis' favor? I didn't receive that information from him," Lanya abruptly said.
"Ah, right. That. He basically gave me a location."
"What location?" Night raised his voice.
Arima pointed his finger at the sky. "Around a hundred thousand million miles in that direction," he stated and everyone froze.
"…What?" Night exclaimed.
"As I said," Arima smiled. "He gave me the location of a certain planet. To be exact, he told me where the Dragons' home is. Their home planet," he explained and Night had to admit that it made him curious. He was a dragon himself; his race's home was indeed something that interested him.
"Are you talking about Fantasia?" Chulainn inquired.
"Yeah," Arima nodded.
"Then what was the favor?"
Arima shrugged. "Well, although it was a bit surprising coming from him. He asked me to save his planet."
"Save? From what?" Night scowled.
"A coming catastrophe evidently. You know that Chronepsis can see into the future, right? He is said to detain all of the knowledge of the world. That’s his legend. He most likely foresaw something happening to his planet. But his favor was actually to find out what the catastrophe is on top of saving the planet from it."
If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.
"Find out? He didn't see what would happen?" Lanya was confused.
"No, from what he told me. The force that will destroy Fantasia is something that even he couldn't probe into. Meaning that the thing that will destroy Fantasia is something above the Third Divine in terms of 'prestige' if I can say so."
"How will you help then? You may be strong, but without going through the Life Judgment, you can only be as strong as the Second Divine at most," Chulainn remarked and Arima glanced at him with a hint of surprise.
"What? I already told you. I assume you have a lot of trump cards. I estimate that you can be as strong as a Second Divine god if you go all out; without caring about your health. But even so, your strength won't be adequate if the enemy is really above the Third Divine."
"To begin with, if you ever had to fight with an individual at the Heavenly Realm, you would be extremely disadvantaged because of the gap between your bodies," Chulainn added.
Arima snorted. "You're damn right. But," he paused. "That's why I decided to assist you with Karez’s case; to become stronger. To be frank, I don't care about Hell’s core, even if it means the collapse of this Plane. Simply because I'm sure the powers in Hell will move to prevent it. Heck, even the H-Gods should be ready to act. And for that reason, I don't think I can be of any help."
Chulainn looked wide-eyed at Arima. "Well, what you say isn't wrong. But I don't think you would be useless. Your magic is already incredibly powerful as it is. I experienced it first-hand. Your magic theories are not useless in the least. Just the fact that you affirm being capable of bringing me back to Hell is enough proof of that. Even I can’t guarantee to be able to do that if I was at full power."
Arima snickered but didn’t deny anything.
"…Actually, there might be something in Hell that could interest you," Chulainn followed. "Apart from the potential life force you could reap, there's something in Hell that no one ever managed to 'tame' or control. The imaginary mount and weapon, Origin."
His words picked Arima's curiosity. "What kind of object is that?"
"An artifact created by the Original God himself. It's a mount fabled to be able to reach any destination possible," Chulainn said with a grin on his face. "Everyone in Hell knows of its location. But anyone who dared to approach it never came back alive. Even some at the Third Divine didn't come back."
"Well, well, isn't that interesting? If you had said that at the very beginning, I would have accepted to go to Hell right away.”
"Yes, I'm sure of that. But I didn't really think you had what it takes to tame Origin at the time," Chulainn responded and the room fell silent.
"…So, what do we do now?" Night broke the silence. "You're going to finish this tournament, then go to Hell and after that, to Fantasia… something like that?"
"Yes, I think it's pretty much all I have on my agenda," Arima stood up and turned toward Lanya. "In any case, we still have two days before the main tournament. I'll train with you for a bit since you just obtained your full inheritance," he declared and his soul gate materialized again. "Let's go back in there, it's more convenient."
Lanya smiled and nodded. "Thank you. I’ve been having a hard time controlling my physical strength and aura since I woke up," she said and entered the soul realm along with Arima.
"I don't even know anymore. Is this guy too chill or just indifferent?" Chulainn muttered and went through the gate's vortex as well.
"Most likely both," Night casually said while tagging behind them, along with Karma who was smiling in amusement.
***
Two days later, Arima's group exited the soul realm. Since Arima didn't want to overwork Lanya with training, he merely spent two weeks coaching her in his soul by adjusting the time-warping to 1:7.
"Well, it’s the big day," Arima commented and snapped his fingers. Small circles formed beneath each member of the group as they disappeared from the Inn.
***
On a remote island, far from every continent, a boat arrived and docked to the shore. The anchor was dropped and when it stopped completely, two groups of students disembarked the boat and stepped on the beach. As they looked around, they spotted two other boats docked to the harbor.
Those boats were, of course, meant to carry the participating students to Cross Island. Ofia, who was with her classmates, led the class and followed a man who had come to welcome them. The man resembled a butler of sorts with his raven suit but when Ofia saw him, she instantly felt shivers crawling down her spine. She looked at her feet and abstained from looking forward.
She felt like this ‘butler’ would literally destroy them if they were to even speak to him. It wasn't only Ofia, every student was bowing their head. It was the same for Velvet's class. And Velvet herself wore an extremely unpleasant expression as she glared at the cause.
The only person who was relaxed in the bunch was Arister but even he felt considerably annoyed. When he was about to speak up, five magic circles abruptly formed near them and the same number of figures appeared.
Arister's eyes widened and he closed his mouth. He snickered and prepared to watch. Ferzia who was beside him instantly understood his reaction when she saw who had arrived.
"Excuse me," Arima walked toward the butler. His tone was polite but his voice sounded really cold. The butler froze on his tracks. He looked over his shoulder from the corner of his eye. He didn’t dare to turn around because he knew one thing for sure; there was a heaven-defying monster behind him.
"Could you refrain from intimidating my students? You wouldn’t want your grave to be made earlier than it should, would you?" Arima's chilly voice resounded and the man shuddered.
He immediately retracted his spirit and Arima nodded in satisfaction. "Let's go then. Children, follow me," he said and walked past the ‘butler’. The man felt even worse as Arima ignored him and forced him to be part of the ones following instead of leading. Furthermore, Arima seemed to know exactly where they should be going, which confused him.
The two classes behind were elated, to say the least. Even Velvet smirked satisfyingly. Arima yawned as he casually led the classes with Chulainn who was sleeping on his shoulder without any care for anything in the world.
"So, who are you?" Arima asked as they took a path made of a material similar to asphalt.
"…My name is Mandus. I'm one of the disciples of the Cross-Competition's organizer," the ‘butler’ responded.
"Disciple, huh? Well, is the butler attire some kind of trend? Or your master’s hobby?" Arima muttered and Mandus could only bear silently. "Though, your master must be fairly powerful to have the likes of you as a disciple," Arima stated.
Mandus was remarkably at the First Sky. Perhaps the master would be around the Third Sky.
After a few minutes of walking, the classes of the PA joined with four others that originated from the two other participating academies.
Most of the students in those classes, and even the teachers, strongly reacted when they identified Arima. Even on other continents, he was a well-known personality. The theories and magic he gave to the world were revolutionary. Some people even thought that he was still hiding a lot of things. But none dared to go ask him for more.
The three 'butlers' guiding the six classes reunited and then observed everyone. "We are the ones who will be explaining you the rules of this tournament. But for now, please enter and make yourself at home. We'll soon tell you everything. The actual tournament will begin in three days. Enjoy yourselves here until then," the man in the middle, who seemed to be the strongest among them, pointed behind him with his hand.
Most people were confused because they couldn’t see anything there except a vast meadow. But after a few seconds, they gradually saw a blurry image forming in their sight. And in no time, a stunning building complex had manifested itself in front of them.