Immediately upon completing the teleportation and after having successfully transported over 1,100 people, Soph stumbled into Lone's embrace as her mind was overcome with a deep and powerful throbbing pain.

She struggled her best to look at all of the system notifications though despite the agony she was in.

Soph didn't know if it was because of Lone's influence or not, but she was very prone to getting hopeful for a skill rank-up now after extensive use of a skill, and this case was no different.

Congratulations! The host's unique skill [Remembrance Teleportation] has levelled up! It is now Beginner level 6.

Congratulations! The host's unique skill [Remembrance Teleportation] has levelled up! It is now Beginner level 7.

Congratulations! The host's unique skill [Remembrance Teleportation] has levelled up! It is now Beginner level 8.

Congratulations! The host's unique skill [Remembrance Teleportation] has levelled up! It is now Beginner level 9.

Congratulations! The host's unique skill [Remembrance Teleportation] has levelled up! It is now Beginner level 10.

Congratulations! The host's unique skill [Remembrance Teleportation] has levelled up! It is now Intermediate level 1.

Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Mental Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Beginner level 2.

Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Mental Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Beginner level 3.

Congratulations! The host's passive skill [Mental Pain Resistance] has levelled up! It is now Beginner level 4.

Were it Lone getting these levels up, he'd have easily gotten 20 or so for Remembrance Teleportation and 11 or 12 for Mental Pain Resistance, which only went to show just how much experience Soph had gained for the two skills.

Lone frowned as he cuddled Soph. She had teleported them to the bridge that connected The Academy and the city of Mystopolis as planned, but she shouldn't have been in any pain at all if she'd properly taken the mana she required.

He quickly decided to use Clicker's power on his Eternal Mana Crystal to see exactly how much MP she'd used.

[Unnamed] Eternal Mana Crystal Description

Created by Lone Immortus with unidentifiable magic. Normally, a godly-level of understanding in mana and an almost impossibly perfect raw Elphodicmalondal Stone would be required to create this item.

This Eternal Mana Crystal was designed with the purpose of being an endless and unbreakable storage bank for mana.

Rank Mythic Stats Durability: ∞ Weight: Very Low Abilities Can store up to 200,000,000 MP. (Currently stored MP: 38,000,000 [-30,000,000]). Anyone may deposit energy into it, but only those that the creator [Lone Immortus] personally allows may withdraw MP from it. Listed users: Lone Immortus, [New!] Soph/Sophie Immortus. Will automatically return to the owner's side if the owner (currently [Lone Immortus]) is more than 1-mile away from it. Will accept any type of energy, but all forms of energy inserted into it will be converted into MP and cannot be restored.

"Soph..." Lone was about to scold the girl for obviously burdening herself with the additional over 25,000,000 MP that she could and should have taken from the orb until he stopped himself. The girl had looked up at him and was smiling weakly.

"I-I'm immortal now... I needed to overtax my MP at s-some point to l-level up the resistance... I think I can withstand the p- Ow!" A sudden jolt of pain piercing her mind, stopping her from speaking any further.

Eolande wore a frown much like Lone. "Silly girl."

"Hehe... I didn't want to waste all of Lone's MP... He needs that to make stuff..." Soph confessed.

A sigh of loving worry wormed its way out of her fiancé's mouth. "Okay, just, never do that again. Even if you're immortal, I don't enjoy watching you look so weak and helpless. It hurts my heart, ya dummy," Lone playfully said with a small smile on his face.

Soph felt guilty, but she still nodded and answered, "Mmm, I'll try... but no promises."

"Ha-ah..." Lone sighed again. "I can't really ask for much more. You've gotten so bold recently... Anyway, did Mental Pain Resistance at least rank up?"

Soph shook her head sadly, resulting in Eolande snorting. "Please, Lone, not all of us are gifted with your absurd 'talent'."

The girl weakly laying in Lone's arms whom he was holding in a princess carry smiled. "Uh, no, but Remembrance Teleportation did..."

"well, that isn't too abnormal," Eolande muttered in embarrassment as she twirled her violet hair bashfully.

"Any new effects?" The skill-junkie Lone immediately asked.

"Um, let me check..." Soph pulled up the skill's new information timidly.

Unique Skill: Remembrance Teleportation

A skill unique to the host, Sophie Vladimirovich, and it cannot be used or learnt by any other existences other than herself.

Can teleport the host up to 1,100,000-meters [+100,000-meters] in any direction where the host may physically materialise (includes inside of bodies of liquid).

Any location that the host has previously been to, they can teleport to (currently only applicable on Altros).

Cost: 45,000 MP [-5,000 MP] (An additional 45,000MP [-5,000 MP] per extra target being teleported) Mastery: Intermediate Level 1

The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

"Uh... I can teleport a bit farther and, em, it costs a bit less," Soph said as she firmly cuddled the tail that had snaked its way around Lone's waist and into her arms. A content smile covered her adorable little face.

Lone honestly wanted to push her for more in-depth details, but he saw that past her goofy grin was a lot of suppressed anguish from having her mana reserves completely emptied.

That normally only happened to people that were desperate, insane, or both, so unlike Lone who not only had a very high tolerance for prolonged mental pain, a relatively ordinary girl like Soph would be on the verge of passing out constantly until her mana was in a usable state again.

Leaning down to kiss her forehead, Lone whispered, "That's great."

"Hehe..." Soph weakly giggled.

"Blissful Sleep." Normally, this illusion magic skill would have never worked on Soph for several reasons.

Firstly; at the beginner stage, it only affected I-rankers; secondly, it had a 70% chance to fail even if it was applied to an appropriate target; and lastly, Soph was immune to all negative effects thanks to one of her unique skills.

Regardless, the girl's eyes slowly closed and she began weakly snoring as she lay there in Lone's arms like a kitten.

Congratulations! The host's active illusion magic skill [Blissful Sleep] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Rank 2.

Congratulations! The host's active illusion magic skill [Blissful Sleep] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Rank 3.

Congratulations! The host's active illusion magic skill [Blissful Sleep] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Rank 4.

Congratulations! The host's active illusion magic skill [Blissful Sleep] has levelled up! It is now Beginner Rank 5.

Breena was confused. "How did you do that, Master?"

Lone grinned arrogantly. "Soph didn't resist it even slightly, not even subconsciously, so the usual rank barrier was ignored. As for her immunity, that didn't trigger because the spell is helping her, not hindering her."

Eolande sighed. "It's very frustrating how well-versed you are in how skills work, even how they secretly work past their basic descriptions."

He shrugged. "Skills are one of my hobbies."

"Uh... I don't mean to be rude, S-Sirs and Madams, but, uh, is the little one okay?" Joseph asked in worry.

'A fish out of water in an unfamiliar land but you're still worried about someone else? You're a good man, Joe,' Lone commented internally. "She's fine. She's just a little bit worn out from teleporting so many people here."

"Speaking of which, we may want to get them sorted out now, Lone," Hazel said as she looked ahead of them at the slowly building crowd of interested academy students.

It was lunchtime right now at The Academy, and even though they'd appeared at the centre of the massive bridge connecting The Academy and Mystopolis, their arrival still hadn't gone unnoticed.

"Right. Wrath, do you and Greed mind bringing the villagers and slummers to the guild's headquarters? I'm sure Sarah will figure out how to return them to their homes," Lone asked.

Wrath shrugged. "Sure. Beats interacting with the stuck-up noble pricks that study here. Come on, Greed," the fiery boy said as he held out his hand.

The snake sadly hissed before she licked Lone's check and then slithered over to rest around Wrath's bicep.

"Hey! Don't eat my flames! You may think you're being sneaky, but I can feel it, you damned reptile!" Wrath shouted as he walked away to go gather the 400 or so villagers.

"Hiss!" the albino snake cutely protested.

With them gone, Lone, Hazel, Breena and Eolande proceeded to cross the bridge.

Once they'd arrived at The Academy's central square, Lone said, "You guys, look after these mages, would you? I'm gonna go find Erion."

"Why?" Eolande asked. She was actually very curious as to what Lone's plans for the experimental mages were.

"This place has dorm rooms, right? I want him to take these folk in and help reeducate them and reintegrate them into society. Also, having them all in one place will be useful since I need to cure them anyway so they don't turn to stone," Lone casually replied before he walked off towards the direction of Erion's private tower.

Eolande chuckled. "Hehehe, as crazy as ever... I don't think I can ever stop loving you..."

"Life must be painful for you," Hazel commented cynically.

"You, of all people, saying that makes me feel uneasy," Eolande laughed coyly, though she was trying her best to hide her lingering sadness.

Hazel shrugged. "Soph will never accept you. You need a miracle."

As the two of them were talking, Breena had decided to sit on the floor cross-legged and continue practising her Crude Fireball chants with the help of her standard wand.

The only thing she wanted was to never lose her place as Lone and Soph's personal bodyguard, so she was aiming to get a perfect score on her grades here, and to do that with her talents would require substantial effort.

Hazel glanced down at her brother's unofficial sister as a bitter look entered her eyes. 'You aren't his family, so stop hoping that he'll keep seeing you as his sister and stop wishing for things to never change. Naive girl.'

That unbecoming glance in her eyes hadn't gone unnoticed by Eolande. The Elder Tylwyth Teg covered her mouth and snickered faintly. "I see we both are not free of emotional distress, hmm?"

A blush covered Hazel's expression. "S-Shut up..."

----------------------------------------

"What an utter fall from grace," Vice-headmaster Merkel spat as she stood in front of Headmaster Erion's desk.

Raising his eyes from his paperwork and smiling sharply, Headmaster Erion said, "Now, I wonder whatever you could be referring to?"

"You don't honestly expect me to believe that you aren't aware of the small army of deficients your pet fox has suddenly appeared with, do you?" Vice-headmaster Merkel asked mockingly.

Headmaster Erion chuckled. "Ah, that. I thought you had come to discuss something important."

"How on the Primal's Altros is this not important, Erion? Every one of them is incompetent with magic and they clearly ingested something to force this change. Not unlike Samson, in truth," Vice-headmaster Merkel stated.

"A temporary issue. I'm rather excited in all honesty to accept them all as special-case students," Headmaster Erion claimed a bit dismissively.

"You... what?" Vice-headmaster Merkel could feel her blood-pressure rising from that off-handed comment of his. "Never. I won't allow it. Their potential is limited! They'd be lucky to ever reach 150 on the entry test, let alone gain a score that we'd consider passable!"

Suffice to say, she was enraged. "Not to mention the fact that we simply do not have the room! It would take weeks to clear enough space in the dorms for so many people, even with the help of a space mage or two!"

"Not an issue. You are aware of the extension to Lonely Island that I've had commissioned, yes? Well, construction was finished yesterday and Professor Dana has agreed to build a dormitory for me on the new land. Archon Milos- rather, Vice-headmaster Milos now - has also agreed to reinforce each room with space magic, making them luxury accommodations. He arrived this morning, in case you were unaware of this," Headmaster Erion said as his smile grew friendlier along with his tone.

"What?! You have always advocated for all dorm rooms to be of the exact same quality, have you not?! Why now do you choose to grant privileges to untalented fools?! I still do not and will not accept their enrolment into The Academy!" the aged woman firmly said as she crossed her arms over her chest and wore a powerful scowl on her face.

Headmaster Erion simply sighed. "And, luckily, your opinion doesn't matter. For all intents and purposes, Vice-headmaster Merkel, The Academy is a monarchy and I am its king. I am willing to listen to your counsel as you have been a good friend to me over the years as well as a strong voice of reason when you've been able to look past your prejudiced views, so I would ask you to back down and trust me on this similarly to how I have pulled back on decisions after hearing your thoughts on them."

A complicated look surfaced on Vice-headmaster Merkel's expression. It was rare to see the headmaster speak seriously, so she didn't flare up aggressively like usual. "This is the last time, Erion. If this doesn't work out or if you make another addled move like this again, even with your apparent ability to see the future, I will start an uprising. One of the most powerful Divines or not, you are very quickly becoming unfit to rule this 'monarchy' of yours."

She turned her back and headed for the door, but it opened before she could reach it. Lone walked in and grinned while he cuddled the sleeping Soph. "Interrupting anything, are we?" he asked in a teasing tone.

"... And your 'personal disciple' is treading on thin ice all the same," Vice-headmaster Merkel said before she brashly brushed past Lone and disappeared down the tower.

"Rude cunt," Lone muttered as he closed the door with a soft kick. "Anyway, Erion."

"Yes?" the headmaster gently responded in a questioning tone.

"This is the first time that we're talking face-to-face, and you've been mostly good to me, so here," he said then gently laid Soph on one of the few seats in the room before he proceeded to stick his hand out towards the Divine.

Headmaster Erion readily shook it and smiled. A few seconds later, Lone pulled his hand back then picked up Soph again and sat down with her on his lap. She, of course, was still out like a light.

Once he was comfy, Lone opened his mouth again. "So, I met an old acquaintance of yours. Some fella hellbent on destroying this place."

"Maxwell was no acquaintance of mine, Lone," Erion surprisingly said, taking some of the wind out of Lone's sails. "He was and always has been a target of surveillance. A valuable one at that, too."

"Huh?" Now it was Lone's turn to be confused. "I never mentioned Maxwell. How'd you know I was here about him?"