"Oh my, I didn't think you'd have something similar to the reaper form." Mio raised her eyebrow in surprise.
"This is my True Spirit Nature mum. Normally it'll be on a one minute limit but in here it seems to not have a limit." Shiro explained while moving her hand around.
After a minute, she could sense her form shimmer for a moment but held strong.
"Yup, it doesn't run out." Shiro shrugged.
"Interesting…" Mio touched her chin as she glanced at Shiro's form.
"Well your grandparents might be able to tell you more about it I suppose." Mio shrugged.
Pointing towards a large oriental mansion in the distance, Mio snapped her finger as tens of phantoms approached them and kneeled down.
A red aura wrapped around their body as they now looked human with black dresses.
"Welcome back Young Miss. Master and Mistress has been waiting for you." One of the phantoms said as Mio nodded her head.
"Mn, prepare two rooms for my daughter and her friend. We may be staying for a little longer." Mio ordered as the phantoms nodded their heads.
"Understood."
Disappearing from their spot, Mio gestured for Shiro and Nan Tian to follow them.
Following behind Mio, Shiro glanced around at her surroundings curiously. Trying to sense the mana in the surroundings, Shiro realised that the ambient energy wasn't exactly mana as it was more similar to her celestial energy rather than anything. It wasn't godly energy like divine energy but it was more powerful than mana.
Pushing open the door, Mio led them through a few rooms before arriving at a large set of finely carved doors.
"Right then, my parents are just past this door. Are you ready?" Mio asked with a smile.
"Mn." Nodding her head, Shiro took a deep breath and prepared herself mentally.
Smiling at this, Mio opened the door.
Sitting on two great thrones, two elderly people narrowed their eyes at them.
"Welcome home Mio. I had expected my granddaughter but who's this with her?" The elderly man asked as he rested his cheek on his hand.
He had long grey hair as well as a black robes. His dark red eyes swept over them as a feeling of pressure crashed into all of them.
However, to his surprise, none of them are phased which caused him to grin.
"Hou hou, mental fortitude is rather good." The elderly said as the elderly woman nodded her head.
"It's Mio's daughter after all. Though I am curious as to who the young man is. Care to take off that mask?" The elderly woman asked as Nan Tian nodded his head.
Taking off his mask, the elderly woman raised her eyebrow for a moment before smiling.
"Right then, Mio, I believe you said that your daughter was called Kuromi right?" The elderly man asked as he stood up and walked towards them.
"Ah yes about that. She ran into an accident and it seems like the system has renamed her to Shiro." Mio smiled as the elderly man nodded his head and walked in front of Shiro.
"So you're called Shiro now?" He asked as Shiro nodded her head.
"What shall I call you? Gramps?" Shiro asked as Mio paused for a moment but decided to say nothing just yet.
"Hm… Gramps sound pretty good." He grinned
"But if you're called Shiro, you wouldn't happen to know Hades now would you? Because I heard quite a few interesting things about a person called Shiro from him."
"We're acquainted." Shiro shrugged.
"Pft as carefree as he described. He did mention that you were quite nonchalant in front of a few of the gods." The elderly laughed as he patted Shiro's head.
"So why did you want to meet me Gramps?" Shiro asked curiously.
"Mn… should I tell her or should you tell her?" The elderly man asked the woman on the throne.
"You can." She chuckled.
"Right, so we wanted to see you because we noticed that your connection to souls has advanced past a certain point. It's hard for people to advance to this stage outside in the real world so we were curious as to who you were as a person. And we're not disappointed so far." He laughed as he picked up.
"Uahh!" Crying out in shock, Shiro didn't expect a sudden burst of strength from him as she wasn't able to react in time.
"Don't be too rough with her and tell her the real reason hon." The woman rolled her eyes as the man shrugged.
"I can't even play around with my granddaughter. Fine fine, the reason we wanted to talk to you is because we heard from Hades' that you play quite a large role in the new age. He seemed to know that you were my granddaughter hence why he has told me to meet you. It was just a coincidence that your mastery over souls has increased quite a bit."
"Mn I do play a rather important role I suppose." Shiro nodded her head.
"If it was just that, we wouldn't have been so hasty to meet you but after he told us that Zeus seemed to be rather annoyed with you, we figured that we might as well meet you and give you a bit of help."
"Oh? What kind of help are we talking about Gramps? I'm pretty competent myself so if it's just Zeus I should be ok." Shiro tilted her head.
"Yes but there is a small problem. Zeus has allied herself with a Queen and he has specifically asked for the Queen to eliminate you. Annoyingly, it seems like he managed to work around a few of the rules so he can target you." He frowned.
"To make things worse we don't know which Queen. Since you're our granddaughter, it's only natural that we were worried." The woman said as the man nodded his head.
Letting Shiro down, he went back to his throne and sat down.
"How about we talk about this tomorrow mum, dad. We'll let Shiro digest some of the information first." Mio suggested as the two nodded their heads.
"Mn, that's fine."
Watching the three leave, they made sure they were along with sighing out heavily.
"Uggg… I think we started off too serious. The air is somewhat awkward." The elderly man sighed.
He was Kalus, the leader of the reapers and yet he wasn't able to interact with his granddaughter how he wished in fear of being despised.
"It's not a we, it's a you. You do realise that they wouldn't care if you're a little goofy with her right? She seems to be the relaxed kind of girl." The woman chuckled.
"But if I'm too goofy wouldn't she think I'm weird and distance herself from me? Plus, shouldn't a leader be refined?" Kalus sighed as the woman shook her head.
"You've seen Mio's messages. You can relax around her." The woman rolled her eyes as her husband was the type to overthink things way too much.
She was called Sitril and many believed her to just be a simple helper but in actuality, she takes care of most of the important matters while her husband is similar to a spokesman.
"Are you sure?" Kalus asked with a frown.
"Just believe me. Hais, I wanted to just run over and hug her when she cried out in shock but since there was that young lad next to her, I didn't want to present such a shameful display. Speaking of that lad, who do you think he is for Mio to bring him along with Shiro?" Sitril asked curiously.
"Hmm… friend?" Kalus replied after a short pause.
"Mn perhaps but the way young Shiro looks at him might be more." Sitril chuckled as Kalus frowned.
"Let's not be too hasty now. Last time we were too hasty and Mio ran away with someone else." Kalus reminded as Sitril nodded her head.
"Even though it was our fault I'm still not too keen on seeing that lad again. His declaration was rather… impactful now wasn't it." Sitril forced a smile as Kalus could still remember what Koji had shouted when he married his daughter.
'F*ck your traditions. I love Mio and we're getting married with or without your agreement!'
After shouting that, Koji had proceeded to flip them off and run away.
Massaging his head, Kalus couldn't help but sigh. Thankfully, Mio was still willing to visit home every once in a while so that was fine.
"How about you try to be more relaxed around Shiro tomorrow. You can't keep this serious façade up at all times after all." Sitril chuckled.
"Mn… If I cooked her something to eat tonight do you think she'll relax around me?" Kalus asked as Sitril nodded her head.
"Give it a go and see what happens." Sitril shrugged as she was more curious at the large amounts of divine energy she could sense from Shiro. While it wasn't on the level of Hades, it was rather strange for someone like her to possess divine energy unless she was a god.