309 Well, Some Friends We Could Talk To

Not a single body from the battle could be seen!

Had Godsfall disposed of them with an evil combustion spell? Where were the daggers that were hurled and the arrows that were fired? Where was everything?

The only thing that was left behind were the trenches. Even if Godsfall had a habit of cleaning up of its dead cultists, they could not possibly clean up even the most minor of details, right? Even if the missing battle accessories was the work of a cleanup crew, how had they managed to do so without Baiyi even knowing?

Was there someone else in this realm who had managed to evade Baiyi's surveillance?

"How long was I in that isolated space?" Baiyi blurted out. The aftermath of his fight with the assassination team had been very messy, to say the least. However, his battle with the doppelganger had not last long, so no one should have been able to completely clean up after his battle with the Godsfall cultists within that time!

His heart lurched when he thought about his students' safety. Frantically, he tore through the sky with all his might, streaking at high speed till he reached the hill he had last left them.

As soon as Baiyi reached the hill in the woods, what he saw a few cabins scattered around!

"Alright. Am I hallucinating or did I just travel in time?" Baiyi muttered as he landed with a loud crash.

At that moment, a beautiful figure emerged from one of the cabins. She was holding a pail that contained wet clothes; she looked ready to hang them to dry.

"Waahh!" The lady cried out in surprise when her eyes caught the sight of Baiyi, who had just landed, and the pail almost fell from her hand. Closer inspection revealed the lady to be Aya, who was dressed like a common girl-next-door!

"W-where… Where have you been?! Why have you only returned now?" Once Aya recognized Baiyi, she was almost reduced to tears and leaped right into his embrace. She hugged him tightly, and in a tone of voice that contained surprise, affection, and guilt — she stammered, "I-I-I thought you were..."

This scene resembled one of a wife finally reunited with her husband after a long period of separation. Aya's body trembled as she hugged Baiyi tightly. Baiyi could only cough awkwardly, and before the owners of the eyes viciously watching him from the Void could snort in derision, he gently pushed Aya away and said softly, "Please, calm down. Tell me what happened… and what today's date is."

"Today's date? What have you gone through?" Aya wiped the tears away from her eyes. "It's December 6th! Yesterday was Grace Day!"

Baiyi froze. He was sure that they had left for this trip on November 28th, a week before Grace Day. The fights he had gotten into out in the gobi only seemed to have taken two hours. How could one explain the difference in his perceived time and the real world's time?

Experiencing a different time flow in different dimensions was cliche in fiction. However, most of the time (pun not intended), the time within the special dimension flowed faster than the time in the real world, not the other way around!

Baiyi had only just begun to ponder about this when his students, upon hearing Aya's cry, rushed out of the cabins. The faces of the girls held expressions of fatigue and anxiety; it was as though they had been through much hardships in life. This was not surprising as they had been living in the woods, far from civilization and the comfort of their Aegis Mansion. This had dampened the attractiveness they usually had about them.

"Sir, welcome back! Where did you go?"

"Sobs… I thought you had abandoned me, Master..."

"Godfather! We were all so worried about you…"

As the students formed a tight ring around him, they began to voice their feelings and sentiments, creating a sad cacophony. Baiyi tried his best to comfort them while checking their health status.

He was glad to find that they had not been hurt in any way; the worst they had suffered was weight loss — a testament to the less than savory lifestyle they had been living since he was away.

It was this moment that Baiyi noticed that one person was absent from the crowd. It was the student who, arguably, should be present at his arrival. His heart skipped a beat, and in a flash, Baiyi's psychic energy encompassed the surrounding, trying to locate her.

His gaze locked onto one of the small cabins, and he raced towards it.

In the middle of the humble cabin was a dilapidated wooden bed. Lying atop of this bed was Little Mia; her face was as pale as snow. Her expression was serene, however. When she saw Baiyi, her beautiful eyes widened, and she couldn't help blinking as she looked at the soul armature softly.

Her lips curled into a smile of relief. "Welcome back, Mr. Hope," she said feebly.

Baiyi did not waste any time rushing to her side and scanning her body meticulously with his psychic energy. He sighed in relief when he saw that the little girl was only suffering from minor internal injuries, resulting from the huge amount of energy he had used back then. It was not too serious.

"I-I'm sorry, Mia… I…" Baiyi rubbed her forehead gently. The only reason she was in this state was because he had forced too much power out from her in his last battle! It was a fact that pained Baiyi.

"Don't worry. Big Sister Cia helped heal me a while ago," Mia said, with a smile. She stretched her little hand from underneath her blanket and gripped Baiyi's gauntlet, which she proceeded to pull close to her cheek. Then, she said, "I could tell… I could tell that you met one of the strongest opponents you have ever faced, right? Was I… Was I helpful this time?"

"Mm!" Baiyi nodded his head hard in confirmation. His peripheral vision, however, caught a few glistening shards at the corner of the wall.

These were shards of the Octuplet twin crystals! Apparently, when he drew in that massive amount of energy, the sudden spike had shattered the very formation he constructed to spread Mia's burden.

If something as durable as the crystals had shattered, then one could only imagine the pain that befell frail, unfortunate Little Mia, who had to withstand it purely because she was Baiyi's main power outlet.

Just the thought of how much pain she must have undergone caused Baiyi's chest to feel a sharp jolt of pain; it was as though his heart was being torn apart.

"You were exceptional, Mia. Thank you," Baiyi said earnestly. "Don't you worry, you're gonna be fine, very soon."

"Hee hee; being able to help is the best," Mia replied with a docile smile. Her eyes squinted into two lines as she rubbed her cheeks on Baiyi's palm lightly. "Seeing you all alright is good, too…"

"Sorry for making you all worried," Baiyi said. Although he was facing Mia, he said that loud enough for the students coming into the cabin. "I'll explain what happened…"

He proceeded to give his students a summary of what had happened, taking care to leave out information that he deemed inappropriate. When he finished, he took out the form-fitting leather suit for the students to look at.

"It really is transparent! What a bizarre clothing… Is it as incredible as you said, though?" Tisdale took the suit from Baiyi's hand and examined it, comparing her body size with the suit. Her face suddenly turned red, probably because she had just imagined how she would look in it…

With how tight the leather suit was, even Tisdale would have to forgo any other garment just to wear it, despite her lean and skinnier build. Laeticia, who was a little bit "Thicc" would have trouble putting on the leather suit. Vidomina, on the hand… would probably get stuck halfway into the leather suit.

Fortunately, Baiyi did not plan to have any of his students wear the leather suit. It was not safe, and it was not necessary.

When Baiyi's tale was over, it was then the students' turn to tell theirs.

They had listened to Baiyi and stayed in the same place, awaiting his return. They just had not expected to wait a week.

They had sensed the tremors from the battle. When they did, Aya, Zakum the Fox, and the other non-human students rushed to the scene of the battle, but all they found was the messy aftermath of the battle. The land had been defaced, and it was littered with arrows, daggers, corpses, and bones. The bones were the remains of the undead army.

Thus, he had no choice but to conclude that although the soul armature was still alive, he had disappeared for some reason relating to the intense battle he had just fought or another he was fighting.

In unison, the students decided to stay in this realm, at the very spot in the woods Baiyi had asked them to wait. The days passed after that...

Fortunately, Baiyi did not cause students any heartache. Although he looked quite battered and spotted new scars, he had still returned safely.

"Phew! It's great that no one's hurt! Gosh, I didn't expect a blissful realm like this one to harbor so much danger! I thought this would be a normal outdoor excursion," Aya said as she hit her own chest lightly.

The girls' expressions instantly darkened at her remark as the memories of their previous "happy" excursions crossed their minds. This time, even an uninhabited realm had managed to bring them many unfortunate occurrences.

"Cough! Cough!" Baiyi coughed awkwardly to break the silence, in a bid to change the topic and lighten the mood. His eyes darted around, and after examining the cabin they were in, he said, "Quite resourceful of you all to have built such a homely cabin. Not bad, not bad."

"Oh…. this…" Little Mia laid in Baiyi's embrace, feeling content as he healed her with his own mana. Thanks to his healing, her face had regained some color, and her body had regained some strength.

"We had some help making these cabins, from some new friends we made," Laeticia finished Mia's sentence for her.

"New friends?" Baiyi asked in surprise. "There were other people here?"

"Well, not really… people. Just friends we could talk to… I mean…." The girl replied slowly, as if her herself was not sure how to describe them.

"Chill, Sir. You're gonna see them when it's dark outside!" Tisdale chimed in.

Hence, in order to pass the time, Baiyi clandestinely healed Little Mia using theurgy, and at the same time, he was answering all the questions his students threw at him. Some of the questions were so direct, he found them really hard to even answer; for example, what power had he used to project the strong beam of black energy from the formation. Baiyi lied that he had used a very special combat chi that could only be found in the North.

They kept chatting until night time, and Lumos spells were cast.

Then, from outside the cabin came soft, disjointed shuffling sounds. It sounded like something was crawling about.

Baiyi walked out to see what was making those sounds, and he spotted some gigantic ants which were as big as bulls approaching the cabins.