“Huh?”

“Rise and shine~!”

“W-what is this…”

“Glad to welcome you back amongst the living, want something for that dry mouth?”

A dumbfounded Isabella was looking at a white-haired man behind a tiki bar. There were various colorful cocktails sitting on that bar counter and the wind was making the bamboo chimes hit against each other.

There were some large totems to the side along with tropical trees and even hula girls dancing in the background. Along with the man there, there was also Beatrice that was slowly getting on one of the wooden barstools. She looked not as bewildered by this whole predicament as if she had gone through the whole thing before.

“Here take a seat, relax. We need to talk about a few things, I bet you are confused but that is because of the soul resonance you two had gone through.”

“Soul resonance?”

This time it was Beatrice that spoke up first.

"Yes, you seem to be connected more than by your bloodline."

After the battle was over Zhang Dong returned to the soul realm but there he also found both of these blond girls. Seeing Beatrice there wasn't anything out of the ordinary but now he also saw the drill blond that was supposed to be the villain here.

Both of them were a bit out of it after trance they were through so he prepared a nice tropical setting for them. Something like this was quite easy to him, by shaping his soul repeatedly he was gaining familiarity with it. The more he did it, the stronger it became and the more access to his spiritual energy he gained.

"This is knowledge that isn't that well known so let this Leigong explain."

During the stay here he had gone through all the possible books and scriptures that this academy had to offer. Thanks to his special disposition he could even go through the Principal notes and the old archaic books. Through this, he knew a few things and one of them was this soul resonance.

“You see, this is a very rare occurrence and only happens between two or more members of the same bloodline. It also depends on how remarkable the ancestor was that you were drawing power from.”

“Ancestor?”

Isabella finally decided to join the group as she awkwardly sat on one of the bar stools. Next to her was a drink with a little umbrella in it. It had a strange light pink coloring to it that was strangely alluring. The young girl resisted the temptation of giving it a sip as she had no idea where she was.

“Yes, with the soul resonance you can call up the powers of your ancestor and materialize them to some degree. Your souls must be quite similar to a powerful summoner, thus you were able to lend me enough mana so I could exert more of my original power.”

This is what he learned from the books. He was sure that the other magicians in this world would know about this as well. What they would do with the knowledge he didn’t know. Beatrice wasn’t fond of the main house that Isabella was from.

Then Isabella wasn’t very welcoming to Beatrice that she saw as some upstart trying to go out of line. Now the two girls would need to work together and help him defeat all the demon lords. This was something that he needed to do as it was his only clue to finding more cubes.

“Yes, it must have been someone good with mana as your powers increased exponentially. Thanks to you two I managed to slay the Archdemon.”

“You were able to defeat a Demon Lord?!”

Isabella jumped to her feet while slamming her hands on the tiki bar counter. The drinks started shaking around while she looked at Zhang Dong in disbelief.

“I knew you could do it Mr. Leigong.”

On the other hand, Beatrice gave out a sigh of relief, she at least had belief in his power. After spending so much time in his soul dimension she had also grown accustomed to his quirkiness.

“Of course, that little demon was nothing. If I had access to all of my power I could crush it with my little pinky!”

Zhang Dong gave out a laugh while Beatrice rolled her eyes a bit. After being close to him so much she kind of knew that he liked to joke around a lot. She also knew that he might be telling the truth as his power was something real.

“Where are we... how do we get home… what is this place…”

Isabella on the other hand was slowly waking up to the reality of this moment. She was on a strange tropical island. There was a large golden dragon playing around in the water in the background. It looked to be wrestling with some kind of huge prehistoric-looking fish. There were also the hula dancers that after a while started to vanish into thin air.

“Don’t be afraid, we are just in the spirit realm.”

Beatrice smirked a bit while looking at her old enemy. She was glad to rub it in and Zhang Dong could tell that she was liking the fact that Isabella was acting afraid.

“Spirit realm? H-how can this be...how do we go back home…”

“Calm down little girl, no one is going to harm you. Due to the strain on both of your souls, your bodies went into a coma. With time you will recover while I nourish you back to health with the help of my own power. Look.”

Zhang Dong pointed to the side and Isabella followed his finger. There a rift opened up to show what was happening in the real world. Both the girls were together in one room and were being watched by some adults. The man that had ridden the dragon was also there, besides him was a familiar-looking man in a mustache.

“Father?”

“Pappa?”

Beatrice named her father quite traditionally while Isabella on the other hand referred to him as pappa. She noticed that both Zhang Dong and Beatrice looked at her in a funny way, this caused the girl to blush.

“Yes, they are both there. I’ve spoken to them about this so don’t worry, in a few days you will recover and be able to return to your bodies.”

Zhang Dong thought back to a day before, this was the moment that he brought down the demonic being called the Lord of Pain. The salute that the dragons gave him was quite unexpected but it also gave him the leverage to proceed with his little plan.

The person that came riding on the dragon was a Duke and current leader of the main house that Isabella was part of. He was the most powerful summoner in this kingdom that used his black dragon to battle foes. Thanks to Zhang Dong’s draconic soul beast they thought that he was some kind of old Heroic Ancestor Dragon. This made things easy as they took the whole soul resonance explanation easily.

He had explained to the Duke the connection that the two girls had. The man was hard to read as he kept quite the poker face. He didn’t know if the man liked the idea of her daughter having a similar soul to someone from a weak branch house. It was possible, these noble types saw their weaker relatives as nothing more than moochers.

Their existence was dependent on the main house but now it seemed that this branch family was standing out. Zhang Dong was afraid that these people would not like how things are turning out. First was the grandfather that was one of the more capable summoners, even close to this Duke in power if what Beatrice’s parents said was true.

For now, the Duke was cooperating with him but this was probably due to the status of ‘Dragon Ancestor’ that he had now. What would happen if he wasn’t there anymore was bothering him. He needed to make Beatrice strong enough to fend for herself in one way or another.

“So, you two can get acquainted. Why don’t you two try working together?”

“Us working together?”

Beatrice’s face contorted a bit while looking at Isabella. The blond with the drills narrowed her eyes as well before turning her face away.

“Why do I need to work with the likes of her?”

“The likes of her? What do you mean by that!”

Beatrice jumped up to her seat while slamming the poor tiki bar with her fist. The wood started buckling under the pressure and even broke in a few spots.

“Not even an ounce of dignity and decorum!”

Zhang Dong wanted to facepalm as the two girls started to argue. He knew well that Isabella was the reason Beatrice was being bullied in the academy. This was something she knew as well, working with your bully was not an easy thing to do. Why Isabella had it out for her wasn’t out in the open, he attributed it to the pretty boy with green hair.

He was her fiance but was showing more interest in Beatrice than Isabella. If he had other girls on the side wouldn’t really surprise him. In this country, high nobles were allowed to have mistresses but only one wife.

Normally Isabella’s parents and the royal family would never allow the prince to take Beatrice as a wife. But then he appeared, a super-strong spirit that was able to defeat a demon lord. With this Beatrice’s stocks would flourish and she would be seen as a proper marriage candidate. The moss head was also not the crown prince, so he could be used as a pawn to get other powerful families on the side of the royals.

What he needed to do now was to somehow get these two girls to work together. They were stuck here with him so they would need to interact. Speaking with others wasn’t his forte but he would probably need to play the nanny in this situation.

“That’s enough!”

A crack of thunder and lightning resounded through the entire place. The sunny sky turned cloudy, hurricane-like winds picked up and rain started to fall. The two girls instantly looked to Zhang Dong who was now out of his bartender role and back in his white robe.

“Stop bickering, you’re acting like little brats both of you.”

He pointed his finger at the two while they backed away.

“You will have to learn to work with each other from now on. The lives of many are at stake, do you think the demon lords will wait?”

One of the Archdemons was dead, news of this would probably reach everyone in time. Maybe the demons already had gotten this information and were now preparing for a counterattack. Beatrice and Isabella were now both in danger and he wouldn’t be able to protect them unless they performed their soul resonance.

“Please great spirit, appease your anger.”

Isabella, who didn’t know Zhang Dong well, was quite afraid while Beatrice grumbled under her breath. But after he gave her a glare she also started apologizing, the fear of balancing heavy objects while running away from menacing beasts was still with her.

“Good. Now we can talk about your future endeavors!”

The weather turned back to normal and the girls were handed fresh cocktails.

“Endeavours?”

“Yes, you two must learn to get along with each other and also be able to perform the soul resonance when the time comes!”

“You don’t mean?”

Beatrice gulped while backing away.

“Yes, we are going to do some special training!”

“Nooooooo….”

The sound of the waves blocked away the screams of the two girls, soon their new training would be starting.