The sun was already descending when Gaius decided to set off. Indeed, as Isabelle had predicted, he had asked for more than one extension, but in his defence, he just wanted to fly kites happily. After all, it was something he hadn’t done ever since he crossed over to Orb, so he had taken to it after an hour or so.

Unfortunately, there was only so much the two had done. Gaius and Isabelle had only arrived at the Western Holdings yesterday — they had spent nearly four days in transit. As it turned out, the Western Holdings were a lot further from the Central Circle, compared to the distance between the Eastern Territories and the latter. In fact, an accurate map of the Five Lands should have situated the Western Holdings as halfway around the globe.

Nexus had helpfully noted that the distance between Eastern Territories and the Western Holdings were actually closer than that of the West and the Central Circle.

Gaius still couldn’t quite believe it, though.

“Still, is this really the most efficient way of getting to the Heaven-cleaving Fortress?”

Gaius couldn’t blame Isabelle for asking that question; he was also doubting Nexus’ words. “Is there something wrong with the Map of Stars, maybe?”

“Yeah…no. The Map of Stars has functioned well for millennia. It’s not going to fail at this juncture,” Nexus replied. “Either way, the fastest way back to the Republic and the deep south would be to head west to the Eastern Territories, before heading to the Southern Continent.”

“How long will that take?” Gaius asked.

“A rough estimate?” The artificial intelligence, who was sprawled over on his backpack, sat up and tilted his head. “Around three days, if you travelled at the same speed you were at when you arrived here.”

Gaius clicked his teeth. He was beginning to regret not using his Blink ability to set down a small marker.

“How about you teleport us back into the Library of Ancients?” Gaius asked.

“That might not be possible,” the artificial intelligence replied. “A few hours ago, spatial travel above a certain distance became prohibitively difficult. I posit that it is the Demon God’s influence, or that of the Stabiliser, but either way…”

“So we need to fly there manually.”

“Well, yes.”

“Little wonder you weren’t all that fussed about me overstaying by an hour or two,” Gaius noted. Muttering something darkly, he fell back down on his seat again. “Can you identify the cause?”

Isabelle eyed him, before rolling her eyes.

“Let me try to show it to you, then.” A small screen appeared in Gaius’ vision. It was something Nexus rarely did; the artificial intelligence had used it only once, back when he was heading out to find Isabelle long ago. This time, however, it wasn’t a map.

“Is this… the Great Divide?”

“What used to be it, yes.”

“Can I see it too?” Isabelle asked, curious.

“I’ll need to be sitting on your body or something for that to happen,” Nexus replied. “And I’m too lazy to get up now.”

“You’re an intelligent artefact. Intelligent artefacts don’t become lazy.”

“We have rights too!”

“Says who?” Chuckling, Gaius picked up the little sculpture and popped it on Isabelle’s head. “Pull her hand and I pull your head off.”

“Such blatant favouritism…anyway, do you see it now?”

While the two chattered away about the sudden new screen in Isabelle’s vision, Gaius turned his attention back to his own. It was, if he had to describe it, a top-down view of the world…or rather, the area surrounding the Heaven-cleaving Fortress. Gaius himself had never seen it before, but the descriptions he’d heard from news and gossip sounded accurate; it was a fortress that spanned the entire southernmost border of the Republic.

That was stunning in its own right, but the best part wasn’t the scale of the fortress. No, the most terrifying bit was the sea of what clearly were demons, who had flooded what seemed to be the legendary land bridge that linked the Wildlands to the Five Lands.

“Whew. That’s a lot of demons,” Gaius noted. “Still, why are they giving the fortress a wide berth?

“The fortress annihilated anyone in its range. A few hours ago, thirty or so thousand tried to lead the charge, only to get wiped out. I think you still can see remains there.”

“I-I see. Anyway, what kind of cause did you identify?” Gaius asked, steering the topic back. He didn’t want to fixate on the remains of the poor demons who had come under fire; for all he knew, Nexus might decide to zoom in and give him a trauma-inducing image he would never forget.

“Right, the cause.” The screen in his vision shifted — and by the look of surprise on Isabelle’s face, so did hers — to show a shimmering screen.

“That’s a spatial disjoint,” said Nexus. “Right now, for all intents and purposes, the area around the Great Divide has a height ceiling of ten kilometres. Nothing exists beyond that. The Stabiliser carved out a separate space to do battle with the Demon Sovereign a few hours ago, and I suspect that it is this act that prevents spatial travel.”

“How inconvenient,” Gaius muttered.

“To be fair, I don’t think there’s anyone who engages in spatial travel as regularly as you,” Nexus replied.

“It does mean that I can’t use Blink, though. And we definitely can’t return to the Library.”

“Yes, unfortunately.”

“Since we’re going to take some time to get there…shall we set off tomorrow? I mean, who knows? The battle might end while we’re making our way over, and that would be a real shame.”

Two groans came in reply.

“I knew you would say that, master Gaius.”

Isabelle let out another sigh, before reaching out to knead his cheeks. She had done this so many times over the past few weeks that Gaius had a feeling that he was closer to being cute than dashing now. It was fortunate that he wasn’t partial to one style or another, but still...

“What’s our next stop, then?” Isabelle asked. “We’ve checked out the wineries, so we can cross that off our list. But since we probably won’t have enough time to go everywhere…”

Gaius fished out the small brochure Reinford had given them, before passing it over to her.

“You want me to choose?”

“Well, I chose where to go for the South, so it’s your turn.”

“How about this?” Isabelle pointed at a certain place.

Gaius blinked. “Are you sure? We are supposed to be having fun, so…”

“I have a feeling this is important,” Isabelle replied. “Call it instinct.”

“Alright, then.”