The portal generator took up most of the space in the big tent. Something that looked like a radar dish pointed at a large area on the far side of the tent that was mysteriously clear of crates. Zofia questioned me as I examined the strange machine. “You’re from Earth correct? Do you have any education in physics or molecular science?”

While I had taken a physics class in high school, it was obvious that the machine in front of us was several levels above anything taught in a public high school. Zofia smirked at the frown on my face. “I figured. You’re still young. There’s plenty of time to indulge your curiosity. “

“You are a very curious person aren’t you?” I asked, remembering Zofia’s affection level was eternally curious. “Would it bother you if I accidentally broke this?”

She frowned, watching me carefully. “Well, we have backup modules for every part in that generator as well as a replica on the Earth side. Call it quadruple redundancy. You couldn’t shut down the portal without virtually destroying the TGB if that’s what you’re thinking of doing.”

I shook my head beginning to probe the generator. “Actually, I wanted to try something, but since my mana is corrupt at the moment, it might have an unintended consequence.”

Zofia smirked, taking the data pad out of an oversized pocket in her lab coat. After swiping at it a few times, she gave me the thumbs up. “Go ahead. I’ve cleared the area just in case you make something explode.”

The thought of making it explode worried me a bit.

Perhaps you might want to wait outside.

Kalli crinkled her nose, stepping closer to me. Not if you don’t.

Realizing I couldn’t make her go, I traced my fingers along the generator to the spot where I’d felt something. Mana leaked from behind a locked panel. It wasn’t artificial mana inside of the power source. The mana came from a person. “Zofia, where do you get the mana to power this?”

She answered without looking up from the data pad. “We have an arrangement with a local prison back on Earth. Inmates spend time in a special capsule to earn time off their sentences. Our machine traps and contains mana that naturally emanates from them. Obviously, it’s only effective on the awakened. I tried doing it to myself once and the results were negligible.”

There was so much about the awakened world on Earth that I didn’t know about. Prisons for the awakened existed. A real-life Azkaban. I wondered if Earth had supervillains like the current occupants of my ring.

Pushing mana into another object for the first time in forever, I probed the mana battery. A small trace of mana leaked from the device. It was what I sensed in the first place. Further investigation showed the mana in the battery was provided by different people. The mana in each cell battled with one another which was causing a leak.

I reported my findings as I continued my investigation. “Using mana from more than one person is inefficient. The mana rejects mana of another type, kind of like blood cells do. That’s why you have a leak.”

Zofia grunted acknowledgment that she’d heard me as I continued to prod the battery. It was an easy problem to fix by removing the mana and replacing it with my own.

Much more efficient.

Kalli giggled, feeling what I was doing through our bond. Do you think the corruption will make it malfunction?

I guess there’s only one way to find out.

Zofia’s curiosity was rubbing off on me. “How do you activate the portal?”

She frowned, putting the data pad away. “Do you need something from Earth, or do you just want to see my operation on the other side?”

“It’s nothing like that. I want to see if my mana corrupted the portal.” I explained. “Worst case scenario it transports us someplace else. That might be bad for your people. If it happens to me I can just return to Kalli.”

Kalli shook her head, speaking out loud so Zofia could hear as well. “That won’t work since I’m coming with you. If we run into trouble we can teleport back to the castle.”

I nodded and Zofia huffed but complied by punching a few commands on the data pad. The generator hummed to life and began to shake and the two of us took a few steps back just in case. Zofia’s eyes widened and she looked up at me. “What did you feed it? It says it’s operating at one thousand percent capacity but that’s not normally possible.”

I shrugged at her, a feeling of pride welling up inside me. “What can I say? My mana’s pretty potent.”

Zofia chuckled despite herself. “This might yet be a mutually beneficial partnership. Are you ready to see where we go?”

We nodded and she punched a button on the data pad. The dish began to glow before shooting what looked like a laser toward the far end of the tent. Only, it never got there. The mana I’d pumped into the machine attacked the spot at the far end of the tent and ripped a hole in the world. The space itself appeared to have torn whatever wall existed between Gaia and the void. Rather than seeing the path between worlds that I normally saw whenever I kept my eyes open while teleporting, what we saw looked like a mirror of the tent room.

Zofia peaked through the rip and spoke in a sad voice. “That’s Earth. Your experiment failed.”

We stared at her. Had she wanted something to go wrong? I shrugged off the idea and offered Kalli my hand. Together we crossed the distance to the portal I poked it. The experience was somewhat different than normal teleportation. The portal itself felt like the surface of water. Cool to the touch, the portal rippled when my fingers passed through. Gathering courage, I pressed my face into the portal and was surprised by what I experienced. Everything was different on the other side from the air pressure to the composition of the air. The ambient light didn’t have that green tint that I was accustomed to on Gaia.

Zofia popped out of the portal beside me and whispered. “I wouldn’t linger in the portal if I were you. I’d hate to imagine what would happen if it closed while you were only half in.”

Kalli heard that and shoved me through. I flopped onto the floor only to be flattened as she came flying through right after me. Zofia cleared her throat, looking away and pretending to busy herself on the data pad.

When we gathered ourselves, Zofia waved her arms, startling workers on the other side of the tent. “Tada~a, this is Earth. Seen enough? Ready to go back?”

“Where are we?” I asked, making my way to the entrance of the tent.

While I had gone to Ukraine once, I hadn’t had much time to appreciate my first trip outside of the United States. Zofia followed us and replied. “This is Poland. Do you need to know exactly where it is? I’d prefer certain organizations not come prying if you know what I mean.”

“The government?” I asked, raising an eyebrow. The area surrounding the tent had been fenced off with some kind of temporary material. Outside of the camp was a forest as far as I could see. I heard water rumbling somewhere in the distance.

Kalli doubled down on Zofia’s earlier statement. “Are you breaking the law?”

Zofia’s eyes narrowed. She looked annoyed. However, her smug demeanor quickly returned when she answered. “Laws don't exist for half of what we do. We just prefer to stay below the radar. Unlike you magic folks, we can’t just wave a wand and make the powers that be fall in line.”

Seeing the blue sky was the final confirmation that we had crossed back to Earth. I wanted to explore but Kalli tugged my sleeve. We need to get back. Don’t forget about Kalliville and Rasputin.

I desperately wanted to forget about it. Since our fight with Mardella, it seemed we were running nonstop from one place to the next. First to deal with the corruption and save our friends, then dealing with multiple invasions from Earth. I glanced back at Zofia. It was her company that caused all of it. It just couldn’t be a coincidence that Rasputin showed up right when she did.

We headed back through the portal since it was easier than wasting mana on an extra teleport. Zofia ran ahead and flagged down a group of people in lab coats, whispering something.

When she was satisfied, she returned to us. “Okay, I’m ready to go.”

“What was all of that about?” I asked, thinking she was up to something.

Zofia nodded toward the portal generator. “I told them to monitor the battery you charged and to report any changes to the portal immediately. If it blows up and destroys your world, don’t hold me accountable.”

“Can it do that?” Kalli asked, a surge of worry coming from her.

Zofia threw her hands up, waving off the danger. “Anytime you conduct experiments of this caliber, you have to be prepared for side effects on a monumental level. The knowledge we gain usually compensates the loss but don’t worry, this device is really just a powerful magic-based computer.”

Zofia was turning out to be very difficult to understand. I couldn’t tell whether she was joking or not. “Are you suggesting that blowing up Gaia is an acceptable loss so long as you learn something from it?”

“It depends what we gain.” Zofia countered. “There is always a tipping point. Consider nuclear fission for example. Countless lives were lost because of that invention. Was it wrong of scientists to come up with it?”

I didn’t know how I felt. “I prefer to avoid anything that leads to death when I can help it.”

Zofia gave Kalli a pleading look. “Please tell me he isn’t going to try to defeat this Rasputin with the power of love. I might have to reconsider my stay here if this place gets invaded.”

Kalli squeezed my hand reassuringly. “I agree with Melvin. Killing should only be a last resort. We need to find a way to make this man go away peacefully.”

“Even after he killed your people?” Zofia challenged, crossing her arms. “I don’t think I could dismiss my people so easily as you do yours.”

It was true. He had murdered people. Would it be too harsh to imprison him in the ring? If I did that, Longinus could be released. He promised to help us get rid of the corruption if we let him out.

Kalli and I exchanged a glance. Let’s deal with that when the time comes. We don’t even know what he’s going to say.

That’s true. Let’s go see what happened at Kalliville.

We motioned for Zofia to join us and I folded mana over us once more.

The magic of the empire still recognized Kalliville as a village and allowed me to teleport there without much active thought. The debris that was left couldn’t be classified as anything but ruins. The walls I’d placed around my first village were splinters in what could only be described as a series of craters.

“Magic didn’t do this?” Zofia commented, peering into one of the craters. “Some kind of artillery was used here.”

The carnage left behind in the buildings that were destroyed made me want to be sick. Almost every collapsed building had battered remains of villagers. The survivors had been forced to leave their fallen loved ones behind in their haste to flee.

We need to bury all of them.

Kalli nodded, gingerly removing part of a wall from a child’s body. There were tears in her eyes. I take it back, Melvin. Rasputin needs to pay for this. How dare he murder innocent people just to have a word with you. That’s inexcusable.

I still wasn’t sure if I was up to the task of defeating the man, much less murdering him. However, I felt the same way Kalli did.

We will make him pay for this.

It took us several hours to extract the dead from the rubble, and that was with me DELETING everything in our way. Zofia gawked at me as I worked my magic. I’d never dealt with burial rites on Gaia before. Kalli assured me that cremation was socially acceptable. With local plagues and a lack of land, it was often practical for small villages to send their loved ones off in a funeral pyre.

I quickly returned to Celestea Castle to pick up the survivors. Otto gathered them all together and I brought them back to the ruined village. While I was gone, Zofia and Kalli somehow managed to put together a wooden pyre and laid out the bodies as best as they could on it.

Otto broke down in tears when he saw them. “Thank you so much for honoring us, my lord.”

I shook my head sadly. “I only wish I could have done something to save them.”

“Just avenge them.” He growled under his breath. “That is all I ask.”

When the time came to light the fire, Kalli held me back. Let me do this. I think they will see the Luna Fire as something special.

I stood back and watched with the survivors as Kalli approached the pyre and clapped her pendant. It glowed and sucked up the fire she offered, purifying as it emerged a rich green color similar to the light coming from Luna. Everybody gasped as the flames blanketed their bodies. Unlike regular fire that took a long time to consume, the Luna Fire made quick work of both body and pyre. In almost no time there was nothing left but green flames dancing on the ground. Kalli held out the pendant which sucked all of the flames up.

Zofia pointed out deep tracks in the ground just outside of where Kalliville used to be. “Whoever this Rasputin is, he’s brought tanks. That means you need to be prepared for guns and other things. Can you fight against that?”

I looked down at the kinetic dampener on my wrist. The truth was, I’d never really been shot at. Just that one time in Ukraine. Deleting that tank had been easy enough. But what if I didn’t see it coming or they shot at Kalli? Could I protect her? She felt my worry and sent reassurance. It’s going to be okay. Maya is coming with a delegation from the high house. I’m sure they will sort it out if things get out of hand.

Just as she said that, a humming sound echoed across the open plain. After a while, I spotted the source of the noise. An airship in the distance was heading toward Celestea.

I guess we should get back to the castle and tell Maya what we found.