With their return to modern Japan complete, Suimei’s group—with the addition of their new companion, Hydemary—stood in the magic circle in the Yakagi mansion’s garden, ready to return to the other world. Mana ran across the geometry on the ground like an electric current, and after being enveloped in light, Suimei, Felmenia, Lefille, Liliana, Hatsumi, and Hydemary found themselves within pitch darkness.
The teleportation... was a success. It had definitely worked, but their surroundings seemed awfully dark. Curious, Suimei lit a small fire at his fingertip. The warm light soon illuminated stone walls. The room they had teleported into was like a dome made of stone bricks, with iron candlesticks nailed high above them. Suimei immediately lit the candles to get a better look at his surroundings.
“Ummm, where is this?” he muttered.
“Hmm, this isn’t the teleportation circle in front of the house,” Hatsumi commented, looking around restlessly with a hand on her katana.
Lefille was standing ready and on guard, seemingly more composed than everyone else.
“The kitties... aren’t here to greet us...” Liliana said, lamenting for an entirely different reason, hugging her stuffed penguin.
“I don’t know where this is, but it’s definitely a different world,” Hydemary said, twirling her magic wand.
“It is?” Hatsumi asked.
“Mm-hmm. The ether density in the air is quite different,” Hydemary explained. “This is amazing. Because entropy is different here, the equilibrium of physical and mystical laws is different too. I’ll have to make recalculations. Don’t worry, it’ll only take me thirty seconds.”
“That’s... quick,” Liliana commented.
“I’m a genius, after all.” Hydemary puffed out her chest with pride.
Her face wasn’t particularly expressive, so even when she acted like this, it almost didn’t register that she was actually boasting.
“Starting with a Heliomite coefficient of √2 − 2.02, and taking the current volume of ether and mana...”
“Go with a theoretical Heliomite value of −0.63,” Suimei said. “It’ll stabilize.”
“Mrgh. Don’t give me the answer before I get there.” Hydemary pouted, puffing her cheeks out like a child. Still, she gave up on doing the calculations herself and simply asked for the answers instead. “What about entropy? Is the informational capacity the same?”
“That needs to be recalculated,” Suimei explained. “The informational limit in a fixed space never changes, so we’ll have to recalculate by making adjustments to the ether’s base value and the aggregate mystical volume.”
The flood of mystical terms sounded like complete gibberish to everyone else. Lefille and Hatsumi in particular looked utterly lost.
“Hmmm, the base value is rather large,” Hydemary commented. “If this is the equilibrium point, civilization here will never develop, correct?”
“Hm? How so?” Suimei asked.
“Don’t you get it? The evolution of civilization is the advancement of science,” Hydemary elaborated. “If science never develops, civilization will stall. They’re completely isolated.”
“Aah, yeah. You have a point,” Suimei conceded. “This world is overflowing with the mysteries, so scientific theory doesn’t have a foothold...”
And as their conversation continued dragging on, Hatsumi turned a reproachful gaze toward Suimei. The fact they were in an unfamiliar place already had her on edge. How long was this tangent going to last?
“Hey, Suimei,” she said.
“Sorry, sorry,” he replied. “Magicka requires all kinds of calculations. We’ll be done soon, so just wait a bit longer.”
Suimei took a look around the room, then came to a sudden realization.
“Actually, I’ve got some crazy déjà vu here,” he said.
“Yes, this is Camellia’s summoning room,” Felmenia confirmed. “This is definitely the summoning circle I once used.”
“Hm? Wasn’t that room totally destroyed by Blackbass or Seafish or whatever his name was?” Suimei asked.
“Sebastian,” Felmenia corrected.
“Ooh, right. Suzuki,” Suimei said. “My bad, my bad.”
“They must have finished repairing it,” Felmenia observed. “It’s been half a year since then.”
She had a point. They weren’t going to leave an entire section of the castle in a total mess. Even upon Suimei’s departure from the castle, they’d already started fixing it up. But he hadn’t expected them to fully repair the summoning circle—something they had no intention of using—as well.
Maybe King Almadious left it here out of consideration for me... It was entirely possible the king had considered the possibility of Suimei returning to Astel and wanting to study it.
“So we were drawn in by this thing?” Hatsumi mused, squatting down and poking the circle.
“I bet. I might be linked to this place,” Suimei agreed. “I’ll have to keep this in mind and adjust the spell next time...”
“But why did I get dragged here too?” Hatsumi asked. “If that’s the case, shouldn’t I have ended up in the Saadias Alliance, where I was summoned?”
“No, I was the one to cast the spell,” Suimei elaborated. “The teleportation used me as a base to transport everyone together. That’s why we all ended up here.”
In the middle of speaking, Suimei started massaging his rear.
“Hm? Why are you suddenly rubbing your butt?” Hatsumi remarked.
“I was just reminded of the last time I was summoned here...” Suimei grumbled. “I got off lightly compared to you, but it was still hell for me.”
“Meaning you went through more than just getting dragged into it?” Hatsumi asked.
“Yup.”
Half a year ago, upon getting summoned here with Reiji and Mizuki, Suimei had landed right on his butt. It’d been quite painful. He’d thought the impact had permanently widened his crack.
“This is a grave situation!” Felmenia suddenly cried out.
“Hm? Something wrong?” Suimei asked. “I mean, I guess it’ll be a pain to haul ourselves back to the Empire, but that’s pretty much the only downside, yeah?”
“No, I mean the sweets and food we brought back for Her Highness,” Felmenia explained.
“Oh. Right. That.”
For an emergency, it was pretty anticlimactic. Felmenia had, in fact, been terribly eager to present those sweets to Titania. She’d been under the impression she could hand them over immediately upon arrival, but now, she had to consider the expiry dates.
“We’ve got no choice but to throw away the perishables or preserve them with magicka,” Suimei stated.
“Disposing of them is out of the question!” Felmenia protested.
“That’s... right!” Liliana joined in.
“Yes. We can’t be wasting food,” Lefille agreed.
“Y-Yeah...” Suimei muttered.
He had never seriously considered throwing them away. So, he and Hydemary took on the burden of using magicka to preserve the food.
“You got this?” Suimei asked.
“Magicka to delay putrefaction is an art magicians have tackled since days long past,” Hydemary said. “Besides, I was taught personally by the professor.”
“By the monster who set aside coffee for over thirty years and insists it’s vintage?” Suimei pointed out. “Now I’m worried for other reasons.”
“It’ll be fine,” Hydemary insisted. “I’ll preserve the taste too, so leave it to me.”
They continued chatting and finished the work quickly. Only after that did they consider leaving the room.
“Alright. Menia, lead the way,” Suimei said.
“Leave it to me. Everyone, with me.”
Felmenia took the lead and left the room used for the hero summoning ritual. They came out into a European-style corridor, completely contrasting the stone summoning room. Large windows lined the chicly decorated walls and, combined with the elegant furnishings throughout, drew quite the picture.
“How do I put it?” Hydemary said. “It’s very much das castle.”
“Well, that’s exactly what it is,” Suimei retorted.