After a comfortable journey through the dimensional portal created by Nana, the first thing Joel saw upon reaching his destination was a vast forest rushing toward him. The cold air hit his face as his eyes quickly scanned the surroundings for danger, taking advantage of his height.

  The fall must have been about fifty meters, and only seconds passed before he and Connor crashed into the treetops.

  For Joel, dodging branches and cushioning the descent was no problem; he twisted in midair, propelled himself off a log, and landed softly on the ground covered with dry leaves. He immediately looked around for the former agent.

  Connor, still without hands, wasn't so lucky. Battered from side to side by branches and leaves, he ended up dangling awkwardly between two thick branches like an impromptu prisoner.

  "Don't say anything," Connor growled as Joel lowered him.

  Joel said nothing. She just smiled with a soft sigh.

  He then drew his sword and began sawing down all the trees near his landing spot. For a hundred meters around, trees fell like blades of grass, clearing a perfect opening from which the portal could be seen, still floating in the air like a gleaming wound between dimensions. The sky was clear, tinged with gold, though the sun threatened to disappear in a few hours.

  Shortly after he finished his work, Joel's wristwatch showed exactly ten minutes since he and Connor had crossed. It was then that a figure emerged from the portal: Liam, falling without a scream, without surprise, and without losing his composure. To him, accustomed to climbing the gigantic trees of Myrrial, the height felt almost familiar.

  Ariel appeared a second later. "WAAAAH!!" Her excited shout echoed from the sky.

  Joel took a step, quickly judged the distance, and leaped, catching her mid-air as if it were the most natural thing in the world, absorbing the full impact of the fall with his magically reinforced legs. She laughed, wrapping her arms around his neck as he held her like a princess. After so long, that scene brought a strange sense of home to them both. Although he soon felt deceived, when he saw the enormous owl Oscar descend from the portal, easily carrying Abigail in his talons.

  What followed was a small festival of screams, laughter, and chaos. The children began pouring out of the portal one after another, falling as if someone were hurling sacks of grain from the other side… except they were laughing, stamping, and squealing with excitement. Joel, along with Oscar, had to catch them in mid-air and guide them to the ground one by one, becoming the team's official shock absorbers.

  Alicia emerged right after the last child. Liam, seeing her appear, launched himself with all his agility. He caught her with a perfect twist to cushion her fall, though he couldn't hide a wince of pain when his feet hit the ground. She, however, only offered him a wide smile, delighted to have forced him into such an effort.

  Finally, Nana emerged. Her descent was… strange even by her standards. Apparently using her spatial magic, she stopped her fall by anchoring her position in mid-air for a couple of seconds, as if gravity had temporarily forgotten she existed, before gently lowering herself to the ground.

  Joel raised an eyebrow. “That was new.”

  The statue just smiled, mysterious as ever.

  Once everyone had safely descended and the portal had closed, dissipating into thin air like a shattered mirage, a heavy silence enveloped the group. Most remained motionless, eyes wide, trying to process the unimaginable: they had crossed into another world.

  The children, accustomed to the endless, vibrant thickets of the Myrrial forests, observed this new environment with a mixture of wonder and disorientation. The slender trunks, the sparse foliage, the orange sunlight filtering through branches that were too short… nothing resembled the home they knew.

  For Joel, however, the landscape had a warm effect, a familiarity buried beneath centuries of emotional distance. Forests like this existed in hundreds of memories from Earth: walks in European parks, images of North American nature, postcards, campfires. It was like looking at a ghost from countless lives.

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  The only one completely indifferent was Connor. For him, worlds were interchangeable places; They all ended up smelling of danger in one way or another.

  "We need to find a place to set up shelter. Night will fall soon," Joel announced as the sun began to dip below the horizon, snapping them out of their daze.

  With Joel leading the way and Liam keeping watch from the rear, the small group moved quickly toward a hill Joel had spotted from above. From the top, it looked like a natural lookout point, a defensible and useful vantage point for future observations.

  The ground was soft, almost tame compared to the wild forests of Myrrial. They moved quickly, and the group reached the hill shortly after the sky began to darken.

  Without exchanging a word, Joel and Nana got to work. He drew his sword and began slicing through rock as if it were wet clay; the statue, meanwhile, summoned small bursts of destructive magic that cleared the way with incredible precision. Together they carved a narrow tunnel, just wide enough for an adult to enter without difficulty.

  When the excavation reached the appropriate depth, Nana stepped forward. And the spectacle began.

  First, the statue extended its hands as if parting an invisible veil. The children felt the air vibrate, thick and elastic. Then, reality itself crumpled before the newly created tunnel, like fabric being pulled from multiple directions. A moment later, the shelter emerged from that spatial distortion, effortlessly settling into its new home within the hill.

  Alicia let out a small, stifled gasp, while the others stared in astonishment at the spectacle. Even Liam and Ariel were fascinated, despite it not being the first time they'd seen something like it. Nana's technique was constantly improving, and the whole process was becoming faster and smoother.

  But no one was as stunned as Connor. He had first witnessed Nana extracting the shelter from the gigantic Myrrial tree, something he had already deemed “impossible.” But this—seeing an entire, complete space, with its own rooms and passageways, embedded within the solid rock as if it had always belonged there—completely shattered any mental framework he had.

  “I… that’s not…” he murmured, unable to form a coherent sentence.

  Nana tilted her head with that indecipherable expression that mimicked human curiosity.

  “Welcome to applied spatial relativity,” she said, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

  Joel just sighed and commented, “You’ll get used to it.”

  Fortunately, when they all entered the new shelter, this time through a discreet door carved into the rocky surface, what they found was exactly the same home they had lived in for years. Except for a few objects that had not been created directly by Joel or Nana, everything was in its place: the furniture, the additional rooms they had built in Myrrial, even the warm smell of wood and spices that recalled the old house inside the Mother Tree.

  The first thing everyone did was celebrate the successful journey. They shared a good dinner, abundant sweets from Joel's stash, and nervous laughter fueled by the excitement of the dimensional jump. For the adults, the dominant feeling wasn't adventure, but a profound relief. For the first time in a long time, the looming threat of being discovered by the Imperial authorities was gone. It was a strange yet liberating sensation, as if an invisible weight had been lifted from their bodies.

  Joel, however, couldn't afford to relax too much. He had many responsibilities ahead, the most urgent being food. Although the shelter had a considerable amount of grain and canned food, all produced by him in preparation for the journey, that supply would only last three or four months.

  He needed to explore the surrounding area in search of food sources, especially animals that could be hunted, areas suitable for cultivation, and, with some luck, signs of local settlements.

  At first glance, the place they arrived at seemed promising: the climate was temperate, the vegetation abundant, the soil fertile, and the presence of nearby water was evident. It was an ideal environment for agriculture… if they could establish themselves safely.

  Once everyone was settled in the shelter and he was certain there were no immediate dangers nearby, Joel planned to begin exploring. He would first cover a short radius around the hill, then expand his search to include larger bodies of water, large animals, and signs of civilization.

  That same night, after everyone else had slept, Joel had a brief meeting with Nana and Ashoka to discuss their next steps.

  “What have you been able to detect within your new domain?” Joel asked, addressing the statue.

  “I haven’t been able to extend my influence very far,” Nana replied. “But within the area I control, I only perceive forest and smaller creatures, like mammals and small birds… Nothing that poses a threat or possesses magical characteristics. The energy in the air is undeniable, but it’s completely different from what we knew in Myrrial.”

  Joel nodded, watching a faint glow flicker across his hand as he made a fist. “My senses for these things have always been terrible, but even I can tell the difference. Strengthening my body with magic feels… easier.”

  “The changes are significant, no doubt,” Ashoka interjected from the medallion. “And that’s precisely why I must warn you, Joel. My perception has never been sharper, and I’ve noticed a strange imbalance in your spirit world. Something is putting too much strain on it. I suspect it could be detrimental in the future if you don’t address it.”

  Joel remained motionless for a few seconds, processing the news. “Well… that wasn’t the best revelation. Are we talking about a danger to my life?”

  “For now, none,” Ashoka replied firmly. “But if your spirit were to collapse, it could trigger a violent nervous breakdown that would completely overwhelm you.”

  “That sounds just as terrible,” Joel growled. “Is there anything you can do?”

  “Ideally, we should begin exploring your spiritual world as soon as possible. There, I can observe in greater detail and give you a true diagnosis. But I’ll need your permission to access certain memories and emotions. It will likely be essential.”

  Joel sighed resignedly. “At this point, I’m practically an open book to you. Do what you need to do… just try not to disturb anything in there.”