Chapter 213: The Journey Home
Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Hao Ren suspected that the Orb may have very well ended up in the Surface World.
The traces and trails point towards the malfunctioning spacecraft and the Orb of the Holy Synod being dragged into the same chaotic trans-dimensional field. At that point, a portal opened at the Blood Lake in The Plane of Dreams, so chances of the Orb and the monks guarding it being transported into the Surface World were rather large.
But that did not even come close to determining the exact location of the Orb: The spacecraft was working fine when it ran into trouble at the bottom of the lake. From Hao Ren's guess, the ship was in space at that time, if the Orb's position was directly reflective of where the ship actually was, it may very well have been thrown into deep space. Plus, if it had already been floating there for a good two months, who knew where it actually ended up.
Secondly, the probability of the Orb being reflectively transposed accurately was miniscule. The exact location where the craft ran into issues was at the bottom of the lake, but the dimensional rift opened in the church in the middle of the lake. As such, the MDT surmised that there was probably some distortion when the rift formed, resulting in two pathways opening. The biggest fear when using interdimensional teleportation is a positional distortion. Even a minute distortion could throw someone off their actual destination thousand of miles away, light years even. Furthermore, as both the Surface World and The Plane of Dreams were not direct mirrors of each other, any reflective transposition would not be accurate. The MDT even extrapolated the possibility of the Orb being thrown into a different universe all together. The spacecraft had a void engine in it, which was used for trans-dimensional travel. If it was still active when the ship crashed, there was a chance that it simply threw anything nearby into other dimensions.
But, the Orb's location was not their concern as of now. What was happening in The Plane of Dreams had all of them worried.
"What will happen if the balance is broken?" Vivian looked at the MDT curiously. Her knowledge about things while exceeded Lily's, paled before the cutting edge database.
"The most obvious consequence would be, things from both worlds starting to interact with each other without control. The more similar their fundamental characteristics are, the easier it will be for them to interact. Intelligent beings will start to communicate with other intelligent beings." The MDT then displayed a holographic projection with a sombre scene of war and massacres on it. "For example, demons will start appearing in human city centres, nuclear warheads may fall on the capital of a magical kingdom, biological infestation may occur, a warlike race may take the opportunity to go to war for dominion and destroy other civilisations in the process. And oh, diseases and plagues. A simple flu on Earth may be the Black Death in a foreign world, and it's the same the other way around. A small group could still be fine, as bacteria may not survive the environment and be eliminated by natural selection. However, if it involves the movement of a very large group, then it is a disaster waiting to happen. Even an experienced plague lord is nothing against bacteria or viruses from another world. A small scale outbreak could perhaps be contained, but a big one... well, the medical team may as well die alongside their patients there and then."
The rather vivid explanation sent chills down Vivian's spine. "Then... how did the first group of unusual creatures survive on Earth?"
"Maybe it was really the survival of the fittest, or the transference changed their physical attributes.. No one knows for sure. The Plane of Dreams is a chaotic mess after all."
Y'zaks was also deep in thought. "You haven't even mentioned anything about the worst case scenario. Two converging worlds will probably have issues with their spatial parameters and world rules. Well even before that, if the Planck's Constant just diverges that little bit, any contact will simply result in an apocalypse. That's even more dire than war or plague, hell, not many will even survive that. An apocalypse."
The MDT moved up and down as if it was nodding. "That's the worst case scenario, but that usually happens due to a massive convergence of two worlds. Anyway, based on the current data, The Plane of Dreams and the Surface World share pretty much the same parameters. The most important of those, the Planck's Constant, the basic core settings and spatial construction are pretty much the same. The doomsday scenario will probably not happen."
Hao Ren then looked up at the rest in a sweeping glance. "I think we need to make a trip back. There are too many things to report. We will also need to get someone to do something about that ship."
"Yup, yup!" Lily nodded vehemently. "Sides, there's no electricity, no internet and no nice food to eat... blergh."
This lass was so excited when she first came, and now she was utterly sick of it.
"Well, that's that. We'll go back tomorrow then. We need to say our farewells to Becky, and bring Hilda along," Hao Ren said as he stood up. He then noticed Wuyue, who was still curled up in a ball. "You still can't untie the knot?"
Wuyue was flapping about by the shore. "I'm still numb... still numb.... Ah... I'm gonna roll off!!"
Hao Ren quickly went forward to give the siren a hand. "Don't worry, we'll wait for you."
It was "thanks" to Vivian's lightning attack that Wuyue was so numbed. Remember that they ran into some mechanical guardian underwater? Wuyue, the siren nanny who could not fight, simply curled into a ball using her three-metre-long tail when the enemy attacked. The first thing she saw as she peeped through her defensive ball was Vivian casting a lightning sphere and jolting everyone there...
Perhaps, the high salinity of the sea creature resulted in a high level of conductivity, or Wuyue simply forgot to put some points in her elemental resistance. She was the worst off of the lot. She was still numb after so long, and she could not untie her tail after a good ten minutes trying. And oh, she could not even dispel her siren form despite trying to so.
A beautiful lass with a serpentine tail would have been a work of art, but that was far, far from both Hao Ren and Wuyue's mind as they tried to untangle her knot. It took Wuyue a lot of effort to pull the end of her tail out of the knot. She tapped Hao Ren by the pants. "Don't tell my brother about this, please! I already did this once when I was young. He'll laugh at me until he drops."
Hao Ren could only helplessly look at this beautiful yet clumsy siren because something bugged him immensely. "How did you even manage to tie yourself into a butterfly knot with all that going on?"
"Don't look, it's embarassing." Wuyue tried to turn away.
It took Wuyue another two hours before her numbness had somewhat faded, just before everyone almost decided to simply drag her back. As she was able to move now, she went back into the water to change. She glared at Vivian as she got out. "That shock was really... numbing... Stay away from me when you decide to jolt something to a crisp."
Vivian was probably the most embarrassed of the lot that night, all the way from her head to her toes. In fact, her face was almost red. Imagine a pale vampire having a puffy red face? That's saying something.
The group sneaked back into the encampment. Dawn was about to break as they got back into their camp. Only Lil Pea got any semblance of sleep. She pretty much went back into her pot to curl up after gobbling two sheets of paper, leaving her unlucky lot of uncles and aunts to pack up for the return trip.
Hao Ren's haul this time around was pretty good. He had gotten a rather wide variety of ores, local tools, books and clothing. He stuffed them into his Dimensional Pocket as much as he could. There was no small measure of thanks to Y'zaks business acumen that they managed to procure such items at very reasonable prices. Of course, the most valuable of the loot was the combat bot that was now sitting quietly in the pocket, drowning in Lily's junk food.
That was by Lily's request. She came to take "Bally" as her victor's spoils. Vivian was reluctant to argue with her on that and just let her be.
The group then went to look for Becky, who was doing some morning exercises in front of the camp. After beckoning her to a secluded area in the camp, the group signalled their intent to leave.
"You guys are leaving just like that?" Becky was shocked. She knew that the group was bound to leave sooner or later, and that their interest lay elsewhere, not in the Orb. She never counted on them leaving so soon. "You lot just arrived, no? I thought you were supposed to investigate some dimensional phenomenon?"
"Actually, last night—" Lily was just about to blurt everything out before Vivian cusped her hand over the werehusky's mouth. "Actually, we received an urgent missive last night and it seems like we have to abandon what we are doing here."
"Oh..." Becky did not press the matter. She took a glance at Hilda, who was standing beside Hao Ren. "She's tagging along?"
Hilda quietly looked at Hao Ren, her unease about the journey was quite apparent. However, as she was bereft of any other options, and the fact she confirmed that the portal in the centre of the Blood Lake had already closed two months back, she saw no reason to disagree to it. She simply nodded as she heard Becky's question. "Yes, we are leaving together."
"Alrighty then. I won't be sending you off. Let's work again next time," Becky said as she waved her hand at the group. She then popped the question that had been bugging her, "Say... how do you guys plan to go back? If you need horses you can rent them at Leyton..."
"We'll be teleporting, as usual," Hao Ren said.
Becky was taken aback and leapt a good few metres away from the group. "Bon voyage then. Keep note of your height before you land."
"..."
It seems like Becky really did not buy the whole shtick about "dimensional magic" anymore.
The MDT quickly ran through the calculations needed to ensure that Hilda was transported alongside the group. After pulling some distance away from Becky, the group waved at her as a bright flash of light pulled them away from The Plane of Dreams.