Ethereal Ascendance: A Journey of Transformation

"Now we can finally return to the capital in peace..."

Just as everyone was casually changing the topic to going home, I suddenly felt something was wrong. It seemed like a large number of dark elemental auras had gathered around us unknowingly.

"This is..."

"Monsters!"

Not only me, Selene and Nicola also felt it. Everyone took out their weapons and held them in front of them when they heard me.

"There are them everywhere behind those extinguished forests in the distance..."

Hayden could see them with his naked eyes. Holding up his shield, he reminded us with a grave expression.

"We are surrounded!"

"I wonder how those mountain fires triggered by Michelle were extinguished so quickly..."

Nicola also saw them. She was fearless against one or two enemies alone. But when facing a crowd, especially nearly a hundred of them charging over like now, she didn't dare to be complacent.

"Don't...don't worry. Since your future self has come back, you must be alright!"

What I said was right, but seeing such a battle array, I was still very afraid. After all, only Nicola's safety returning was confirmed. Whether the others would survive or not was hard to say.

"Aren't these the late companions that Fire Goddess talked about?"

Because he was unconscious, Alfreed's memory remained at the moment when Michelle had just revealed her identity. So he still remembered very clearly what the other party had said before that.

"I thought it referred to the reinforcements at that time..."

Eleanora said with a crying face.

"With so many monsters now, even if most of them are not very powerful, how could we defeat them..."

Seeing those monsters had already rushed out of the forest and surrounded us.

Just when everyone was preparing to fight to the death, Selene suddenly put down her weapon and looked up at the sky, shouting excitedly.

"We are saved! Reinforcements are here!"

"Reinforcements again? In the sky?"

I looked up curiously following her, only to find a white figure passing by one after another from the low altitude in the distance...

They were angels...real angels, with pure white wings, flying in groups and regiments.

"They are angels..."

Nicola looked up at the sky with complicated feelings, not knowing whether to feel happy or worried like me.

"Attack! Kill all these monsters without leaving one!"

An eight-winged angel stopped above us and waved her long sword forward, commanding other angels to start fighting.

Hearing her order, those other angels immediately swarmed and charged toward the monsters around us.

Most of them only had four or six wings, holding all kinds of weapons. Some of them rushed down to engage in melee combat, while others remained in the air throwing magic down. Although there were only dozens of them, the monsters had no flying combat power at all on their side, completely at a disadvantage.

So the actual situation was a completely one-sided slaughter of monsters by angels. With one light spell thrown out by the angels above, large swaths of monsters below would fall. And most of the monsters simply couldn't hit those in the sky while lacking intelligence and could only let themselves get beaten passively.

As for those dozens of flying monsters barely taking off, they were intercepted by weapon-wielding angels and hacked apart.

"How did you angel legions find this place? I am Alfreed, the deputy commander of the 5th legion of the royal army."

Seeing there was no need for us to make a move at all, Alfreed walked up to the eight-winged angel who had descended in front of us and quickly introduced himself after seeing her.

Only then did I realize he was not just a squad leader, but also a deputy commander.

Asked this question, the eight-winged angel frowned with a look of seeing an idiot and said:

"Can't you see what it looks like around here? Burning such a large tract of forest and blasting so many craters, did you think our angel legions are blind?"

"Uh... So may I ask who you are?"

Only then did Alfreed react and realize it was an extremely stupid question.

"I am Serena, commander of the 1st Angel Legion."

The eight-winged angel reported her name and glanced at me and Nicola, saying:

"I thought there would only be monsters here, didn't expect so many humans, plus two angels."

"Nicola..."

I moved closer to her side worriedly and asked in a low voice:

"It won't be a problem, right?"

"Don't worry. This eight-winged angel probably can't beat me. If she dares to use force, we'll just run away quickly!"

Nicola whispered back to me.

"So, can you tell me what exactly happened here? I believe with the power of these low-level monsters, such large-scale destruction could not have been caused."

After casually asking some routine questions of Alfreed, Serena suddenly turned her head toward us.

"And...which one of you is Nicola?"

Probably seeing we were chatting with heads together, she spoke up and asked:

“I heard that an unknown angel appeared in the royal army, and then suddenly disappeared earlier today. It should be one of you, right?”

“Unknown angel?”

Hearing this, Selene and Adrian looked at Nicola puzzledly.

In their minds, Nicola had always been the lost angel who was just temporarily staying in the human world because she couldn't find her way back to Edenmere.

But now it seemed that even the angel legions themselves didn't know there was such a figure.

"Uh...they don't know me well..."

Nicola smiled awkwardly and nodded at Serena, answering:

"I am Nicola. What do you want from me?"

Probably seeing how nervous we were with all our bodies tensed, everyone present was puzzled. Why were we acting as if facing enemies when angels were of the same race?

"No need to be nervous. I roughly know about your situation."

Serena also saw our attitude, but she unexpectedly showed great understanding and even spoke to reassure us.

"It seems you guys are all survivors who escaped from Elara Woodlands, right?"

"How did you know? So do you know what is going on with us?"

Didn't expect the other party to blurt out our experience so accurately. Nicola glanced back at me and it was as we had speculated earlier that the secret of us transforming into angels was very clear to them.

"Of course. Neither you nor the angel behind looks like a member of our angel legions. We don't have many angels. Whoever comes and goes from Edenmere is very clear. So you can only be those summoned by the angel descension formation."

As expected, the other party answered our questions without hesitation. Her face was even full of joy, completely different from what we had imagined.

"Unfortunately, the summoning was ambushed by monsters midway with the formation malfunctioning. I originally thought there were only two survivors left. Didn't expect to find another two here unexpectedly..."

"Wait a minute!"

Nicola hurriedly stopped the other party from continuing.

"You said angel descension formation?"

She seemed a little familiar with the term.

"Claudia!"

I suddenly remembered that this was exactly what Claudia had mentioned before, the so-called formation that she said she was summoned by after improving it herself.

"Yes, the angel descension formation is..."

Serena was about to explain to us when she glanced hesitantly at the others and had to change her words:

"As for the specifics, it's inconvenient to talk about them here. Why don't you just come back to Edenmere with me and ask Lady Elara yourselves?"

This Elara could also be considered a "familiar face" after hearing her name no less than a few times.

"But I just heard you say you originally thought there were only two survivors left. And then you discovered another two here unexpectedly..."

The angel descension formation was not what concerned me the most. The key point was in her later words, which seemed to imply something incredible.

"Feliciana, could it be that your meaning is..."

Nicola didn't care at first. After I emphasized the key points repeatedly, she also noticed the crucial implications.

"Ah..."

Seeing our reaction, Serena seemed to understand something. She immediately said with a smile:

"That's right! Although the summoning was attacked by monsters this time, not only did you two survive, but another two comrades were successfully rescued, and they are still in Edenmere now. So if you come back with me, you should be able to meet them."

"Nicola!"

I couldn't believe it and pulled her clothes.

"She said there are others still alive. Maybe..."

If according to my and Nicola's speculation, maybe there were other classmates still alive.

"Do you know what their names are?"

Nicola suddenly asked persistently.

"Names?"

Serena was stunned for a moment and said uncertainly after thinking about it briefly:

"Their names are a bit strange. One of them claims to be Cyra..."

"Cyra? What the hell is this?"

The name was not unfamiliar. But it sounded bizarre when personally said by Serena in this situation.

I didn't remember any classmate with that name...

And who was Cyra in this world? That was the holy angel recorded in the scriptures of the True Church, one of the founding angels and Yawee's wife!

"Madam angel, could it be that our holy angel has descended upon this world again?"

As expected, Selene immediately asked Serena excitedly when she heard it.

"You misunderstood."

Serena shook her head and denied it to her.

"We were surprised at first too. But after confirming it with her, it should just be a namesake and has nothing to do with your True Church's holy angel."

"What about the other? What's the other called?"

I asked persistently, unwilling to give up until the end.

"It seems to be... Reed?"