Ethereal Ascendance: A Journey of Transformation

"This thing looks like the disinfectant Reed showed us before, the one they use in the base," Adrian said.

He quickly searched the guy and pulled out a small bottle from his pocket. He wasn't sure, but he tossed it to me anyway.

"You're right, this is holy water! This fella was damn brave to cover his whole body with this stuff. Must have hurt like hell!"

I rolled up the vampire's sleeve and saw his arm was all messed up from the liquid. Looks like he killed the real light mage and tried to sneak into the other world using the base's disinfectant.

"Didn't they say there were two criminals? Where's the other one? I remember you said the other one was a foreigner, kinda special, maybe helping out?" Cyra butted in, reminding us.

Everything happened so fast. Just as Irene stepped into the portal, Adrian caught the vampire at our feet. But like Cyra said, there was probably another baddie hiding nearby, waiting to make a move.

Before we could start looking, someone suddenly dashed out from the back of the group. He zoomed past everyone, desperately trying to jump into the portal!

This guy was even faster than the first one! Must be that foreign vampire who slipped through.

"Don't let him get away!" Wayne Peng yelled. Even though there were H-country soldiers on the other side, it was safest to catch him here on Earth.

The problem was Adrian and I were still by the gate, at least 30 meters from the portal. The vampire was about to reach it - we were too late.

Bang! Bang! Bang!

Thank goodness for guns! Wayne Peng whipped out his pistol and fired several shots at the target. He hit the head and heart - even a vampire can't survive that!

But even though he died instantly, the guy's body kept moving. The vampire's corpse fell right into the portal entrance.

"Oh no! Don't let him die inside the portal!" Reed shouted.

But it was too late. The normal people from the imperial delegation were closest to the portal, but they didn't have the power to stop it. They were too scared and backed away even more!

Everything changed so fast. A few seconds after the vampire's body entered the portal, something weird started happening.

From the outside, we could kinda see black mist swirling and spreading inside the portal. Soon it all disappeared, like nothing ever happened.

"Is it okay now?" I asked, not really believing it. This was totally unexpected. The portal was still there, open like before. It didn't seem that different.

Was I seeing things, or did the portal get a bit bigger?

Even so, after Reed's shout earlier, nobody dared to enter. Most of the imperial delegation had already gone through. The only ones left were the servants, probably in charge of Katarina's daily life stuff.

These people didn't understand H-country language and had no clue what was going on. But some saw the dark element going crazy in the portal earlier. Now they all just stood there looking at each other. Nobody wanted to be the fool who went first.

"Are you sure the vampire affected the portal?" Wayne Peng asked. He walked up and stared into it for a while but couldn't see anything wrong. He thought the dead vampire just fell into the other world, no big deal. But Reed strongly disagreed.

"Dark element is super active. When it gets concentrated enough, it speeds up changes in all other elements, causing unpredictable problems. The portal has the most earth element anywhere. A monster dying right inside is way worse than just the little bit they give off normally. Plus, this vampire was probably level 5, maybe even from the top bloodline. Wayne shot him in the heart - that's where monsters store their magic power. When it broke, all the dark element in his body went out! This much dark element getting into the portal never happened before. I have no idea what would happen, but maybe nothing. Still, We should stop all portal activities until figuring it out!"

"Not this again! I'm just in charge of security for the farewell ceremony. Even if everything you say is true, I gotta ask the bosses before deciding!" Wayne Peng said with a bitter smile. This wasn't the first time the angels warned them. He made a few quick phone calls to explain what happened.

A few minutes later, the base's top officials showed up. Unlike the bigshots from the capital giving farewell speeches, these were all military guys in charge of stuff in the base. This included Wayne Peng's boss, a general named Lee or something. He might even be the head honcho of the whole base.

General Lee checked out the situation and told one of his guards: "Go find some animals, tie them up with ropes, and test the portal first. If it's okay, then we'll send people in."

This was pretty careful. I had to agree with his decision, given the situation.

While we waited for the soldiers to find animals, the portal started acting weird again. A twisted human shape suddenly appeared on the surface of the ball-shaped entrance. It kept twisting and getting bigger. From past experience, this meant someone from the other side was coming through.

Everyone relaxed a bit when they saw this. If someone could come through, it meant the portal was fine and working normally.

"Is it really okay? The chances of that are nearly impossible - harder than winning the lottery multiple times!" Reed muttered to herself, clearly doubting it.

"So can we keep going through as before?" the leftover imperial servants asked General Lee and Wayne Peng.

"Well, we're supposed to observe first. But if you really can't wait and want to go in yourselves, go ahead!" Wayne Peng said after thinking for a bit. He looked at his boss, but General Lee didn't say anything, so he stopped objecting.

If these guys wanted to be guinea pigs, that was their problem. Plus the portal really did seem fine now.

But just as Wayne Peng answered, the visitor from the other world finally arrived on Earth. To everyone's shock, an eight-winged angel stepped out of the portal! Looks like there was another person behind them too.

"Huh?" I gasped. Even Adrian squeezed my hand hard. We were both super shocked.

"Fe...Feliciana! Isn't that you? Why are there two of you!" Cyra kept poking my back, too excited to stop.

"And another Adrian?" I turned to look at the person next to me with a bitter, helpless smile.

Looks like Reed was right all along - the portal really did have a problem. And it might be a super big one!

"Huh? Didn't I go back through the portal? Why am I still here?" the Feliciana from the other world asked, looking around in confusion.

"Did we never actually enter the portal in the first place?" the Adrian from the other world wondered. He looked back doubtfully, then saw my Adrian. His eyes went wide with surprise.

"What the heck is going on? Why is there another me here!"

Two voices asked the same question at the same time. But everyone just looked at each other blankly.

Haha, I wish I knew what was going on too! This is totally messed up!