Now that Sylas took the coffin, the secret realm which contained Aurelian’s tomb started crumbling apart, still the first king was careful enough to let a portal near the vault, so everyone was ready to leave.
The portal opened and Sylas was the first one to enter, followed by the other members of the royal court and the king, just in case Aster used the paragon body to prevent them from separating in the dimensional tunnel.
This time Kana didn’t faint since she was protected from the very beginning, so she enjoyed the strangely scenery of the dimensional tunnel, Aster noticed that Sarina had a troubled expression on her face and he sat down in the floor and looked at all the girls before saying.
“We are going to be in the dimensional tunnel for some time, come sit with me ladies”.
Alice naturally sat at the right side of her brother, Sarina doubted a bit before taking the left side, and to everyone’s surprise Kana sat down on Aster’s lap.
While others thought that she didn’t pay too much attention to Aurelian’s story, that wasn’t the truth, everyone got a different lesson from it, Orson for example found the motivation he lacked to become a good king.
In Kana’s case, she was marveled by how love worked, Aurelian found the love of his life in a random planet where he casually landed, besides that she also started to think on the future, cultivators had a long lifespan, but when there is a big gap in their realms their ways are bond to separate.
When she heard Aster saying that he wasn’t going to stop in this place, she felt her little heart clench a bit, but instead worrying about it, she decided to not keep her feelings for herself anymore, if she hated something she will say it, if she wanted something she will fight for it, if she liked someone… then she will make her feelings reach that person.
In short words, thanks to this experience she matured a bit, if before she still had some doubts about leaving her birthplace, now her heart was clear and her mind was resolved, she placed herself a goal, “I want to stay at big brother’s side”.
And that’s what led to the current situation, Kana was smiling while enjoying the view, completely unaware that her actions made Alice and Kana direct some weird gazes at Aster.
Speaking of Aster, he didn’t know whether he should laugh or cry, although Kana has been friendly with him since they met, lately it was different, he wasn’t dense enough to not notice that the little girl sitting on his legs… had a crush on him.
Unlike Sarina who was surprisingly calm about this whole situation, Alice was doing her best to hold back her laugh.
“That’s what you get for showing off in front of an innocent unexperienced little girl”, she thought.
After debating with himself for a couple of minutes, Aster shrugged, “Sarina was coming with me anyway, so Kana was already in for the journey as well… she is too innocent, so it’s possible that this is only temporal, if not then we will have time to see how things turn out in the future”.
There was no use in thinking too much about it, so instead of that he simply patted Kana’s head, and enjoyed her cute reactions, his conscience was clean so there was nothing to be afraid.
Aster noticed that Sarina was now smiling at him, which felt a bit weird, as if he had fallen in a trap set by this pair of mother and daughter, since things were like this then there was no harm in a bit of teasing.
He looked at Sarina and smirked.
“If you are going to look at me like that, I’m going to kiss you hahaha”.
Sarina blushed, while Alice shook her head.
“Now that’s the Aster I know and love”, she thought.
Kana’s laugh which sounded like little silver bells ringing, drew everyone’s attention, Sarina saw her daughter laughing at it and she had a weird premonition but she still asked.
“What happens dear, are you laughing at your mother being teased?”.
Kana smiled.
“It’s not that, I just thought we look like a big happy family ♥”.
Aster patted her head, the travel through the dimensional tunnel was quite entertaining for them, Kana actively participated in the conversation this time as if she was stating “I’m also here, so notice me”.
Once they reached the exit of the tunnel, they appeared in the cave where the first king has been living for countless years, this time Sylas and the others arrived a couple of minutes later than them but they weren’t separated, now that everyone was out of the secret realm the doors crumbed apart and the spirit formations also disappeared… all the traces that a secret chamber ever existed were now gone.
After following the same path that led them here, they returned to the surface of the castle, Orson had a lot of things to do, he still had to read the report from Karl about the current situation of the capital city, so he left followed by Leister, Milia dragged Sylas to the infirmary to replace his bandages so for the time being Aster and the girls were free to do whatever they wanted.
As Aster was about to suggest continuing their picnic near the river, Sarina took out her communication talisman because she received a message.
After reading it she smiled.
“The information gathering squad found your friend… he is staying at the mansion of the lord of Hawthorn city, apparently, he got “close” to the daughter of the city lord, so he has been staying there all this time”.
Maybe Sarina was thinking that the reason as to why Eric was Aster’s friend was because they shared some common “hobbies”, but the truth is that Aster was also surprised, all the time he has known Eric, he didn’t show interest in girls, he was basically a battle maniac, most of his time he was training of getting into troubles.
“Perhaps, this time he got into a different kind of “trouble”, hahaha”, he thought while looking at Sarina and Kana.
“How far is that city from the capital?”, he asked.
Sarina contemplated things for a moment before answering.
“It’s not too far, we can go in a carriage and in less than one hour we will be there, we could also fly there but it’s still quite early so the sun is a bit strong right now”.
Aster nodded.
“I will take the carriage, I need to discuss some things with him”, Aster knew Alice wasn’t going to separate from him, so he only needed to confirm if Sarina and Kana wanted to come.
“Do you also want to come with me?”.
Before Sarina could answer, Kana nodded.
“I want to go!!! It will be a good chance for me to show big brother some of the culture of Luonto”.
Listening to her daughter’s excited voice, Sarina smiled.
“There you have it, you won’t get rid of us so easily ♥”.
Aster shook his head.
“Not like that’s what I wanted anyway, before we leave can you take me to the best shop in the royal capital? I need the best communication talisman available, also please tell Marco to bring Cade from Oak Heart city to Hawthorn city”.
Sarina nodded, she sent a message to Marco with some instructions and they left the castle, although yesterday there was a big commotion in the capital, besides some of the soldiers that fought against the spies of Riga there weren’t too many casualties, so all those who weren’t affected by the battle were continuing with their lives.
Along the way Aster saw the soldiers and even some volunteers cleaning the streets from debris and other things, he looked at the sky while thinking on the words of Aurelian, leaving aside some ungrateful bastards like Robert, the people of this place was certainly quite united, probably because they were used to the fact that their galaxy was limited so their “world” wasn’t as big as the one Aster knew.
“Perhaps this sensation of belonging was the reason as to why that old mas was willing to use all the time, he had left to protect the birthplace of his wife… what a shame, such a loyal guy would have been worthy of being a friend”.
Aster who was lost in his thoughts, returned to reality when Sarina stopped walking, she pointed at a big white building which was being guarded by a couple of dozens of early-stage stellar constellation cultivators and four peak ones.
Sarina didn’t seem to be surprised by all the guards as she explained.
“That is the best store in Luonto, the golden cloud merchant house, the number of guards at the entrance has always been like this, so don’t worry about that”.
They walked towards the entrance, the guards recognized Kana and Sarina as the direct “family”, of Robert so the ones leading the guards stopped them from entering.
One of the captains took a few steps ahead and spoke with a disdaining voice.
“What do you wish from our merchant house?”.
Before Sarina could answer, Aster snorted.
“A mere star alignment cultivator dares to be disdainful towards a member of my family… know your place”.
p The guards tried to unsheathe their swords but Aster’s spirit pressure made their knees give in, the sound of metal clashing against rock echoed through the whole street as all the guards fell to the floor.
Sarina smiled while Kana seemed to have sparks in her eyes, Alice on the other hand was used to this kind of situations, this was quite merciful, she still remembers what happened to the poor souls that tried to lay their hands on Lilia, Aria or her, when they were travelling back then in the Azure sky planet.
Aster ignored the guards who were trying to move, and entered the merchant house followed by the girls, of course such a flashy exhibition caught the attention of some people that were passing by but they limited to see from afar, messing with someone that managed to incapacitate four peak stage star alignment realm cultivators was stupid idea after all.