I woke up in what appeared to be a garden full of flowers. I don't know how I survived all those injuries, but apparently my body is healed.

The place I am in seems to be an area with huge vegetation of flowers, trees, etc.

The sky seemed to be artificial as even though I am seeing the sun, I still don't feel its blinding clarity or even the clouds moving.

The room temperature was good and I no longer feel the thirst I did before and it will probably take me a while to feel it again. My body feels much better than it did the moment I entered the cave.

I have no idea who brought us here or if we passed the test, but I'm pretty sure that fairy knows the answer since it was because of her cloak that we survived the longest.

I'm still lying on some sort of cot from the moment I woke up a few minutes ago, but I couldn't get up let alone move as Konan is sleeping next to me while hugging me tightly.

She was sleeping like a baby and had a beautiful smile on her face as she slept. She is probably having a great dream.

I was extremely relieved about this because the first thing I did when I woke up was to see if she was okay. I didn't even worry about the state of my body and could only think about her well being and with a feeling of guilt for dragging her into another painful situation.

Waking up and seeing her lying next to me and sleeping like a baby while holding me as tightly as she could, made me feel extremely happy to see that she was okay and also made me realize how much I am caring about her.

I think because she is the only one in this world that I can call family that I want to protect her unconditionally and am even willing to give my life in exchange for her. 'wait, is there any risk of me turning into a yandere?????'

I feel like it's better that I control my feelings and not let them be exposed or anything like that. In my previous life I had few serious dating relationships and in those few I only got disappointment from most of them.

I'm not sure if she feels the same way I do or if it's just a feeling of gratitude that I saved her life, and so she feels obligated to reciprocate, but whatever the answer is, I just need her to be okay so that I can keep a smile on my face. And if in the future I realize that she doesn't want to be close to me then I will step back and try to protect her from a distance.

After a few more minutes Konan finally woke up. She opened her eyes slowly and stood up to look around, after that she looked straight into my eyes. And as if suddenly remembering something she widened her eyes. But instead of letting go of me and asking where we were, she hugged me again and squeezed me much harder than before and sank her head into my chest.

"I'm sorry!!! I said I would protect you, but I was nothing but a burden.... " she said as she was crying on my chest.

"You Idiot, I who should put my head down and apologize for being so selfish and putting you in danger...Besides, I who have to protect you and not the other way around" I said as I ran my hand over her head and hugged her tightly to comfort her and apologize.

"If you had died because of this selfishness of mine and I had stayed alive, I would kill myself to go along with you because I couldn't bear to live with the burden of guilt and having to lose my only family in this world. So, don't think for a moment about sacrificing yourself to protect me-" I couldn't finish my words because Konan's lips were already pressed against mine.

Her lips were soft, warm and welcoming. I was surprised by how sudden this was, but I didn't back down and started to return the kiss.

I think it's because of the hormones in my body, but I don't want to stop kissing her. That's when she started forcing her tongue into my mouth and I let her in. But I didn't want to be left behind and I started the battle for territory in her mouth with my tongue.

We kept tongue kissing for a while longer until we finally got tired and parted, leaving a trickle of saliva between our mouths. We were still panting from running out of breath, but we continued to stare at each other without taking our eyes off each other.

'We'd better stop here, otherwise my hormones won't take over my control' I thought to myself

"I didn't expect you to be so aggressive like that haha" I said giving a light laugh and a happy smile soon after.

"Baka!" She said as she sank her head into my chest again to hide her completely red face.

I was extremely happy about that. I honestly didn't expect her to act like this at this point, but now I am more motivated than ever to strengthen myself and protect the person I love.

After that we heard a voice behind our side.

"*AHEM* could the two lovebirds stop flirting outdoors!?" Said the ice fairy with a slightly red face.

Then Konan and I, still holding each other, sat down on the cot and looked in her direction. It was then that we had a completely unusual sight of an older woman who appeared to be around twenty years old doing a dogeza on the dirt floor.

The woman had red hair, her body resembled a guitar and I couldn't see her face because her head was practically nailed to the ground, but she was wearing some kind of pink pajamas.

"What does that mean..." I asked as I pointed at the woman in twelvega.

"I FEEL SO MUCH" the woman shouted so loudly that the earth shook slightly from the sound.

Her voice wasn't as beautiful as Konan's or as fine as the fairy's, but it was a pleasant voice to hear. It reminded me of my sister's voice from another life, but let's ignore that and start understanding the shit that's going on.

"*sigh* that was the idiot who almost killed you guys because she fell asleep before the test started and forgot to lower the gravity level around the door" the ice fairy said with an indignant expression on her face.

"Wait, you mean we almost died because that dumb fucking woman couldn't stay awake?" Konan asked with her usual inexpressive face and an angry, indignant tone of voice.

"Yes, that dumb dragon only knows how to be lazy and sleep like a pig" replied the fairy.

"Please don't cuss me so much right in front of me..." the redhead said with a crying tone.

"*sigh* why do I always have a huge amount of luck at these times huh? First the old fucker cheating on me and now a lazy redhead almost killing me for sleeping...my life is getting more and more fucked up!"

"I'm sorry..." the redhead said still in dogeza.

"Hold your head up, I still haven't forgiven you for putting us through that, but since we've been healed you don't have to keep doing this dogeza. "I said with a little irritation and contempt in my voice.

Hearing what I said, the redhead raised her head and sat up while looking at us with watery eyes. Her face was breathtakingly beautiful. Her eyes were a crimson red color almost matching the shade of her hair.

"Anyway, I hope we at least passed the test as compensation for that!" I spoke clearly wanting something in return for all the pain I felt on the test.

"Y-Yes, you passed. The purpose of the second test was to test how far you would go to keep fighting. How determined you were to strengthen yourselves and not lose to any threats" the redhead said with a slightly fearful tone.

"Exactly! But since that dumb dragon doesn't know how to do things right, she set the test at an absurd difficulty and if you hadn't worn the cloth I gave you, you both would have died without even having the chance to be saved." said the ice fairy

"So, should I thank you or cuss that fucking redhead?" I asked feigning confusion

"Both of you, and preferably thank me by making a dogeza and kissing my feet" the fairy replied with a cocky smile.

"That being the case then thank you for your help Mr. Dwarf who failed to supervise the dumb and dumber dragon" I said lowering my head a little.

I'm slightly surprised that there's even a dragon here, but if you take into account that there are tailed beasts that have practically infinite chakra and have the potential to destroy an entire village, then it's not that surprising.

"WHO DID YOU CALL A DWARF YOU SHIT!?" The fairy expression changed drastically to one of pure anger. I guess your height is your weakness.

"Sorry, sorry hehe" I replied with a slight giggle. When she gets angry, she seems cuter and more adorable than she normally does.

"Can we go to the next challenge now?" Konan asked with a slightly bemused tone.

'This gets more and more annoying because Hiro was almost killed by that idiot dragon and now there's even an annoying dwarf who got cocky towards Hiro' thought Konan.

"Right, right, if you are ready, we will take you to the last challenge" replied the fairy who had also noticed Konan's bad mood.

Konan and I split up and climbed down from the cradle made of tree roots and with several flowers and pillows around it. I could even see some food scraps on the ground nearby, and I think this is that stupid dragon's bed.

We continued walking until we reached a kind of walkway that looks like the floor of the streets of Europe at the time of modernism. On the sides of the walkway are many colorful flowers, and all this together makes this garden the most beautiful place I've ever seen in my life.

Then we come to what looks like the exit from that garden. It looked like a vortex just like the black hole I have connected with my item box dimension.

The fairy and the dragon went through the vortex, and then Konan and I went through it. After a second of darkness we arrive at the entrance of what appears to be a huge Japanese shrine. It's a simple shrine without many decorations.

We continued walking and entered the shrine, inside it is basically like the Japanese houses of yesteryear, the floor is a tatami and the doors are run. We continued walking until we reached a door that was bigger and more beautiful than the others.

"We are not allowed to go beyond here, so you two will have to go alone" the fairy said as she pointed to the door.

"okay, but this test isn't going to kill us this time, right???" I asked with a slight hint of fear.

"no, no, you guys go talk directly to the master...or at least what's left of him around here." This time the dragon replied with an expression of deep sadness on her face.

"Right...let's go Konan!" I said and immediately took her hand.

"um!" she nodded and had a determined look towards the door.

We opened the door and saw a staircase leading down into what looked like a dark basement. The walls around the stairs were made of marble and there was no light around us so we had to be careful not to fall. We continued down the stairs until we saw a green light at the bottom of the stairs.

After a few minutes of descent, we arrived in front of a huge shiny gate whose material is unknown to me, but its color was just like a jade jewel.

The door was approximately 20 meters high, and there was a huge yin-yang symbol in the center of it. In the lower left and right corners there were symbols of the moon and in the upper corners on both sides, there were symbols of what looked like eyes, but I won't say anything because that would be a spoiler.

At first, I couldn't believe what I was seeing and what it could mean considering all the factors that protect this place. All we could see around the door was a tea table with some cushions on the floor. Other than that, everything was the same and there were no other people but the two of us here.

Seeing that we wouldn't get anywhere waiting for something to happen, I decided to ring the door just as I did the previous two to see what happened.

When my hand touched the door, it started sucking some of my chakra into it. I think all the doors were made with this mechanism of absorbing chakra since the other two did the same.

After I stopped sucking out my chakra, a white light started emitting from the upper right corner of the door where the eye symbol was located. The light is being directed to the floor exactly where a sitting pillow was.

The light began to shine more brightly every second and after about 1 minute the light was beginning to take the shape of a person sitting on top of the pillow.

After it took shape and glowed brightly for one last time, we could see who the person was.

He was a tall man with eyes that looked like crystals, with distinctive features and horned protrusions on his forehead. He also had no eyebrows and his hair was long and light colored with bangs combed to the left, with a single lock at chin height that hung down from the right side of his face. He wore a full body white kimono with a pattern of six black magatama around a high collar and dark pants with a sword on his hip.

That man is...