I lay in the dark room after a period of unconsciousness staring up at the padded ceiling, the windowless room doesn’t let me know how much time has passed in this world but due to my connection outside I’m able to see that not much has passed. The tables are completely empty not even restocked with food leaving me rather hungry after missing out on desert. The cake was dry without a strong flavour, not something I’d choose to eat but the look on the young woman’s face was priceless.

I laugh to myself as the door swings open abruptly, dozens of footsteps march into the room yet this time they’re not the friendly maids but a group of security officers wearing armour and holding weapons, granted they’re wooden weapons but it still shows a large difference in treatment.

One of the security officers steps up, her commanding voice shouts through a full face helmet, “Lady Pseupheus, we are here to fetch and take you to Baroness Vaelia’s estate on her land. Please follow us to your armoured escort carriage.”

I sit up on the bed, “Do I have much of a choice?”

“You can asking for a hearing with Queen Alferia but I believe that will take weeks to organise.”

“Can I organise it now?”

“She has returned to her city during the night, Baroness Vaelia will be able to assist you with the process so I may I please kindly suggest we leave as the Baroness is waiting.”

I stand up from the bed, “Fine. How long do we need to travel for? Also did you say armoured carriage?”

“Yes armoured carriage,” the woman says while ushering me out the door, the other security officers are following closely behind, “we need to be protected from the elements.”

I nod my head in understanding, yet it’s another situation where I have been pushed around and given no choice in the matter as we walk down the hallway. The woman’s hands always pushing either of my shoulders to get my steps to hurry, we arrive at the carriage arrival where dozens of coaches are lined up with many more of them leaving as though some mass migration is happening, the countless people are loading goods onto carriages while labourers get off and begin piling goods on.

I’m pushed towards a carriage much larger than all the others, the windows are double set and the entire structure is made of metal. It’s an armoured wagon, even the horses are well protected out the front as the door swings open as we near it.

A narrow space is revealed with two soft, comfortable seats inside yet that’s all, there’s no one else inside including food or drinks.

“Is that it? How long is the trip?”

“9 days.”

“Isn’t there any food and water?”

“We need to stop to feed the horses along the way so you’ll be fed then. If you don’t like it you can catch and prepare your own animals.”

“Can we get some food now? Aren’t those crates filled with food?”

I point to the goods being passed around the carriages behind us, “That’s distribution from the quarterly harvest, it’s for everyone so we cannot touch it.”

“I’m hungry though.”

“So am I but we have to work, so get in the carriage please, we need to leave.”

“Well the first stop better be soon.”

The woman laughs as she pushes me into the carriage forcing me up into it, I scramble to the chair so I’m not dragged along the rough surface before the door slams in my face. I look for a door handle but cannot find any while the windows and everything are sealed tight, I’m given little other option but to sit back in the chair watching the windows. The security sit in their positions atop the vehicle as some lead the horse outside of the carriageway they were located in.

The horse slowly walks down the road as I watch out the window, people are going about their lives in a much more normal fashion compared to before, they no longer have the hustle and bustle in their eyes as they go about their lives carrying groceries, rubbish and other goods to and from their house. The store fronts no longer have their most pristine and glamorous goods as they show some simple goods, one might even call them ordinary items one would even find in the previous realms and planes I’ve been on.

The women are all beautiful in their own ways with no one seemingly over the age of 40 in the entire crowd, each one with silky smooth hair of brown, black, brunette, red, blonde and so many more. Most of the women look early 20s at best with very few younger people around the people, there has been no signs of schools or any sort of learning place.

The carriage slows as it arrives to an open area on either side of us, one side has a field that looks like it’s used for outdoors activities while on the other side is a long road leaning to a gated wall, the wall doesn’t cover everything allowing view of the beautiful buildings behind but that’s not what draws my attention as I spot a carriage like one of the many that were by the carriageway. I look inside of the carriage as we slowly pass by it and meet eyes with the other occupant who I instantly recognise, it’s the brown-haired girl called Veluly. Our eyes meet for a moment where she conveys how scared and afraid of things she is.

I look away as I too do feel like that, yet I clench my fist and return my gaze.

I have this option and it’s probably going to hurt yet it’ll probably end up being better than whatever is in store here, I look at the carriage across the way and gather my energy into my clenched fist and arm.

I punch my glowing arm towards into the carriage around me but instead of hitting it, the space on the carriage shimmers like it’s made of liquid as my arm travels through it

I ready myself and grab onto something, I pull myself through ignoring the painful pressure building up with every passing microsecond the portal is sustained.

My head passes through quickly yet I have no time to react to the noises of my destination as I pull the rest of my body through, the painful sensations have upgraded into stabbing sensations as I feel my flesh being torn apart. I pull upper body followed by my lower body where I take the wine glass I stashed away, a flask comes into existence where I hastily pour myself a drink as my legs are coming through distracting my focus for a moment when the portal closes and one of my feet haven’t gone through yet cutting it off.

Pain courses through the body yet I refocus and look beside me, “I need some of that,” I say while taking a piece of her brown hair and putting it into the wine glass.

I drink the liquid that has the piece of hair in it, the genetic material has made my body shift from the one I acquired when arriving here into one of the young woman beside me, my body becomes smaller while my face becomes rounder, my hair changes into a medium length while my breasts become larger as they press almost spill out of my robe. My foot has healed itself too leaving a large amount of blood on the carriage seating, the pressure that was all over my body has disappeared once I stopped using my power too.

“What’s going… Pseupheus?”

“I had to escape and this was convenient, you’ll pretend to be my twin until I can escape again?”

“Escape? Why did you need to escape? What happened to you at the dinner? Why did they give you a penalty for getting attacked?”

“I really don’t know, they explained nothing to me. Where are you going?”

“Jarlsvorne Acacdemy, are you sure that you can pretend to be my twin?”

“Don’t I look exactly like you?”

Veluly looks me in the eyes, her own green eyes reflected back into her own while she touches my head before measuring our height, “Are you really just like me?”

“Yep so let’s try it, I’ll be able to take you out of there if something comes up didn’t you see what I did?”

“Yeah, how did you do that?”

“Umm, I got it when I arrived on the planet,” I make up hoping she buys it. I used my innate powers to cause a weak place in space connecting to the carriage nearby, I’m not strong enough to use my usual portal method in this world but I can still cause a temporary fold in space.

“Really?,” she smiles while looking at me, “why didn’t I get any powers?”

“You probably did, you just haven’t awakened them yet.”

“Really?” she asks with a wide smile grabbing my hands and squeezing them tightly.

“Probably,” I mutter under my breath as the carriage approaches the gate, “what happened after I left the dinner?”

“Well lots of women came to talk to me and wouldn’t let me eat by myself, I think some of friends of the one that attacked you came over too but they were stopped by the others.”

“Oh did you find out who she was?”

“No, just that she’s related to someone important.”

“Hope it’s not the pope or queen.”

“It can’t be, there’s no way they’d put up with her behaviour but they do have some sway.”

“Yes,” Veluly’s eyes begin to dart about as though she’s nervous, “hope she’s not here.”

“Even if she is, let me deal with her,” I say while patting the young girl on the head. She warps her hands around my waist and squeezes them burying her face into my breasts.

“Thank you,” she says softly while holding the hug.

“I should be thanking you, without you I would be on the run,” I say, she doesn’t respond as she holds the hug, I pat her back softly allowing a quiet moment to come over the carriage with only the sound of the horse hooves heard.

We hold each other for minutes quietly until the carriage begins to slow down and stop, I look up and see we’ve stopped by the gate that’s opening slowly. I turn around and spot the armoured carriage that I was inside still continuing along the main path as though they haven’t noticed me missing yet. Hopefully they won’t notice until they reach the destination but they’ll likely notice soon.

Who knows what will happen then plus there’s the fact I left my foot behind.

The door swings open as we arrive at a carriageway filled with several other groups, the security officer stand there blankly for a moment.

“Lady Veluly…s?”

The brown-haired girl hides behind me so I step in, “Yes, it’s an ability we have.”

“Oh amazing, so is this a cloning ability or a split personality ability?”

“Neither, I don’t know what type it is.”

“We should report back to the Pope then as they’ll want to catalogue the ability.”

“No, I’ll inform them at the academy since it was awoken on the way here. I want to explore more of the ability too, make sure there’s nothing wrong with it before I announce it. Who knows, maybe the ability only lasts a short time.”

“True, I’ll defer to Lady Veluly’s judgement, please come along with me as the entrance try-outs are going on.”

“Try-outs?,” we both ask in unison.

“Yes, just try-outs for new intakes. They run them every year around this time, it just coincided with the summoning ceremony this time.”

We both step outside the carriage and immediately meet with two people standing there, an old woman that actually has grey hair but she has retained her beauty in an agely way while the one standing next to her is much younger with short straight-cut black hair, her expression seems annoyed from her crossed arms and frowning eyebrows. They’re both wearing similar suit-type uniforms that seem similar to the security officer uniforms, much different to the robes that are standard gear around the church with sharp lines and dark colours, the older one speaks first.

A beautiful space filled with shady trees and manicured hedges spread the little light in the space creating a beautiful and old looking space where several buildings made of intricate white and grey bricks and stones with countless vines creeping up bearing fragrant and plentiful flowers all over it.

“There’s two of you? I wasn’t told of that. We have limited spaces and we could only guarantee one, since there’s two of you then one will have to go through normal try-outs,” the old woman speaks as though she is already making accommodations.

“We cannot have both, we should send the other one away, I think Jasper Academy could take them. If that’s not good enough then just send them both. We have to return to the testing place.”

“I brought you out here because I’m training you to take this place over yet it seems like you’re not ready yet…,” the two women wearing uniforms talk to one another as though we aren’t there at all.

“I have been ready for years, you don’t want to let me take control of things on my own terms and show you I can bring about results. If you trusted me enough then you’d let me take Halzdadt under my wing.”

“You know as good as me that if she awakens then we won’t be able to hold her, now stop talking about that here. We need to take these new heroes inside and continue the try-outs,” the older woman says while looking up and down myself and the girl next to me, “you two look identical yet your clothes aren’t. I suspect this isn’t cloning ability.”

The older woman holds eye contact with me, I respond by not breaking eye contact with her either. Neither of us seem willing to break the eye contact with one another until a voice draws our attention causing the woman to break eye contact first.

“Why are you staring? We need to go to try-outs Group C is about to finish,” the young woman looks to the crowd of people in carriages, “If you are here for anyone in Group D, they’re about to begin so hurry up and check in.”

Several women and girls standing around move on from the carriages quickly up the stairs and towards the large buildings further away yet our group seems to not be in a rush standing around next to the carriage as the two women talk.

“Something about them seems different, if the Goddess has blessed us with a new ability then we might survive the upcoming calamity.”

“Don’t talk about that please. 18 of the previous calamity predictions never came true and besides, the summoning of the heroes shows that Goddess Athena is still around.”

The older woman lets out a sigh, “Alright let’s go,” she turns around and begins to walk in the same direction as the other people with her hands behind her back, the security officer returns back to the carriage after saluting us goodbye leaving the younger woman behind gazing at us in a fury.

“Move it, we don’t have time any more. Which one of you is doing the try out?”

I step forward before Veluly can even look at me, “I’ll do it of course.”

“You?,” she looks me up and down with a furious gaze, “is it your first day dressing yourself?,” she says before stepping forward fixing up my robe tying it up tightly, she pulls the two of us along the path when,

“Ah! what… what is all this blood! heroes, heroes are you alright?,” I hear the security officer scream from the carriage now a slight distance away, she comes running up to us in a panic grabbing both of our wrists checking our pulse while looking over our bodies for wounds.

“What are you doing Captain Mitichipi, we have to go to the try outs. I am the coordinator and they cannot even hand out the final results without me there.”

“Ma’am Vice Principal Jalien, sorry, I just…” the security officer pants as her face goes flush red, “I just I just…” she repeats.

“Calm down, what’s this about blood?”

“A large amount of blood, in the carriage. I can’t tell where it’s from though as the heroes both have fine bodies.”

“Perhaps it was just from their ability usage, didn’t you say that it awoke during the travel?”

“Relax, if the heroes are fine then there’s no problem. Just chalk the blood up to something us like unexpected road kill and if they hassle you then tell them to contact me. It might even be better to clean it before you return so they don’t know.”

“Thank you Vice Principal Jalien,” the security officer deeply bows as the Vice Principal pulls us forward again.

I dart my eyes back towards the carriage and notice that there is indeed a large amount of blood on the seating, I can only imagine the amount that was left in the other carriage.

We walk through the shaded trees near the buildings as the Vice Principal speaks, “Ok so try outs are rather simple. You’ll just need to meet a basic fitness and magical baseline. As you’re heroes then you’ll have the fitness and probably the magic too.”

“So why hold the try out? Wouldn’t it just be easier to directly admit me?”

“It wouldn’t be fair to everyone else, we already had to scramble to offer the initial placement so be grateful…,” the younger woman looks at us strangely for a moment then turns around and walks forward in silence.

“We are truly grateful but will it cause problems in the academy with us having the same name?”

“Twins aren’t uncommon so… that’s what we’ll do, you’re twins. You,” the vice principal points to me, “we need a name for you.”

“Why not K–

“We’ll call you Valley.”

“Isn’t that too sim–

“Valley?,” Veluly says beside me, her mouth in a wide as her spirits lift up.

“Sure… I’ll be Valley.”

“Ok so Valley will go to try outs, Veluly will come with me,” the vice principal says as we arrive before a towering structure that doesn’t quite look like a building, it’s far too hollow with countless stone pillars holding up the next layer. A few people are standing around wearing smart uniforms with skirts, a light-blue coloured blouse as they stand around and talk.

The vice principal carries on as we enter the structure in a dusty passageway which is surprisingly cold, a few people greet the vice principal as we walk through the corridors and stop before a set of doors, she looks towards me.

“So just go in there and tell Folfeintein that you’ll also be taking part, you know my name right?”

“Vice Principal Jalien?”

“Yes, they should sort you out if not then just head on down this passage,” she says while pointing down the rest of the way, “we’ll be going now. Come along Veluly, I have a few grand-masters that wish to meet you.”

Veluly looks towards me with misty eyes, “I’ll see you later?”

I nod my head, “Yep.”

I open the door and walk inside letting out a deep breath, a cheering sound resounds muffled through the whole building as I stand beside the door.

“Um, excuse me, this is for the try-outs,” a soft voice speaks nearby.

I look towards the voice and notice the room for the first time, countless women are in the final stages of getting dressed with many of them revealing their bodies. It’s nothing unusual yet strangely my own heart begins to beat heavily, the young woman speaks up again.

“Are you lost?”

“No, I need to see Folfit… Folfeintein?”

“Folfe, someone needs to see you!” the young woman shouts and steps away to finish getting dressed, my eyes dart around the room unsure of where to look where I spot someone walking towards the door.

A tall tanned woman with pointed ears is approaching, “Who said someone needs to see me?,”

The young woman raises her hand, the tanned woman walks over to her and slams her fist beside her head causing the metal to distort, “I said don’t call me that.”

“Soooorrrry,” the young woman says.

The tanned woman punches the young woman again, this time aiming for her head. The young woman twists her legs causing her body to lower before launching a reverse strike towards the tanned woman’s stomach.

The tanned woman brings her elbow down to deflect the blow but it’s too slow as the punch connects for a moment before the tanned woman takes a step back, “You have learnt some.”

“You still have brute strength.”

The two woman laugh with each other as though they’re old friends and pat each other on the back, “still don’t call me that.”

“Fine, there was someone at the door looking for you.”

The tanned woman looks towards me standing at the door awkwardly wondering when I’ll get my chance to interrupt, “You?”

“Yeah, Vice Principal Veil… Jalien said that you could sort me out. I’m a late participant.”

The roar of the crowd is heard again as the she scans my body up and down, “I see well let’s get you ready then.”

She strips off my robe leaving me standing there naked stunned…