SSS Ranked Awakening: All My Skills Are at Level 100

Chapter 614: The Door Between Worlds

The connection opened, and four people arrived in the middle of a room on the far side of a world.

There was no flare, no tear in the air, and nothing that pressed against the isolation Leon had set inside the residence walls. One moment the floor was empty. The next, Seraphine, Ira, Vyra, and Loriel stood upon it in ordinary Moonfall grey and blue, all four motionless while their bodies adjusted to the pressure of a higher world.

Seraphine moved first.

She crossed the room without a word and caught him by the shoulders. Her hands went immediately to the left one, tracing the place where a chain had torn through it and a spear had later struck the same wound before Leon twisted the weapon away with Space.

”It healed,” Leon said.

”I am checking whether it healed properly.”

Her thumb moved along the joint and across his collarbone. Then she turned his face toward the lamp and studied his eyes.

”You have lost weight.”

”I have been eating noodles.”

”That explains it.”

Her composure lasted one breath longer. Then she pulled him against her and held on hard enough to make his ribs complain.

”Nearly two weeks,” she said into his shoulder.

”Outside,” Leon reminded her. Time had passed faster in the dimensional world. The wait had felt longer for them than it had for him.

”That does not improve your position.”

”I didn’t think it would.”

Ira came up on his other side, inspected his arms, and began counting.

”Two,” she said. ”More than I expected. Sera, he kept both of them.”

”Ira.”

”I am being supportive.”

She caught the back of Leon’s neck and kissed him without ceremony. The kiss was hard, but the hand that remained at his nape trembled once before becoming still.

”You entered a garden with four Void Immortals,” she said quietly. ”Alone.”

”They weren’t a problem.”

”That is the part I hate. You say it as if that makes listening easier.”

Vyra had not moved from where she arrived. Her arms were folded, her chin raised, and her posture contained an argument she had been refining since they crossed.

Her gaze travelled over Leon once, lingering on the healed shoulder before returning to his face.

”You survived,” she said.

”I said I would.”

”You say many things with unreasonable confidence.” A fraction of the tension left her shoulders. ”Good. I had no desire to explain to my people that I followed a man into another world only for him to die before establishing our position in it.”

”Your concern is touching.”

”It is practical. Do not make it sentimental.” She glanced at Seraphine and Ira, then added, ”Keeping us inside was the correct decision. I disliked it. Those statements do not conflict.”

That was as close as Vyra came to admitting how carefully she had followed every report.

Loriel had remained a few steps away, watching Seraphine and Ira claim Leon’s attention. When the space around him finally opened, she started forward, hesitated, and then gathered enough courage to cross it.

She wrapped both arms around him.

The embrace was gentler than Seraphine’s and far less confident than Ira’s kiss, but it lasted long enough to make her intention unmistakable. Leon returned it, feeling her relax before she remembered the other women were watching.

Loriel released him quickly, her face turning pink.

”I missed you,” she said.

Ira’s smile widened. Loriel saw it and immediately crouched beside the garden door, pressing one palm to the threshold as though that had always been her destination.

”There is water under this building,” she announced.

”Is there?” Ira asked innocently.

”It is moving, and it is carrying something. The whole headland sits on a spiritual vein, and someone built the compound directly over it.” Loriel kept her attention firmly on the stone. ”It is extremely interesting.”

”I am sure it suddenly is,” Seraphine said.

They gathered around the low table, and Leon explained where they were.

This was only a reception compound outside Jade Moon Palace. Qingyue’s recommendation had bought him one night and one examination. At the first mark after dawn, three artifacts would measure his bone age, cultivation, and spiritual root. The results would decide whether the Palace treated him as a candidate, a curiosity, or a threat.

”If it goes well?” Seraphine asked.

”I gain status and a legitimate place here. Eventually, that gives me room to introduce four attendants I met in a frontier city, supported by real papers and a story that survives questions.”

”And if we are discovered tonight?”

”A stranger with an unverifiable history turns out to be hiding four foreigners inside a restricted compound. Nothing I say afterward will matter.”

Seraphine disliked the answer, but she accepted it. She still tried once to find a position from which she might remain near the examination hall.

”There is no near,” Leon said. ”The gate is watched and departures are counted.”

”Do not apologize for being correct. It is irritating enough already.”

”What do we need to know if the examination goes badly?” Ira asked.

That was useful, so Leon gave her a real answer: the three rings in the courtyard formation, the route between the residence and the north hall, the official controlling the outer ledger, and which of Yanning’s eleven contacts would move people without asking questions. Ira repeated the important parts once and remembered all of them.

Loriel waited until they finished.

”Does the Palace have a medicine court?”

”Certainly.”

”A living plant archive?”

”If I am accepted, I will find out what access exists.” Leon pointed at her. ”I will not ask about ferns.”

”I said nothing about ferns.”

”Your face did.”

They talked long after the practical matters ended. Leon told them about the bones stripped clean in the Desolation, the starving man who had pulled a rusted knife because any stranger approaching him meant danger, and Qingyue cutting the Moonless mark from his shadow. He told them how she had refused to interfere openly in the Shen estate because her presence would have exposed the family, and how Shen Yuanhe had risked his name and fortune to give Leon a lawful identity.

”The merchant’s signature mattered more than the three men you killed,” Seraphine said.

”Much more.”

Vyra asked about Qingyue.

”She is a Late Earth Immortal,” Leon said. ”Three named realms above me, with two complete realms between us. She is disciplined, direct, and willing to risk her standing rather than leave something important in a frontier city.”

”I want to dislike her,” Vyra said.

”You would get along.”

”That is what I am afraid of.”

The women had adjusted during their subjective time inside the dimensional world. None of them would collapse merely by walking through a street now, but their power still circulated in patterns no local cultivator would recognize. They had no meridians or spiritual roots.

”We would fail tomorrow’s examination quickly,” Ira said.

”Which is why none of you will take it.”

The lamps burned lower. The conversation slowed. Eventually, Leon noticed Seraphine had remained at his side for more than an hour and no longer pretended it was accidental.

Ira noticed him noticing and rested her chin on her hand with open amusement.

Vyra set down her cup.

”Loriel. We should leave.”

”Yes.” Loriel looked from Seraphine to Ira, understood immediately, and turned red again. ”The fern still needs its evening inspection.”

”Of course it does,” Ira said.

They said their goodbyes properly. Vyra stopped beside the connection and looked back at Leon.

”Pass the examination. We did not remain confined for this long so you could fail at paperwork.”

”I will try to justify your sacrifice.”

”See that you do.”

Loriel lingered after Vyra crossed. Her eyes moved briefly toward Seraphine standing close to Leon, then toward Ira’s openly amused expression.

”First mark after dawn,” she reminded him, suddenly unable to look at any of them for long. ”Do not be late.”

”I won’t.”

”You say that, and then someone discovers a water vein.”

They disappeared. Leon sealed the connection, and the room became very quiet.

Seraphine stood close enough that he could feel her warmth. Ira remained beside the table, watching them both.

”Now,” Ira said, ”we can stop pretending this is still a strategy meeting.”

Ira licked her lips. Seraphine pressed against Leon’s chest, her breasts warm against him as her arms circled his waist.