Hey guys, just gonna say but in my last chapters, I forgot about Akinobu, Rei, and Shigehito, so sorry if you noticed that. I totally forgot until I reread the fifth volume. I'm just gonna make it so that they stayed in the hotel and were about to leave until Jinwoo picks the class up. As for Ayaka, she's somewhere, I'll tell you that. Anyways, enjoy the story!

Chapter 9

A column of fire hit Takeshi head on, smoke covering his whole being.

"So annoying," she said, frowning, as if she'd just killed a mosquito. "Alright, everyone, if you don't want to die, listen to me."

"I told you, they are under our protection."

The smoke revealed Takeshi in a gold-colored barrier.

"Woah, what the hell?"

"An actual superhuman battle?"

Sion rolled her eyes. "Perhaps I should kill some of the students then."

She straightened her hands and swiped the air in a swift chopping motion.

BAM!

Against her expectation, instead of half the class dying, the general area of the students glowed a translucent golden yellow.

"I guess I should have put more into it or changed space to get through it."

Takeshi caught wind of her muttering and instantly flew into action.

She can shoot invisible energy, teleport, blast out fire, and control space too!? Takeshi thought as he swung his fist towards her. This world's too broken!

He punched the woman, but to his surprise, she didn't budge a bit.

"How weak," she said. "I have countless magic barriers around me. I don't think you can break even two."

With that, she opened her palm right at his abdomen. He couldn't move out of the way, or the students would take it, and who knows how she might've reconfigured her attack? So, he took it instead.

BWOOSH!

Splat!

A ten centimeter hole appeared in the middle of his abdomen, blood splattering, chips of bone and bits of intestines scattered about! Students hit by the blood screamed, and the ones who had the bits of intestine land next his or her desk screamed even louder.

"AHHHH!"

"KYAAA!?"

"HELP US!"

"WE'RE GOING TO DIE!"

"UGH!" the Vessel gurgled as he collapsed on his knees. He then laid on the ground, and stopped moving.

Sion stared at the lifeless body. "Hm, how heroic," she commented before moving on. "Huh, it seems that your memory was tampered with. I don't sense the Battle Song in you either."

Raising her palms, she said, "I guess I'll have to re-install–"

"Reinforce."

Gold flakes appeared on Takeshi's dying body, and with his draining strength he stood up as a hulking, golden-armored man. Blood seeped in between the gaps around the torso and mouth area, but he nevertheless stood his ground.

And quickly, he closed the short distance between them and slammed his fist into Sion's side. This sent her flying some distance away, as well as crumpling Takeshi's hand. He held his hand in agony, blood pooling under him, breathing heavily.

"Mister, who are you?" a student asked.

"Not now," he replied. "Reinforcement is– gasp!"

A hand shot out from his pectoral area, more blood gushing forth from the hole.

"Geez, I thought this would be less of a task. Well, I guess I should start from the beginning," Sion calmly said, appearing right behind him.

With no concern that she was lifting an almost 240 pound man in one hand, she threw him off to the side, at least hundred of meters off.

"Well," she continued turning to the students, her calmness being the most eerie part about her.

"I guess I'll have to start from the bottom. What I just did to him will happen to you if you do something that annoys me, alright?" She smiled.

All the students nodded in fear.

"Alright, I'll make it quick. You were summoned to this world to become Sage Candidates. Sages protect this world from many dangers. However, when the number falls short, we will summon Sage Candidates. You can do this all together, go separately, or separate into clans. The only condition is that you'll have to produce a Sage.

And, before you ask, I will turn you into livestock for energy use if you fail. Anyways, let me install the System…"

She snapped her palms, facing the student. The student flinched, some even covered their faces. When the panic settled, everyone noticed that they were glowing.

"Woah."

"What's… happening?"

"I have installed Battle Song version inside of you. The color will differ between powers. The brighter the color, the stronger. Remember who's stronger than you. Oh, and there's a boot-up process, so please be patient."

"Woah, I can see a logo."

"Me too!"

Tomochika was puzzled. Everyone was saying they could see a logo but she couldn't.

"Do you see anything, Mikochi?" she whispered.

'"Yeah," Romiko, the short-haired girl sitting next to her, replied. "It says 'Status'."

"Really?" Tomochika.

Jinah also couldn't see anything… she suddenly got a twinge of anxiety, as if she were remembering something bad. A sense of deja-vu swirled around her mind, as if her consciousness was about to pinpoint the cause but missed, every single time. This sentiment was not specific to her, however.

"Huh? This scene… it feels familiar."

"Yeah, I feel like I've seen this screen before."

"Ah, and for those who don't see anything, you're out of luck," Sion said, as if she caught something that was about to slip her mind.

WORLD: EARTH

LOCATION: X POLICE DEPARTMENT, KOREA

Vrrr! Vrrr!

Jinwoo felt a vibration on his pocket where his phone was. He looked around his office and dug out his phone. It was a quiet day today, activity levels low in the department.

He looked at the screen: Unknown

He put the phone to his ear: "Hello?"

"Shadow Monarch," spoke a male voice on the other end, urgently, "come quick! The same class, they're gone!"

Jinwoo's eyes widened.

"Do you know where?"

"The energy signature feels the same as last time."

"When?" Jinwoo rushed to Woo Jinchul's office.

"... five minutes ago."

Jinwoo nearly crushed the phone in his hand, but he managed to restrain himself. 5 minutes… how long was it there? It was unpredictable, the fluctuations of time in each world differing every time it was measured. 5 minutes could be a day, or a year.

"I'll come immediately."

It should be fine, right? The day when Jinah returned home, he put a bracelet-like artifact on the bag, a bracelet that would help entangle time if she were ever summoned elsewhere again. It was a paranoia for him at the time, but a reality now.

If she still had it, then only five minutes would have passed there also.

He knocked, then opened the door to Jinchul's office when Jinchul said to come in.

"Chief!" Jinwoo nearly shouted.

"Yes, Mr. Sung?" Jinchul asked in a mildly surprised expression. Though he did seem that way on the inside, seeing Jinwoo panic this way, a second time since yesterday did cause a dark feeling to stir inside of him. Something was very wrong. Very wrong on a cosmic scale.

"Chief, my sister…" Jinwoo calmed himself. "She was taken, again. I need permission to take a leave today."

Jinchul, eyes wide, quickly stood up from his chair, the chair falling over from the force it was subjected to.

"Granted," said the head of police. "Hurry!"

The head of police was told of Jinwoo's side job some time ago, half a decade after Jinwoo got the police job, by the man himself. He knew the severity of the situation at hand. Especially when the rate of survival for an abductee was less than 30%, even less the second time.

No more words, no more questions needed to be exchanged. Whether it was the same world or not, time was of the essence. He could ask later.

Jinwoo changed instantly to his casual long coat outfit, and teleported, leaving behind a mist as black as space, which dissipated as soot.

Jinchul leaned back on his chair, remembering a conversation between him and Jinwoo on the situation yesterday. That world, Jinwoo had said, was dangerous. The rulers were as powerful, possibly even more powerful, than Jinwoo himself.

The head of police could only pray for Jinwoo's luck.

LOCATION: X HIGH SCHOOL

The sunlit shadows of desks and chairs swirled, like a shadows grew darker and darker, and the two-dimensional planes started expanding, becoming a spout of spinning void. As quickly as it'd appeared, it dissipated, revealing a very upset Jinwoo.

He looked around and saw the classroom. Except, it was bare of any desks and chairs. A broken piece of chalk laid broken on the floor, on where the podium was supposed to be.

"Welcome, Shadow Monarch," greeted a Ruler's Vessel. The other next to him bowed also.

"Have you heard from Takeshi?" Jinwoo said, cutting straight to the issue.

"He sent us a transmission as soon as he felt the space around him shift," explained Smith. "It came to us seconds before."

"But why five minutes?"

"It is my theory that the warping of space and time delayed the transmission."

"Alright. Do we have any more teleportation stones?"

"Readied. Sir, have you contacted your shadows?"

"I can't contact them over there…"

"No, but the bracelet. Have you checked that it was actually in her bag?"

Jinwoo froze. He had put ten of his shadows to guard Jinah, High Orcs and beings on par with and surpassing them. And also one of Ashborn's original servants. So they should be protecting her even there. But as for the bracelet, he hadn't checked whether she had it.

"Scaly!" he called. A green point popped into existence and swirled into a ball of mist before turning into a lizard, standing to his stomach on four feet, and taking up half the empty classroom in length. Its most striking feature were its red eyes, which could paralyze victims with a look when it so desired.

"Go to Jinah's home, and see if she took the bracelet out of the bag!"

A panic could be felt within the stern voice of command, a fear penetrating from the cold facade.

The green creature seemed to turn even more blurry as it strode out of the door, turning into a spectre, leaving behind quickly disappearing trails of green mist.

"How did you seal this room?" Jinwoo asked. "The students of the grade would still notice an empty classroom, even when it's sealed in a dimensional gap."

"We told the principal to announce that the classroom was off-limits, and that the class they had for it was replaced with free studying. We will erase all of this from their minds after we accomplish our mission." The other vessel explained all this.

My Liege, the shadow called out, the bracelet is still in her room.

SHIT!

"Smith, the teleportation stone."

"Here," Smith handed to Jinwoo two green, glowing stones, a rune carved on it.

Without a word, Jinwoo applied mana into it and left the plane of that world in a blur of light.

WORLD: OTHERWORLD

LOCATION: HOTEL (HANABUSA)

Jinwoo reappeared in front of a tall building, comparable to a Marriott hotel, a weird sight to see in another world like this. From an outside perspective, people saw a blur of light dissipate, with nothing to show for it, in the middle of the street. Right now, it is important to not draw attention.

He called upon his shadows and ordered them to find the same people as before.

The shadows danced between the shades of people and objects, through which they glided across the two dimensional plane with speed the eye wouldn't be able to track.

All Jinwoo needed to do was wait.

Five minutes… when they'd come back last time, only two minutes had elapsed in his world.

My liege, called out a shadow, I have found your sister.

Jinwoo looked through the shadow's eyes and saw her. She was in a hut surrounded by trees, along with another girl, Tomochika.

My liege, called out another shadow, I have found Ayaka.

Jinwoo, without hesitation, moved to Jinah first.

Yeah... it's been a long time. I haven't being doing too well for the past months, coupled with procrastination. Sorry for the delay, but for some news: I've finished all of Instant Death, so that's good. But I don't feel the need to read Ragnorak since this takes place when Jinwoo was MUCH weaker than he is in Ragnorak. Anyways, I will be uploading a new one next week, a little over it at the latest. Anyways, hope you've had wonderful day, and see you next time!