Chapter 6 - Meet

After some waiting, metal clanking noises were heard outside the building. A knight, a woman in her twenties with long blond braids and blue eyes and also a classy mirror floating beside the woman entered the open room.

"What's with the fake knight?" Peach turned to the mirror and said in a sarcastic tone.

"It scares the monsters away, but how'd you know it was fake?" Illy asked.

"It has no chance of it hurting us. It's an illusion." Peach explained.

"You're right Devil, you've always had useful eyes." Illy noted. "Let's let our companions speak for a bit." Illy added.

"I go by Peach in this lifetime, but I agree. Besides I have some things I'd like to talk with you about as well." Peach explained. 

The fake knight vanished in an instant.

Olexia started hastily walking towards Jinny, and still being at least ten steps from Jinny, Olexia started talking. "Hey, Jinny right? My name's Olexia, glad to meet you!" She said with a cheerful smile. Olexia extended her hand for a handshake still around five steps away from Jinny.

"Glad to meet you as well, I like your name." Jinny returned the smile although hers would be a bit more awkward. She took a few steps forward extending her hand for a handshake.

Olexia took Jinny's hand, shaking it with excitement. "Yours is also great! Honestly meeting another human feels nice, even if we've been in this cursed world for only around 5 hours." Olexia exclaimed.

"Yeah, I guess you're right, it is nice meeting you Olexia... You know when I think about it is kind of weird how every human here has died once." Jinny said, slightly weirded out by thinking about it.

Olexia let go of Jinny's hand. "When you put it like that it does sound kinda weird... But at least we're getting a second chance at living, so I don't find it so weird that we've 'died' once." Olexia replied, scratching her head. "So ignoring the fact that we've died, what are your interests?" 

"Oh, I-" Jinny's mind went blank at that question. What were her interests? For the last few years of her life, all she would think about is getting rid of that damn cancer that was stopping her from doing anything she wanted to. "I guess I don't really have any interests..." Jinny mumbled quietly.

"Oh? Why's that?" Olexia asked with concern.

"It's something that's got to do with my death... I don't wanna talk about it." Jinny added.

"I understand, I won't push you to talk about it. So what happened before you got here? Anything interesting happened with you and your god?" Olexia asked.

***

"So what is it you wanted to talk about 'Peach'?" Illy asked Peach.

"I wanted to talk to you about the capabilities of our companions. Is Jinny any good?" Peach asked.

"My mistress is a fast learner and she's quite agile too, I decided to teach her the basics of the sword and she grasped them quickly. She has a lot of potential." Illy explained, happy she's got Jinny as her companion. "What about Olexia?"

"Olexia is... well, quick thinking. It's not that she's bad it's just that her physical capabilities are just a bit too low for my normal standards. I managed to teach her the basics of mana, and to my surprise, the density of her mana sparks is high. She managed to output a few sparks and in just half a minute a large sphere of mana was formed around them." Peach explained.

"So she'll be proficient in magic! That's great! Why are you even complaining?" Illy asked confused.

"I'm not sure, maybe my standards are just high. Ignoring that have you seen the top one on the leaderboard? Not only is that kid being accompanied by the God of Time his physical strength is actually crazy..." Peach said annoyed at a simple 'entertainer'.

"I did take a look at him, yes he's pretty strong but only strength can only take him so far. For all we know he might have no proficiency in mana." Illy said reassuringly.

"You're right, putting that aside what are we going to do for this collab? We set up a meeting but I don't have a plan." Peach asked disappointed in himself.

"I've already got it planned, here's what we do..."

***

"You learned how to use mana?! That's so cool!" Jinny yelled out with excitement 

"Yeah that's what I thought while using it but sadly I can barely control it yet..." Olexia said quietly with disappointment looking at the ground.

"Hey cheer up, I'm sure we'll be able to become good 'entertainers'." Jinny replied in a sarcastic tone.

Olexia giggled. "Yeah yeah, of course-"

A sound was heard from where Peach and Illy were talking, it sounded both like a demonic screech and an angelic bell.

Olexia and Jinny both turned their attention to where the sound came from.

It was a swirling portal, with four colours swirling around, orange, a dark purple around the edges of the portal and white and black swirling in the middle.

"What the- a portal?" Olexia said confused.

"Mistress, and dear Olexia, we want you to go through this portal. A challenge is waiting for you on the other side of it." Illy explained.

"Yeah, what she said." Peach added.

"'Dear Olexia'? Why don't you talk to me like that Peach?" Olexia asked as if she was picking a fight with the demon.

"Shut up... and just go through the portal." Peach replied in an annoyed tone.

"A challenge? Will we be fine?" Jinny asked.

"You'll be fine I promise." Illy reassured Jinny.

"Well if she said it's fine then it must be fine. Probably just something to test us again." Olexia explained as she started walking towards the portal.

Jinny stood still for a few seconds processing what just happened. `How did these two even create this portal? Just how much power do these beings have?`

"Wait hold on, Illy how'd you even make this portal? Can you explain?" Jinny asked.

Olexia was now just a few steps away from entering the portal, but she stopped to hear the god's answer. 

"We'll explain everything when you two go through the portal." Illy explained.

Olexia continued to walk towards the portal.

"Olexia wait for me!" Jinny yelled out, starting to run towards the portal.

Olexia walked through the portal and shortly after Jinny ran through it. Peach and Illy vanished and shortly after the portal did too.

On the other side of the portal just ask Olexia walked out, Jinny ran straight towards Olexia, both tripping and falling down.

The floor was made out of limestone, as they looked around they seemed to be in a large colosseum and outside it nothing but space and many multicoloured stars.

"Welcome to the 'Chaos Conclave' illusion and probability edition." Both Peach and Illy exclaimed at the same time. They were nowhere to be seen but their voices echoed throughout the Colosseum.