The woman went down the tree and entered the city followed by Aster and the girls, since the barrier couldn’t move, they were only protected by the paragon body, but apparently there was no need for it, since the self-proclaimed woman from the heavenly rose clan didn’t try anything.

Inside of the city the guards had already finished dealing with the corrupted beasts, Sofia took her father to the mansion of the city lord for treatment, so Eric was supervising the rest of the operation, but his attention was immediately drawn by the Aster returning to the city… with a new girl.

“That’s my brother for you… but that woman looks weird as if she wasn’t really here”, he thought.

Eric approached Aster unaware of the potentially dangerous person that was walking next to him.

“Brother you only left for a couple of minutes, who is the new addition to the team hahaha”.

Aster had a weird expression on his face.

“Well, she is the nether vine… apparently the translation was incorrect, she told us she is from the heavenly rose clan, and she acceded to explain things from her point of view so we need a place to have a nice conversation”.

…

Eric froze in the spot.

“Brother… sometimes I wonder if you have a thing for surprising others, sigh whatever there is a mansion which was originally designated for me but I never used it, so you can go there, I will stay to finish the task the city lord gave me, if you need reinforces just say the word”.

The woman laughed.

“Those with the barbarian king body constitution are always quite frank, I will give you that”.

Eric was in awe.

“Another one that could tell with just one look that I have a special body constitution, no one around you can be normal right brother?”

Aster smiled.

“Well, even in her spiritual form which has weakened over the years… she is still probably a genesis manifestation cultivator, so it’s only normal for her to have quite sharp eyes”.

Eric guided them to the mansion the city lord originally gave him to leave before returning to supervise the guards, the woman entered followed by Aster and the girls, the inside of the mansion was quite simple and they weren’t here to play around to they just sat in a table.

The set was the same as before, Alice and Sarina at Aster’s sides and Kana on his lap, the woman sat in front of them and after a couple of seconds she took the initiative to present herself.

“As the host shouldn’t you offer this queen a cup of tea? You already know I’m in my spiritual form so the slightest exposition to that golden light yours will be lethal”.

Aster sighed.

“One can never be too cautious, but I guess you are right, unfortunately I’m not too fond of tea… but I have something decent here”, he said as he took out a white bottle and some small cups from his spatial ring, Aster poured the content of the bottle on all the cups.

Aster gave everyone a cup, even Kana.

“This is a soft drink of my creation, I haven’t named it yet but I’m quite proud of it, give it a try”.

The woman was the first one drink it, the piqued was basically a mix of some fruits juices and spirit energy in a liquid form which he refined with Rigel’s flame, the result was a refreshing drink.

“Mm not bad, the ingredients aren’t too special but the alchemic flame that was used to refine it, is quite something else, this fresh soothing feeling is quite comfortable”, said the woman.

“Since you have shown some proper etiquette, let me present myself, as I told you before I come from the Heavenly Rose clan, this queen’s name is Eris Lyselle and I’m not whatever others might have told you”.

While Aster drank the content of his cup, the first one to spoke was Sarina.

“How can you say that you aren’t the enemy, when you gave the second king the knowledge to commit genocide just to open a gate out of this galaxy!!!”.

Eris shook her head.

“If I was guilty of that then how come that woman from the Ash Nether clan didn’t notice it… I bet that in that human’s story she painted herself to be the “protector” or something like that, the human was limited to the royal castle but just like me, that woman could have used her spirit form to destroy those killing arrays”.

Aster frowned his eyebrows.

“Ash nether clan? In Aurelian’s story the other one called herself the “cosmos tree”, so are you trying to tell us he lied?”.

Eris shrugged.

“Not really, the Ash nether clan is known for deceiving others, so that woman must have lied to the human all the time… let me tell you what truly happened and then you can judge whether you believe me or not”.

“Cosmos tree is the name of the place from where I and that other woman come, I won’t enter into too much details about that, let’s just say my family and hers have been fighting for quite some time, in our last battle we both were dragged by a space rift and ended in a lower plane”.

“Of course, we didn’t care about that and continued with our fight, our strengths at that point were the same so we tied every time, until we realized we couldn’t absorb the spirit energy of this place to replenish ours… in a last try to finish the other we both got sealed away, but before that I finally got an advantage over her, in the last moment I managed to pierce her chest with my sword”.

“After that we entered a semi death state, the remaining energy of our battle gave birth to many nature treasures, which attracted those two… let me guess in the story you know it says I possessed the one that found the object on which I was sealed?”.

Seeing the surprised expression in Aster’s face, Eris laughed.

“Those spineless people from the Ash nether clan like to invert black and white, when that guy tried to forcefully absorb my power the backslash killed him, humph how can a mere heavenly transformation mortal withstand the Divine spark of this queen”.

“It’s easy to understand what happened after that, that despicable woman tricked the other human to make him think I killed his friend and after weakening for do many years, her power combined with the one of him, forced me to flee… I was the one that created an artificial stellar boundary to isolate this place”.

“I used too much energy on that so I hid my body and went to sleep for some centuries, when I woke up there were two civilizations in war… both manipulated by that woman, the second king was her puppet, from the shadows I witnessed how she disposed of him after that portal was created, those arrays were designed to steal life force from other living beings, but most of it was absorbed by her”.

“Still how can her half assed divine rune knowledge compare to mine, I changed the conditions of the portal to only allow others to enter but no one to leave, and that was the last time I interfered”.

…

After a moment of silence Eris drank the rest of the liquid on her cup and extended her arm, Aster poured more of it on her cup which made her smiled.

“So, what do you think? Am I telling the truth, or is it just another made up story?”.

Aster smiled.

“If you were the one that created the barrier that isolates this galaxy, then why can’t you leave this place?”.

Eris frowned her eyebrows.

“I can open a small gate if I want to, but it will consume some of my reserve spirit energy, besides unless you are protected by a high-level space ship or a heavenly conqueror… then the travel won’t be a pleasurable one and if I leave then the barrier will disappear, and the consequences for this lower plane will be horrible”.

Alice put on a cunning smile.

“We meet the requirements, help us bring someone from the outside and then we will believe what you tell us”.

Aster nodded.

“I can help you recover the spirit energy you use to create the gate, so there are no reasons for you to refuse… that is if you are telling the truth of course”.

Eris laughed.

“A leap of faith huh? Fine, that woman has fallen so low that she made a deal with the corrupted, right now they are looking for my body to destroy it, so I don’t have time to lose… but how can I trust that the one that will come won’t try to enslave me, humans aren’t exactly trustable after all?”.

“Because she is my mother and she will never do anything that I don’t like, I can give you my word that if you are my ally then all my family is your ally”, said Aster with a serious face.

Eris narrowed her eyes, the word family wasn’t exactly her favorite due to a variety of reasons, but looking at the two women and the little girl who seemed to have the resolution to follow Aster to the depths of hell if needed made her mentally sigh.

“You haven’t told me your name kid… if we are going to fight alongside, tell this queen your name”.

Aster patted Kana’s head and she stood from his lap followed by Alice, Sarina and lastly him.

“My surname is Drage, I’m Aster Drage”, he said as he extended his arm to offer a handshake.

Eris looked a bit confused, but she accepted the handshake.

“With the Cosmos Tree as witness I will never betray those who help me, the only thing I ask in return is to reciprocity in this oath… do you accept it”.

Aster nodded and he felt a weird sensation on his body, it was different than a soul oath but the result was the same, a contract between two people, in this case Eris and him.

Eris felt the contract succeeding and she let out a sigh of relief, in her birthplace the Cosmos Tree is the guardian deity, it punishes those who lie but grants its protection to those who are worthy, she as the young lady of her family can use this contract only once in her lifetime, but even she wasn’t aware about the big changes that the decision she made today will bring to her future… or if they would be good or bad.