"I never had to leave the country!" Matthew defended himself while the girls looked oddly at him.

"We have been to hell." Ffyr corrected Matthew.

"That’s not what I meant, Ffyr." Matthew facepalmed himself.

"What is this passport thing?" Ffyr asked, looking at Helen’s closely.

"It’s a document that allows you to travel to other countries." Tina explained patiently.

"Why do you need documents?" Ffyr asked, confused.

"Because other countries don’t want just anyone going in." Helen replied with a smile.

"You primes are also so full of rules." Ffyr sighed as if she was tired.

"Anyway." Tina brought attention to herself. "Ffyr is a familiar, she doesn’t need a passport, but you do." She turned to Matthew.

"Can’t I just sneak by?" He asked, not wanting to wait.

"You’re welcome to try, but I really don’t want to meet you in prison." Tina shrugged. "Security is tight."

"Let me ask my dad." Mia said, taking her phone and calling her father.

"Her father?" Matt asked.

"Her father was appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs while you were away." Erin explained.

Mia returned, skipping with a smile.

"Daddy is bringing my passport and he said he’s going to pull some strings for you." She told Matthew.

"Thank you." Matthew smiled, relieved.

He then texted his family saying that he would be going to Faralynn’s planet and he would stay there for a while. He didn’t mention anything about the war.

"You barely arrived, Jerk!" Sarah texted him back. "But I understand."

"Have fun, son. Come back soon." His father simply said.

"Take care, my baby. Tell Lynn that we love her and are waiting for both of you to have dinner together." His mother wrote.

It took about 15 minutes for Mia’s father to arrive. He was a tall skinny man with the same blue eyes and blond hair as his daughter. He was wearing a dark blue suit with a red tie and a white shirt.

"I finally get to know you." He said, shaking Matthew’s hand and then greeting the others. "Thank you very much for what you did for my daughter."

"It was really nothing much. She’d do the same for me." Matthew said with a nervous laugh.

"You bet she would." Mia’s father said, looking at her knowingly.

As a Minister, Mia’s father had diplomatic immunity and certain prerogatives. Such as skipping the line to enter Nuilynn and avoiding border control.

He took all of them to the other side of the portal with just a quick chat with Nuilynn’s authorities. He was a charismatic man with an easy smile and a silver tongue.

"You know I can’t help you all here." Mia’s father said while hugging his daughter goodbye. "Please be careful."

"I will daddy." Mia said, hugging him back.

"Take care of my daughter." Mia’s father said to all of them, but looking at Matthew which made Mia blush. "Good luck." He said before going away.

The gate complex on Nuilynn’s side was as huge as it was on Earth’s side. But, once they were out, it became clear they were on another planet. The sky was cyan, instead of Earth’s blue and the sun had a different shade of yellow, closer to red. The plants were green, but the shades of green were off. All of them had seen those plants before in the Laugraan campus, but seeing them growing as a forest was impressive.

Nuilynn’s gravity was not much different than Earth’s, only about 1% weaker. It had a single moon, but it was covered in ice, making it blue in the night sky. According to astronomical calculations, Nuilynn was located 60 thousand light years away from Earth, still inside the Milky Way.

The city they arrived in was called Terra-Dakcif, literally meaning Earth Gate City. It had many modern buildings around and some few sky scrappers, but most of the city consisted of buildings made of living wood, much similar to the classrooms in Laufgrann academy.

The roads were paved with cobblestone and few cars circled around. Most of the traffic consisted of horsedrawn carriages.

The whole planet was at a medieval state of technology when the gate to Earth opened. Now, very slowly, the elves were adapting to the new technology. However, as elves didn’t age, they tended to do things very slowly. Very few things required haste from an elf. One of them being war.

The outskirts of the city were packed with people coming and going. Troops were gathering wearing plate armor and holding pikes. More at the distance, they could see cavalry running in circles training charges.

The medieval warfare contrasted sharply with the few tanks and helicopters parked there.

"You don’t need to worry, kids." The elven cab driver said while driving them. "The battle will be far away from here. It’s a civil war in the Laufgraan duchy, the other provinces most likely won’t be affected." He explained.

"We know." Matthew said while fidgeting with his necklace where Ffyr was resting inside.

"We’re going to the Laufgraan duchy." Erin said and looked at her watch.

"Oh." The cab driver said, stopping the car at a train station. "I didn’t realize. You all look like tourists, not mercenaries."

"We’re neither." Mia said getting out of Helen’s lap onto the street.

"We came to help a friend." Erin explained to the cab driver while paying him with a Mannium bill. "You take these, don’t you?"

"I do, but you better exchange it before going further into the country. There are places that still use only old currency." He warned them. "Good luck to you all. Hope to see you back in one piece." He said before driving the cab away.

"The trains to Laufgraan stopped running." Tina said after trying to get some tickets while Erin and Helen were exchanging their Mannium into the local currency, gold, silver and bronze pieces.

"Already?" Erin asked, coming back from the exchange booth.

"How do we get there, then?" Matthew asked.

"We go to the Luthan Shire." Erin said, opening a map on her cellphone. "From there, we can go to Laufgraan by foot or rent a car or chariot."

The train was modern, a bullet train you’d see anywhere on earth. But the scenery outside was utterly medieval. Farms with peasants working still with scythes and forks, small villages made of wood and stone and many long patches of untamed wild.

Elves lived very long lives, but reproduced very little. Female elves weren’t very fertile and most elven couples had only a single child every 100 years. This meant that the elven population in Nuilynn barely reached 1 billion on a planet almost as big as Earth.

Luthan was a small city that grew around the train station. The count of the shire was neutral in the war happening in his neighboring province and decided not to intervene in any way.

This led the group not being able to hire any means of transportation to get to the Laufgraan duchy.

There was no cellphone reception there, the network was just in its inception and only worked near Terra-Dakcif. Therefore, they didn’t have a way to communicate with Faralynn about their coming.

While walking to their destination, Matthew approached Mia.

"Are you alright?" He asked.

"Yeah, why?" She replied.

"I was just worried." He explained.

Mia chuckled and blushed. She felt a bit flattered for his worrying, but also a bit offended. He still saw her the same way he did 2 years ago, just a damsel in distress to be saved.

"You don’t need to worry, Matt." Helen said, tapping his shoulder with a knowing smirk.

"Mia was the one of us who put in the most effort in the past years." Tina added.

"I’m level 25 now." Mia smiled at him with a hint of anger in her voice.

"Really?!" Matthew was surprised and oblivious.

"Yeah." Mia said, rolling her eyes.

"How’s your build?" Despite all he’s been through, Matthew was still interested in builds and class synergy.

"I’m a pure Luxomancer. I’m getting some Wizard levels to go Tautomancer now." She explained.

"Light magic is so cool. I fought alongside an angel that would create weapons made of holy light..." Matthew started to tell them the tale of his battle against Vine and how Mitzrael used his skills.

In the middle of his tale, he suddenly stopped. All the girls looked at him confused, but then Matthew drew Aym’s blade from his inventory and cut an arrow in midair, making it fall on the ground burning. He was warned by his Sixth Sense skill, since he didn’t detect anyone with his Sense Others.

"We’re under attack!" Matthew said as they all gathered in a circle while Mia raised mana walls around them.

"Where are they?" Tina asked, taking weapons from her inventory and giving them to Helen.

"At least one southeast, in the trees." Matthew said, pointing with his head to the direction the arrow came from. "But I can’t sense anyone."

"Then let me find them." Mia said with a smile.