"Buzz—"
As the aura of dead souls rolled in, the white jade on the forehead of the Celestial Sparrow standing on Jia Na's shoulder also burst forth with dazzling white light, purifying all the aura of dead souls that approached Jia Na's body.
"It seems your two Contract Summoning Beasts and my ghost servants don't get along well."
Lightly waving his magic staff, the skeleton ghost, having received the command, reined in its aura and silently retreated behind Pading-Green.
"They are just relatively sensitive to the aura of dead souls."
Gently patting the Thorn Flower Fairy's arm, as a plant-type spirit inherently extremely sensitive to the aura of death, the Thorn Flower Fairy's stress response when facing the skeleton ghost was even greater than the Celestial Sparrow's.
"Lola, they won't attack us yet, you don't need to be too nervous... Afu, keep a close eye on that ghost. If there's anything unusual, tell me immediately."
"As you command, Master."
After calming the Thorn Flower Fairy, Jia Na also gave instructions to the Celestial Sparrow via telepathy. After all, as the member with the lowest Wizard level in the team, Jia Na had to proceed cautiously with every step.
"Since the spatial rift has opened, Mr. Pading, please go first."
Similar to Jia Na's attitude, although both parties had just reached a verbal cooperation agreement a few minutes ago, Richard-Eva wouldn't actually team up and travel together with a Black Wizard Apprentice whose background was unknown within the alternate dimension.
"Gentlemen, I hope we can continue to 'cooperate' once we're inside."
The last two words were spoken heavily. After finishing, Pading-Green, his smile gone, leaped directly into the spatial rift with his ghost servant.
Seeing this, Richard-Eva also turned around and took out an antique silver-gray cross-shaped pendant from his interdimensional space ring.
"The stable period of the spatial rift is only twelve hours. Just in case, let's stick to the original plan and leave two hours as a risk buffer, completing the exploration within ten hours. Does everyone agree?"
"Agreed."
Generally speaking, after a spatial rift enters its stable period, it usually remains in the material world for about twelve hours. However, there are a few situations that fall outside the realm of common sense.
Therefore, for the safety of the team, everyone still agreed with Richard-Eva's risk avoidance plan.
"This is the apprentice-level Wizard Tool 【Guardian Veil】 that I borrowed from my family. Once inside the spatial rift, it can help us resist spatial storms and various elemental attacks... In addition, it can also prevent us from having our teleportation locations disrupted by the spatial storms inside after entering the spatial rift."
After speaking, as Richard-Eva injected his magic power, a sliver of silver-gray medium seeped out from the cross of the 【Guardian Veil】 and rapidly extended, transforming into a cylindrical veil with a mercury-like texture but tending towards semi-transparency, enclosing everyone within.
"Jia Na, I'll give this to you first."
After activating the 【Guardian Veil】, Richard-Eva handed the silver-gray cross pendant in his hand to Jia Na.
"The protection range of the 【Guardian Veil】 will change with the position of the holder. After entering the spatial rift, you two should prioritize protecting yourselves. The rest will be left to Suoluo and me."
"Understood."
As the support roles in this team: Jia Na and Luo - Yinhu only needed to perform their respective duties according to the plan. The overall safety issues were jointly handled by Richard-Eva and Suo Luo-Lie Yan.
Up to this point, Luo - Yinhu could tentatively be considered to have completed his part of the task, while Jia Na's task officially began from now.
"Let's go in."
After all preparations were complete, the four people positioned themselves in a formation with Richard-Eva at the front and Suo Luo-Lie Yan at the back, and then walked towards the spatial rift in sequence.
"During this time, everyone must not fall behind. Otherwise, once lost in the alternate dimension, it will be very difficult to get out again."
After giving the final instruction, Richard-Eva was the first to step into the spatial rift. Seeing this, the others entered the spatial rift in sequence, without leaving the range of the 【Guardian Veil】.
"Pop—"
Like rippling water, the moment Jia Na entered the spatial rift, it felt as if her body was rapidly shrinking, then infinitely expanding. In an instant, a flat yet vortex-like pitch-black passage appeared before Jia Na.
"This is the 'Ant Path'. Passing through here leads to the Mirror Layer Domain."
Clearly within arm's reach, yet seemingly a thousand miles away.
After entering the 'Ant Path', Jia Na's perception of space seemed to malfunction. Looking at the people who were clearly close by, Jia Na subconsciously felt that the distance between them was constantly in a chaotic state of being sometimes far, sometimes near.
"Clop— Clop—"
Stepping on broken branches, as the footsteps got closer, the familiar sound coming from not far away once again caused Jia Na's perception to feel chaotic.
【This is the spatial rift leading to the foreign realm...】
【It looks like the spatial rift still needs some time to enter its stable period...】
【This proves that we arrived just in time...】
Familiar dialogue, familiar scene. Glancing out of the corner of her eye, seeing the projected figures not far away that were identical to their own group of four, Jia Na couldn't help but feel a wave of goosebumps.
"Is this the historical projection of the Mirror Layer Domain...?"
【Wait, who's there?】
Four gazes were like torches. Feeling the stares cast upon them, it wasn't just Jia Na; at this moment, even Richard-Eva and Suo Luo-Lie Yan, the two third-level apprentices, felt their bodies stiffen for a moment.