A few hours later...

Althea finally woke up from her unconscious state. Something she had never gone through in all her life.

Her head ached a little. But overall she was fine. She was confused for a moment until she remembered what had happened.

Without a second thought, she threw away the phone in fear.

She then looked at it cautiously from a distance for a few seconds.

Then got a stick and started poking it.

That went on for a minute until she completely calmed down.

At that point, she had realised that the device wasn't inherently bad. It was only bad when one tried to poke into it.

She hatefully cursed Muku for not warning her. But then again, he probably didn't know. And even if he did, he wouldn't have expected her to try it or face such a heavy backlash from it so it wasn't his fault. He was just trying to be nice.

But one question remained...

"Where did he get this thing?" Althea spoke to herself.

Her gaze then wandered to where he and the others were cultivating. At that point, they were still far away from MR7, but making steady progress.

Despite taking breaks, Muku was still keeping up with the rest. That was definitely a result of his talent.

Only Raya was ahead of them all. Muku might have been able to keep up with her had he not taken breaks but not now. She had pulled ahead.

Anyway, it didn't look like he was going to take a break anytime soon. Likely because he had given her a phone so it wasn't necessary anymore.

For that reason, Althea was left to study her phone, which she both loved and feared at the same time.

After a while, she had completely forgotten about everything that had happened as she started watching old human reels on some popular app from before the apocalypse since no new stuff was getting posted for obvious reasons.

She even forgot to clean the purple blood that had stained her face and clothes until she noticed her reflection on the phone. It was only then that she cleaned up and continued.

The matter with the phone had been put aside for now. That's how carefree she was. She had figured out that as long as she kept her boundaries then everything was okay.

There was no point thinking about it on her own after all...

....

Around a whole month later...

Muku finally came out for a break...

None of them had reached MR7 even after all that cultivation but they were getting closer.

It was a lot harder to advance when one didn't rely on killing alone.

And honestly, unless they get Mrs C's help which she was obviously not willing to give, they couldn't cultivate any faster.

"Hello, Ms Althea" Muku greeted Althea.

No he wasn't being disrespectful. She was the one who told him to address her like that instead of Monarch Althea. She had wanted to just be called Althea but the girls refused.

They felt that if they let her and Muku become too familiar then they might fall for each other..

Yes, they really thought that Muku could pull a Monarch if he was given the chance. Especially one as innocent as Althea in matters of the heart and with so much curiosity in it.

Yeah, as fellow girls they could tell that about Althea from the moment they understood her a little.

"Yo!" Althea replied in a way that caught Muku off guard.

It seemed the phone was already changing her. Then again, it was a phone that didn't die, didn't get bad service, or have any issues, so Althea had been using it nonstop since she got it.

"...Ah, sup. So how is the phone treating you?" Muku asked in a slightly awkward tone.

"It's great. Just one minor issue..." Althea replied without looking up. She seemed to be playing some game or something.

"Really? What's that?" Muku asked curiously.

After all, he knew the phone quite well and knew that there were no issues with it at all. It was even indestructible.

"Oh, it's nothing major. It just attacked me and made me faint for the first time ever in my life when I tried to poke into it with my divine sense. It made me wonder... Where did you get these phones? I know for a fact they aren't a product of your world. At least not before the war" Althea replied.

She finally looked up at Muku with a questioning gaze.

"Ah. That. Yes, you're right. These were a gift from the operator of the restricted zone after passing the trials we were given" Muku replied immediately.

He expected this question at some point so he had already prepared the answer.

"What? Restricted Zone? How? How did you even gain access?" Althea asked in shock.

"It went like this..." Muku went on to tell Althea about the trial ground. How he found himself after that fight with the resurrected Monarch and whatnot.

Of course, some details were skipped. From how he said it, one would assume that Mrs C was just some spirit who managed the trial ground and not the strongest being he knew.

Which honestly he thought she was when he first saw her.

A lot of details were mixed and twisted but nothing was objectively a lie, so it was okay.

"To think that that's what's in those zones. Y'all just made history. I wish I could have been there. It sucks how the greatest mystery in this world is for humans. How is that fair? Well whatever, if it's from that mysterious place, I guess it makes sense. But to think the rewards are so personalised. How wondrous" Althea completely ate up Muku's bullshit.

"Yeah. I was happy to receive it too. It makes communication way easier. And I'm sorry that such a thing happened to you. I didn't know it was possible"

Muku replied and apologised.

He and the girls never looked into how it was made since they never had the reason to. So he didn't know that such a thing would happen. Though he doubted that anything would have happened to them anyway.

It was probably Mrs C protecting her creation from outsiders. She tended to disregard beings that had nothing to do with her after all.

It's something he had noticed when she visited that time and completely ignored all the people in the embryo including Sarah's child despite always demanding a grandchild from Muku.

"No it's fine. It's my fault for being too curious. As they say in your world. Curiosity killed the cat right?" Althea waved off the apology.

Even if she was a bit angry initially. She likes the phone way too much to be angry after such a long time.

"Okay. Thank you for understanding. Is there any news from outside?" Muku asked about the outside world.

It was something he asked about every time he came for a break. They had to keep up with current events after all.

"Nothing yet. The Monarchs are plotting something as usual, but the plans don't have anything to do with your world since it's going to be a while since an R7 appears. I do feel that something might happen here soon though" Althea replied.

She had unpaused her game after getting her answer. So she wasn't looking at Muku anymore.

"Okay. That's good I guess. I won't bother you anymore" Muku spoke then turned to leave.

Since his world was okay, then he was okay. It wasn't that he cared about it. But some of his girls had family there, so he had to know what was going on at all times.

"Peace" Athea replied without looking up.

Muku's lip twitched but he said nothing...

.....

Around 7 months later...

Muku came out for his monthly breaks that only lasted a few minutes.

At that point, they had all reached MR7 and were working towards the peak which wasn't too far away.

Taking so long to advance was honestly draining when they were used to advancing quickly. But it was safe, so it wasn't all that bad.

"Is there anything yet?" Muku asked Althea without even greeting her.

At that point, they were quite familiar so it wasn't necessary at all.

And he had long lost all awe for Althea after coming out one time and seeing her wearing hip-hop themed clothes he had no idea where she got them from.

It got worse every time he came as she had a different set of weird clothes each time.

Right now she had a medieval-themed noble dress. Yeah, she didn't care about the time period. As long as she liked it, she wore it.

"There is some news this time actually. I heard that an R7 finally appeared in your world. Interestingly enough it wasn't a human or beast. But some failed experiment made by some Monarch remnant no one knows the identity of. After that, another two appeared a few hours later. And one of them was mine, isn't that just amazing?" Althea replied trying to speak like a noble woman and failing terribly.

"What?!' Muku was shocked and it was obvious in his reply.