"Shiina Mashiro gave me her phone a few days ago. I explored the Metaverse alone for a while at that time, but after discovering that this place suppressed my power of fate quite severely, I didn't come in again."
"Compared to a few days ago, the current Metaverse is indeed somewhat different from before," Miyauchi Hikage explained to Shinomiya Kaguya while moving quickly with her.
Shinomiya Kaguya asked curiously: "Has any change occurred in the Metaverse compared to a few days ago?"
"It seems to be more active in feeling. If entering the Metaverse before felt like this space was dead, then now it feels like there is more vitality. I think it should be the appearance of you people who obtained the Otherworld Navigation APP that caused the change here."
This was not what he said, but what Tohru noticed.
After all, in terms of perception of Rules, Miyauchi Hikage was barely getting started now, unlike Tohru who could see through the essence of the Metaverse just by entering it a few times.
Currently, Miyauchi Hikage couldn't reach that level, but it was no problem to explain using what Tohru felt.
"Maybe the appearance of that Temporary Palace is also due to this reason," Miyauchi Hikage said, and then also took Shinomiya Kaguya for several short-distance teleportations.
The Metaverse was large, but it was also a three-dimensional structure itself. Sometimes it took a long time to walk along the tracks to reach a place, but Miyauchi Hikage could save several hours of exploration time directly with a teleportation of less than a kilometer.
Dragging Shinomiya Kaguya for three short-distance teleportations, in less than two or three minutes, they arrived at the node where the change occurred.
Just as Katsura Kotonoha said, the tracks in this place were twisted somewhat strangely, extending all the way into a red mist where the inside couldn't be seen clearly.
"A new space appears again in the world attached to the gap of reality. It looks indeed magical." Miyauchi Hikage tried to reach out to touch the mist, but felt nothing.
Instead, following his movement, a figure familiar to Miyauchi Hikage soon walked out of the mist.
"Hikage-kun?"
Kasumigaoka Utaha looked at Miyauchi Hikage dragged over by Shinomiya Kaguya with some surprise, not expecting to meet Miyauchi Hikage at this time.
After May, her relationship with Miyauchi Hikage had actually become more harmonious than before.
However, after all, she still had to consider Shiina Mashiro's existence, so she usually only occasionally discussed the practice of Hamon breathing with Miyauchi Hikage. Besides that, the two of them didn't have much contact in private.
Even though Kasumigaoka Utaha received the reward of Water Affinity a few days ago, which gave her the ability to summon water sources anywhere at once, she was only studying this newly acquired power by herself and really neglected Miyauchi Hikage a bit these few days.
She didn't expect them to bump into each other in the Metaverse.
However, when Katsura Kotonoha just said she wanted to go back and swap Shinomiya Kaguya over, Kasumigaoka Utaha had this idea. After all, Shinomiya Kaguya always valued Miyauchi Hikage's ability now.
And unlike her who still had scruples about Shiina Mashiro's existence and kept a distance from Miyauchi Hikage, Shinomiya Kaguya didn't have so many fastidious points.
She valued Miyauchi Hikage, so she used many means to approach him and constantly brushed up her presence in front of him.
And speaking of it, although they had recently obtained quite good abilities and had certain self-protection capabilities in the Inner World and the Metaverse.
But compared to the more talented Miyauchi Hikage, these rewards they obtained seemed really incomparable to Miyauchi Hikage.
As the strongest and easiest person to talk to among the people the girls in the group knew and had a good relationship with, it was indeed more appropriate to let Miyauchi Hikage come over to check the current situation of the Metaverse.
It was just that Kasumigaoka Utaha was somewhat dissatisfied with Shinomiya Kaguya's approach in her heart.
If she had known earlier that Miyauchi Hikage was coming in, she could have gone to the entrance to guide Miyauchi Hikage; there was no need for Shinomiya Kaguya to make this trip personally.
"What a coincidence, Hikage-kun. I didn't expect Kaguya to really pull you in." Kasumigaoka Utaha greeted Miyauchi Hikage.
Miyauchi Hikage nodded gently.
"Mashiro told me about this place. I also explored it alone before and was somewhat interested in the changes in this space. So after hearing about your situation, I planned to come in and see what exactly this Temporary Palace is."
Miyauchi Hikage continued to analyze: "This Temporary Palace gives me the feeling from the outside that it's a bit like a special Domain. It should be quite different from the Domain Expansion of jujutsu sorcerers, but the nature should still be referenced."
Miyauchi Hikage said this while observing the red mist in front of him with his Eye of Destiny open.
However, for these girls, they hadn't even figured out their own supernatural abilities yet. Domain Expansion, a power considered quite high-end in the entire Inner World, was completely confusing to them.
Even if the principle of Domain Expansion was completely placed in front of them now, they might not be able to understand this power at all.
This feeling was like they were still studying middle school function problems here, while Miyauchi Hikage had already started self-studying advanced mathematics.
In fact, the existence of this Temporary Palace was much more complicated than Domain Expansion, and even closer to the level of a Reality Marble.
After all, a Reality Marble itself was also the product of the materialization of the user's own mental world (image world).
It was just that the Temporary Palace existed attached to the Metaverse. At most, it could be considered a semi-finished mental world, not reaching the level of a complete Reality Marble.
Saying this, Miyauchi Hikage walked into the mist.
The red mist itself was just a thin boundary. After passing through the red mist, Miyauchi Hikage came directly to the inside of the Temporary Palace composed of countless mirrors mentioned by Katsura Kotonoha.
After entering the Temporary Palace, Miyauchi Hikage's feeling became more obvious.
If it was just a small world of this level, then as long as he opened Unlimited Blade Works, he could probably complete the erosion of this mirror world in an instant.
This wasn't even like Tohru using the power of Rules she mastered to erode the world inside the Reality Marble.
Rather, the integrity of Unlimited Blade Works itself was above this palace. As long as this palace was pulled into Unlimited Blade Works, this fragile world could be crushed naturally.
Perhaps a formal Palace would be harder and reach the level of a Reality Marble?
Miyauchi Hikage thought so in his heart, and then greeted the two girls who were studying those weird mirrors.
Ichinose Chizuru greeted Miyauchi Hikage simply, and then put her mind back on finding clues to this mirror world.
Sudou Ayami's gaze was placed on Miyauchi Hikage from a distance.
Miyauchi Hikage's fame was indeed great for them.
After all, not everyone could make the Mysterious Person suffer a loss.
However, as a character recruited by the Mysterious Person, Sudou Ayami thought deeper.
Because the Mysterious Person was not like what he said himself, leaving Tokyo for other places because of the bad luck inflicted on him by Miyauchi Hikage.
The Mysterious Person had been in Tokyo from beginning to end; only one of his clones left Tokyo.
But under such circumstances, the Mysterious Person deliberately showing an attitude in the diary that he was tricked by Miyauchi Hikage seemed intriguing.
Sudou Ayami, who had lost her father first in these years, and then fought wits and courage with that scumbag stepfather who liked domestic violence and her biological mother who only cared about love and family, still had quite a lot of thoughts in her heart.
She subconsciously felt that there might be some special connection between Miyauchi Hikage and the Mysterious Person.
If it was as she thought, that Shinomiya Kaguya was another informant for the Mysterious Person, then maybe Miyauchi Hikage was also a "genius" personally cultivated by the Mysterious Person, or even Miyauchi Hikage could be the Mysterious Person himself!
Therefore, seeing Miyauchi Hikage at this time, Sudou Ayami also paid more attention to him.
It was just that the style of the Mysterious Person and the style of Miyauchi Hikage in front of her were completely different.
Even if Sudou Ayami looked with the most careful gaze, she couldn't find any similarities between the two.
Height, figure, voice, speaking tone, and even posture when moving—none of them matched.
This made Sudou Ayami feel somewhat defeated in her heart.
But she also knew that the focus now was to figure out the situation of this Temporary Palace.
The Mysterious Person actually told her some settings about Palaces, but she didn't expect that the first Palace she encountered was her teammate's Palace.
For this reason, she didn't dare to summon her Persona to destroy those mirrors, lest it cause any bad influence on Ichinose Chizuru herself.
Miyauchi Hikage didn't care about Sudou Ayami's suspicion of him. It was impossible to recognize his identity from those external characteristics.
Even if she had doubts about his identity, let her doubt.
After greeting Sudou Ayami, he concentrated on observing this Palace.
This screen full of mirrors indeed looked a bit mentally polluting.
Even looking at it with his eyes that opened the full map felt a little uncomfortable.
But he still confirmed many things.
There were many Shadow reactions in this Palace, but in the final analysis, they should all belong to parts of Ichinose Chizuru's Shadow.
He turned to look at Ichinose Chizuru.
"I heard from Kaguya-san that your dream is to become an actress, right, Miss Ichinose?"
Miyauchi Hikage asked Ichinose Chizuru.
Ichinose Chizuru also nodded without hesitation.
This was her only ideal and pursuit currently.
"Then, the reason you want to see your Shadow is to confirm the desires in your heart?"
Ichinose Chizuru hesitated, nodded, and then shook her head: "I have such an idea, but the main thing is to communicate with the true self in my heart. I think this might improve my acting skills a lot. I just didn't expect it to turn into the current situation."
Ichinose Chizuru turned to look at the mirror space in front of her, unable to understand why her Shadow had such a problem.
Miyauchi Hikage was observing Ichinose Chizuru's current attire.
Not much difference from the description in the original work.
This woman would use different faces to face others in different scenarios.
In college, to avoid being entangled, she would wear dowdy clothes, tie a ponytail, wear old-fashioned black-rimmed glasses, and keep a low profile in everything.
Outside of school, especially when dealing with other girls who possessed diaries, she would restore her original appearance, and even dress up carefully to show her best side to the girls.
Just from this point, Ichinose Chizuru's personality indeed had some problems.
Including her later choice to become a rental girlfriend due to lack of money, and even expressing the idea that she could hone her acting skills by becoming a rental girlfriend, all reflected the split in her personality.
Although the reason for the appearance of the Temporary Palace was still unclear, Miyauchi Hikage didn't find it strange that her Palace would be this Mirror Theater composed of countless mirrors.
"Mirror Theater?" Shinomiya Kaguya heard this sentence from Miyauchi Hikage, and then observed this building composed entirely of mirrors.
Previously, her vision was interfered with by the mirrors, but now observing with the idea of a theater, this space really looked somewhat like a theater.
"The main gate should be in that direction, but it's not easy to find under the reflection of countless mirrors."
Miyauchi Hikage pointed to the position of the main entrance. It was indeed very hidden. These girls had searched in this place for nearly half an hour without finding the entrance. Kasumigaoka Utaha even thought about destroying some mirrors to find clues.
It was only because Miyauchi Hikage opened the full map and knew the internal structure of the entire theater; otherwise, it was estimated that these girls would have to search for another hour or two to find the entrance.
Ichinose Chizuru subconsciously wanted to walk towards the entrance of the theater, but Miyauchi Hikage reminded her.
"If you go further into this theater, I'm afraid you will have to face those unspeakable desires deep in your heart directly. are you sure you are mentally prepared?"
Hearing this, Ichinose Chizuru was actually a little nervous, but she nodded quickly.
"Yes, I'm ready. No matter how bad the desires in my heart are, that's part of myself. I will try my best to accept myself."
"Then let's go up. I also hope you can remember what you said now."
Amidst Ichinose Chizuru's somewhat uneasy emotions, Miyauchi Hikage led several girls to the main gate also made of mirrors, and pushed open the theater door with gentle force.
And after the door was pushed open, the first thing that appeared in front of them was an Ichinose Chizuru wearing somewhat revealing maid outfit taking the initiative to greet them.