Return of the last survivor

"Cortana, contact Philip and figure out how much time it will take us to reach earth."

As Merlin, Cortana in her Black Knight body, Mecha's Main body, the Bundle of ropes- ahem, elf representative, and the demon representative walked into the gate, they felt the world spinning for a while, before he found themselves in a corridor sort of place. However, there was no ground nor sky, only lights flashing by at immeasurable speeds.

It took a second, but Merlin recognised this scene.

'Warp Speed?' he thought to himself, remembering two particularly famous movie franchises using this technology.

However, not much he could do with that knowledge, and so he moved on to estimating his time.

A few hours later, Cortana replied.

"Forefather Philip and I have deduced the estimated time of arrival to the hour, it will take about 2 days and 12 hours earth time to reach. Leaving us with a few days Earth time before the next mana burst."

"Alright."

With that done, Merlin sate down and began chatting with everyone in the group.

He learned that the cool beauty ahem- demon lady was called Bvida, and was 41 years old, while the bundle of ropes girl was called "Mpfpfpph" and was "kakakdded" years old.

'Useful information' Merlin nodded in his head as he began to think about something.

'The elf ropes girl seems extremely troublesome. Should I get rid of her right now? Throwing her into the planer void outside the gateway ought to do the job.'

But then he thought, 'Doesn't really matter. I won't be the one dealing with her anyways. I'll get Sean to deal with her. Put her through some disciplinary training before I ever see her face again. Hmm, seems like a plan I suppose.'

He then though about Bvida.

'She seems like a calm and smart person. She should be fine. But why not. I'll send them both off to train. Just making sure that Bvida is treated slightly better.'

And just like that, the fate of the two daughters of each tribe's grand elders were decided. They would be sent off to boot camp indefinitely until they become loyal subordinates.

Merlin did not wish to burden his already limited soul-contract slots with two more or less useless people with no possibility of growing into strong people. He would rather use it on talented people like Sean and Kyle.

Thinking about talented people, Merlin suddenly thought of Alice and her twin sister. Although he could, he would rather not. Especially now that the threat of the zombies had greatly reduced and would stay like that for some time, until the fourth mana burst.

Instead, Merlin began to think about the future. What he would do when Zero come, what he would do if he survived that.

Since the day he had returned, his life was not in constant threat like his previous life, but instead, there was a giant timer above his head, counting down to the day Zero arrived.

'Sigh, Let's just focus on chilling for now. I get to rest from the constant elemental law set meditation. I can't do it here due to the lack of mana, so all I can do is rest.'

And so began Merlin's 2 and a half days' worth of rest within the dimensional gate, after nearly 11 years of constant vigilance and alertness.