Over the next few hours, Randidly performed various experiments to understand why exactly his drops of liquid Aether were deconstructing while he wielded the physical manifestations of images. In the end, he received good news and also news that should have been obvious, in retrospect.

The act of condensing liquid Aether basically synthesized the prevalent and pure energy in Randidly’s body with the accumulation of emotion and meaning that he accumulated while living his life. For this reason, there was a soft cap on the amount of liquid Aether that Randidly could generate. He only possessed so much emotion of the requisite intensity.

For him, it had turned out that it was extremely difficult to condense an eighth drop of liquid Aether prior to the confrontation against Kaan Swacc. He had expended some effort during his recovery to generate more and had reached six drops of liquid Aether before this training session. From the ease in which he reached that point, Randidly suspected that the emotional turmoil he had experienced in the last several weeks had raised his soft limit, but that was irrelevant to the current issue.

While resting over the past few days, Randidly had been investigating his body to see how the physical manifestations of images would affect him. What had been confusing was that the results were… inconsistent. Sometimes it seemed like the images being in his body was slowly improving his physique, sometimes Randidly couldn’t find the slightest change.

After seeing a drop of liquid Aether begin to dissipate during his simultaneous activation, Randidly realized the truth; drops of liquid Aether and the physical manifestation of images came from the same source. When he focused on one area, he weakened the other.

In a way, it made sense. Liquid Aether was externalizing the benefits of images, per the System plan. Keeping those benefits within the body as Randidly was doing was a method that didn’t seem to be supported. But the real issue was that both required immense mental energy and focus.

What was even more annoying was that neither was inherently superior. While the Nexus gradually pushed people toward externalizing their emotional meaning to avoid breaking the physical limitation, this method provided a store of ready-made, sudden bursts of power. As Randidly had seen while fighting Kaan, having liquid Aether present to counter another’s use of liquid Aether was important.

Of course, Randidly recognized that this simple usage of liquid Aether became less clear the more talented someone was with their images. At Randidly’s level, the two combatants were effectively bursting with so much strength for a brief instant that they couldn't control it. They had to rely on their image to channel it. If someone with plentiful experience using liquid Aether was Randidly’s opponent, the counter-strategy wouldn’t be as applicable.

It was a sobering thought. And it helped Randidly understand the difference between himself and someone like Elhume.

Meanwhile, internalizing the benefits with the physical manifestation of images was a constant passive boost to Randidly’s performance. It pushed his actual abilities beyond the limits of his Stats.

Randidly released his focus and began to drum his fingers against his healing left arm. The fact that he was sacrificing one benefit for the other was a wrench in his plans that Randidly hadn’t expected. Still, he believed that even though he was splitting his emotional meaning in two directions, the benefits of having pure Aether on his side would still mean he could more efficiently do both.

Now it was just a question of divvying up percentages.

With a sigh, Randidly hopped to his feet. Assuming that he received good news from Octavius, he would be spending the next several months of his time within a Dungeon to work on achieving image balance. So the decision regarding his focus could be tabled for the moment.

Besides, Randidly had another concern nagging at him. Although his three initial islands would meet Kharon’s immediate needs, Randidly expected that his Wandering City would grow even larger in the future. Perhaps more quickly than could be anticipated. As such, he needed to give the city the tools in order to make the additional floating islands on its own. The moss spirits continued to proliferate freely, so it wasn’t a question of power.

He just needed to find someone capable of the Engraving process. In terms of relationship with Moss Spirits, there was an obvious answer. Grimacing, Randidly pulled out the report that Tatiana passed onto him regarding Tim Moss.

The kid’s young age made Randidly hesitate. It wasn’t an issue of Tim eventually leaving Kharon and taking the Skill elsewhere; Randidly wasn’t trying to prevent other cities from achieving something similar. If those places could poach Tim and then figure out how to power the floating islands, more power to them.

No, Randidly just wanted to ensure Kharon’s growth wouldn’t need to slow because of this issue. But considering the fact that he was soon leaving the city…

Perhaps if Kharon Academy was developed running, I could have him enroll and study the kid for a while. As Randidly chewed his lip, purple-black revelation energy sparkled outward from his left eye. But if I delay my departure until that point, it will push back the Nexus situation by a few months. Damnit, I hope Octavius includes some details of what the plan is when he finally gets around to replying…

As the revelation energy soaked into his skin, Randidly peered forward into the future. Especially concerning the Path of Kharon, Randidly could see relatively far into the future. Considering the strength and focus of the image he cultivated in the Wandering City, he was relatively confident in his predictive abilities. The changes to the government and the assembly of the Academy complicated things, but still, Randidly persisted in following the chain of causality forward, even as each scrap of information he could glean became increasingly vague.

The further afield he looked, the more the energy around his eye darkened.

Congratulations! Your Skill Revelation of the Atramentous Threshold (T) has grown to Level 302!

Eventually, Randidly sighed and shook his head; there was a key piece of information missing: Tim himself.

Randidly had sensed the kid in the past, but he hadn’t had any interaction with him. As such, it was almost impossible to have any sort of insight into the choices he would make in the future. And perhaps just as important as Tim himself, Randidly wasn’t very familiar with his father, Derek Moss. Honestly, the elder Moss might be even more indicative of the family’s behavior in the future. It would be a while before Tim was independent.

So Randidly shook himself and dropped off of his island onto Kharon below. Time to conduct a little bit of research.

*****

Tim leapt to his feet as though the chair beneath him caught on fire as his dad walked through the front door. Even from his bedroom at the back end of the apartment, the sound of the door opening was attention-grabbing; their apartment simply wasn’t very big. So hurried out of his room, rubbing his sweaty palms on his pants while he did so. He surged past the kitchen, the hallway closet, and then arrived at the entry area that connected with the living room. And then Tim looked at his dad.

From the heavy frown on Derek’s face, it was obvious that his day had not been an easy one. Tim’s already pounding heart began to race as he tried to keep his face neutral. He put his hands behind his back. This is such a bad idea… But if I don’t do this...

“Uh, hey dad,” Tim began. His eyes were on the light dusting of snow that covered the taller Moss. Derek knocked his boots against the sill of the door to dislodge snow and began to take off his coat. “Here, let me help with that. Um, were you thinking anything in particular for dinner?”

Derek’s eyes slid to Tim as he slowly passed his son the coat. Tim tried his best not to jump. Then Derek chuckled. “What, you hear about some fancy restaurant from your friends? You are in luck; after the day I’ve had, there is no way I’m cooking. What sort of cuisine is it this time? I’m down for a little bit of a treat.”

“Ahaha.” Tim did his best to imitate his usual laugh. He honestly thought he sounded pretty convincing. He folded his dad’s heavy coat in his arms. “You know, whatever’s fine. I’ve just been… uh, especially hungry lately. Puberty and stuff. So whatever it is, let’s just get a lot, okay?”

Derek gave his son a slightly longer look as he struggled with the coat. “Puberty and stuff, huh?”

Something in Derek’s tone warned Tim that he had somehow gone astray. He frantically scrambled for something to distract his father. “Ah… just… can we have time with the two of us, you know? With you working in the Order Ducis- ah, no it’s really cool! But just…”

That softened Derek’s expression. He released a long sigh. “Yea, I haven’t been home much, have I bud? Sorry about that. So how about this: instead of ordering something in, do you want to head to that three-story game-center that you are always talking about? The one that used to be a bowling alley on the boulevard. Just the two of us. Some quality time.”

Tim’s initial reaction was to be very excited, but then he remembered the source of his anxiety and he began to sweat. “Ah… well… I think-”

Knock, knock.

Someone firmly rapped on the door to the Moss’ apartment, surprising both of them. After glancing at the door, Derek frowned and looked at Tim with some of his earlier suspicions. It seemed that Tim’s expression made something click into place in his mind. “So, you wanted to go out for some reason, huh? Tim, what did you do this time? Telling me first will make things much easier for you.”

No! YOU were the one that wanted to go out! I just wanted more food. Tim wanted to say. But his tongue was stuck in his mouth from nerves. He could only smile nervously. Somehow, his hands were sweaty again.

Sighing, Derek turned and took a few steps back toward the door. As his hand twisted the knob and pulled the door open, the hall closet burst open and the source of Tim’s stress burst out. “No! Don’t open that door!”

Delilah tumbled across the hall in a spray of cleaning supplies and broom handles until her forehead collided with the wall. Then she hopped to her feet and put her hands on her hips. The jumble of paper towels and bleach only served to emphasize how dirty her t-shirt and shorts were from several weeks of skulking around Kharon’s streets. Likely she would have continued to live out of dumpsters and floating tree forts if not for the sudden drop in temperature, which was why she came and practically begged Tim to let her live in his closet.

Tim’s dad just blinked as the door swung open.

Derek gave Tim a long look as he turned, the ‘we will talk about this later’ look. The open door behind him revealed a face that no one in Kharon would mistake. Tim’s jaw dropped. That’s… the Ghosthound….?

“Argh, you! Why couldn’t you just leave me in peace!!” Delilah’s faced turned ashen and she took several steps backward.

The Ghosthound’s mouth was open, but he seemed to pause as he saw Delilah. He frowned and studied each of them in turn. The weight of that examination was such that not even Delilah could move. Then he turned to Derek. “Delilah is staying with you?”

“If she is, now’s the first time I’m hearing of it, sir. Are you here to speak with her…?” Derek said slowly. But he did frown at the Ghosthound.

The Ghosthound waved his hand. “No, it’s honestly a good thing. I’ve been a bit worried about what Annie would do if she found out I let her daughter sleep in some igloo somewhere-”

“Ah! An igloo! Why didn’t I think of that.” Delilah pounded her tiny fist into her palm. Then she glared and the Ghosthound and shouted. “I’m blowing this dipshit stand!”

Then she spun around and bolted for the window at the back of the apartment while Tim stared at her back in wonder. Is she really just five years old…?

But as the young girl pumped her small legs as fast as they could carry her, Tim felt a pulse of an image behind him. It was brief but overwhelming. And in the next moment, a spectral claw phased out of the floor and caught Delilah, dragging her struggling form back down the hallway. During that time, she continued to display her rather expansive knowledge of swear words. Tim learned quite a few new phrases.

“Ah.” Derek Moss scratched the back of his neck, glancing over his shoulder at the struggling Delilah and then looking at the Ghosthound in front of him. “Do you want to come in for a scotch, Mr. Ghosthound? This has just been a really long day.”