Randidly Ghosthound scanned rapidly through the typically extensive message from Octavius Shrike. Unlike last time, this message took a bit longer to return; it was now about a week after the funeral for the deceased Commandant and Randidly had asked his question the day that Velio Dunn had tried to visit. The tournaments for his recruits were scheduled to occur today. Still, Randidly read through this message carefully. As he did so, he gradually frowned.

Octavius was able to determine that Tellus was one of the few planets from the Fifth Cohort that wasn’t completely cut off from Aether support after last week. Mostly, it seemed this decision was made because Tellus was still doing its job as an Aether refinery. The System pumped rough Aether into the atmosphere and the planet was quite explosively producing a refined product. Likely due to the devastation of the Second Calamity, these few years had seen rapid growth from the survivors.

They had managed to pass a Calamity. They were rebuilding after a catastrophic population loss.

But there was one thing that Octavius could not determine: the location of Shal.

The records clearly indicate that he was given an opportunity to approach the Pinnacle and failed, Octavius’ message listed. This isn’t a surprise; to approach the PInnacle in that manner, you essentially fight all those who approached the Pinnacle ahead of you on a straight Path. It would be a miracle if someone was able to survive in such a gauntlet. In addition, it is clear that the Swacc Family made special arrangements for Tellus afterward. These are publicly recorded events.

However, it appeared that the Swacc Family’s assistance was contingent on some agreement with Shal. And the Swacc Family refuses to talk about their own business with outsiders. Using some of the functions of the Nexus Ways, I can determine that Shal is still alive, wherever he is. But he is cut off from the other portions of the System…

Sighing, Randidly turned his attention back to the task at hand. He floated in the Web, rubbing his chin with his right hand. The emotions that the Stillborn Phoenix had been refining over the past few days wound out of him like thread from a spool and spun upward, buoyed by the currents of Aether. Randidly watched the densely flowing emotions with a complicated expression. Is this what a spider feels like as they spread their webbing…? It’s not like anyone should be captured by the emotions, but they are steadily infiltrating other places within the Nexus…

Randidly shook his head lightly. There was a strange sense of… connection that was growing as Randidly released more and more emotions up through the Web into the lower portions of the Nexus. The one upside of this was that Randidly definitely felt some of the pressure from his Nether Nebula ease. With a larger ‘base’ to distribute the strain even slightly, the enormous density of significance he was gathering slowed him down less.

He didn’t overlook the unique way that a portion of Aether was assisting with a portion of Nether. The two energies complemented each other. Emotion and connectivity could achieve a strange balance… in a similar way to significance and shape could reinforce one another. Unified, the two energies were overwhelmingly powerful.

Which was why Randidly was still so annoyed he had heard nothing from Neshamah Rex in the past few days. In fact, as he floated in the Web, he was starting to be so disgruntled at his helplessness that the emotions Randidly was releasing began to sputter and spread out strange infectious tentacles through the air. The emotional energy changed color and the surrounding space seemed to be tinted by the intensity.

With a twitching eyelid, Randidly calmed his heart by snorting out a blast of steam. The emotions unwillingly faded back to their normal state. Seeing his emotions taint the surroundings reminded him of Commandant Wick’s madness, but Randidly tried to reassure himself, again, that his work with the emotions could be considered a public good. They were much easier to parse apart than the chaotic emotions that flowed up from below, even if they were a tad more insidious.

Chuckling to himself about being an environmental hazard, Randidly flipped out his Philosopher’s Key and returned to the Fifth Cohort Rally Station. After grabbing a few pieces of smoked boar on the table, Randidly began his normal routine.

After cleansing his emotions, he sat in a meditative position and continued fine-tuning the Inscrutable Mien of Genesis and the Implacable Price of Exodus. As he enriched Yggdarsil’s life energy and continued to guide the consciousness of the tree’s new monster, Randidly steadily accumulated the relevant Skill Levels. Currently, he felt like both Skills had sharply increased in potency, even if neither of their details changed.

Such steady development was a function of Randidly’s current prodigious strength, but he couldn’t deny that it was somewhat less satisfying than the explosive changes he used to so frequently experience. But such gains were few and far between now. Another wouldn’t occur until the next Soulskill Tithe.

After working on his Yggdrasil Skills, Randidly headed down to his personal training array and continued his version of physical fitness. Helen frequently complained that his sessions rendered most of the nearby training pods unusable because of Randidly’s wide image reverberations, and Superintendent Xeruth sent very mildly worded queries about the increasingly frequent tremors running through the Rally Station, but Randidly believed that this was also a necessary avenue of improvement.

His body continued to accumulate overwhelming Nether Brawn within his limbs. With his enemies slowly revealing himself, the process of training his greatest asset was extremely reassuring. Randidly flexed his hands with enough force to produce localized sonic booms. This is the way that I catch up, despite how many years head start they possess… I have to make use of every tool available to me...

Every now and then during the week, Randidly would check in on Sulfur, watching the armor’s continued progress. However, he had to be very circumspect about it these last few days. He had apparently checked in a little too often with Sulfur and now the Soulseed was rather huffy that Randidly didn’t believe it could accomplish its task. Anytime it noticed his attention, it would get all surly.

Not that I don’t know that you’ll eventually do it, it’s just I’m wondering about when… Randidly thought with amusement. But he tried to be a little less micromanaging. Besides, he had so many other things to do.

Randidly had attempted earlier in the week to cheat into contact with Neshamah by using his Dreamcatcher of the Long Night, going back to the meeting with the mysterious woman and studying her more aggressively. But overt observations caused her to clamp down Nether defenses around her body, laughing in the alternate memory at Randidly’s attempts, much to his chagrin. And a slower examination was about as effective as trying to figure out how a car worked while staring at the exterior: he could glean nothing at all except it was what he was looking for.

So his Nether progress mainly consisted of continued observations of the Nether System in his training area. As it continued to develop, patterns were emerging that Randidly could identify and extrapolate to broader truths about Nether. In his estimate, five years of such observation would be very beneficial to him.

...but five years was too long a timeline. People wanted to kill him now.

To increase the effectiveness of such observations, Randidly poured a bit extra Nether into his Alpha Cosmos to establish a similar organization there. But he needed to be careful about how much significance he accumulated; the grey bubbles continued to be a strange, pseudo physical strain on his Nether Nebula.

Randidly rolled his shoulders and slapped his hands against his cheeks. “Even if there isn’t any easy Path forward, I’m still progressing. I’ve gathered quite a lot of PP again. Soon I’ll be able to take another Path. And about 1000 PP beyond that should be the next tithe from the Alpha Cosmos…”

Randidly probably wouldn’t be able to earn that much PP before the three-month time limit was up. But hopefully, his actions on the frontlines would gather a huge amount of PP to him and accelerate that process…

Congratulations! Your Skill Absolute Timing (Ru) has grown to Level 172!

Randidly glanced toward the window. Checking the time, the recruit tournament would begin soon. Although Randidly wasn’t going to be helping with the administration, he should begin to pay attention to the recruits; some of them were starting to show serious potential. Plus, Randidly needed a little bit of a break to refine his thoughts regarding All Things Succumb, Yet Time Whirls the Earth. He had decided that he was finally prepared to address the Grim Chimera’s ultimate Skill.

Yet just as Randidly walked through the door, he stalled out in shock at the message he had received. His hand reached for the doorknob and missed. A split second later, Randidly forgot about his plans to leave as he reread the message. Instantly, a grin covered his face.

Did you miss me, Randidly?

I don’t know why you would, when I’m an objectively ignorant fool. I’ve been so busy I couldn’t even manage to send a single message to you. My bad. I’m not so good at this, you know.

Randidly couldn’t help but chuckle; the message was from Vualla. Although he couldn’t reach out to her with his Nether Rituals, the messaging would work when she was in Aether controlled space.

I did feel you try to reach out to me previously, but the Xyrt Brigade been rather constantly active since we came here, destroying these Nether nodes as quickly as we can. It’s gotten better since the new Commandant came to the frontlines to assist us, but it’s still quite rough. I could use a nap. Some of the people trained with me have been slaughtered right in front of me. The Nether Gatekeepers we have encounter are… different.

They aren’t just cookie-cutter beings. They have individual traits and the equivalent of Skills. When pressed, they can transform into a super form that will last for a few minutes. But before we identified this capability, we were getting ambushed by it every day. Heh, some bastard even dared to rip out my intestines. Not that it was serious, but certainly a cavalier way to treat a lady, right?

Gradually, Randidly’s excitement over hearing from Vualla disappeared. His expression grew serious. His three images pulsed with tightly controlled fury. If Vualla mentioned a wound to him, then Randidly knew that it was much more serious than she let on.

But what I wanted to tell you is that the upper echelons of the Xyrt Brigade are scared. They hide it well enough, but it’s clear that they haven’t fought against Nether like this. Especially because we haven’t yet been able to figure out why the Nether King is sneaking around setting up these Nether Nodes. A lot of our resources are put toward destroying them, but the upper echelons won’t commit to eradicating them completely.

Some of them are beginning to suspect these nodes are simply a distraction. But no one has any idea what they are supposed to be a distraction from. The opposition currently has the initiative in the Fifth Cohort. This Nether King is making the Nexus seem like a much more mortal foe, eh? It doesn’t help that after the previous leader of the Xyrt Brigade was killed, there has been a lot of infighting behind the scenes.

If the Nether doesn’t kill us soon, we might just fucking do it ourselves. I get that what I want to see is a dismantled Nexus, but it’s frustrating that it feels like I’ll be on the frontlines of those losses.

But in other news, I’m more powerful than ever! Want to spar? We are being sent back to the Nexus to debrief and rest for a few days. I’ll come find you, even if you try to hide~.

Stay safe. I’ve heard some strange rumors about you. The Xyrt Brigade doesn’t know what to make of you. But they deeply fear Commandant Wick.