Despite Nauda's concerns, in the morning they found Fiyu in the courtyard with a normal smile on her face. She sat in the most shaded corner, several sublime materials spread out before her. When they arrived, she gestured for both of them to sit across from her.

"Please, let us begin. I hope it will not be so miserably bright when the sun rises."

"I'm glad to be invited," Nauda said, "but am I truly necessary? I don't know anything about this defensive chamber you intend to create."

"Your presence is required. In order to give precise instructions, Theo will need to observe my soulhome more closely than he can accomplish himself. Please, perform your linking technique." With that, she extended a finger with each hand to touch their arms and closed her eyes.

Though Nauda hesitated and glanced at him, in the end she shrugged and drew them all inward. Soon they drifted within Fiyu's bleak soulhome, which had changed a little since he'd last seen it. The canvas wall had been replaced by dark stone, presumably refined from the pile remaining to the side. There wasn't much left, however, and Theo had to wonder what Fiyu would do when she ran out of sublime materials from her home.

"This will be the first time I attempt to create something that is not part of my relative's blueprint." Fiyu emerged carrying the sublime materials they had acquired the previous night... except the sand had been melted down into a sheet of dark glass. Theo was a bit disappointed that he had missed the process, since he could always use more knowledge of glass for his solar blueprint. "I will require your assistance."

"You've seemed extremely competent in all our classes," Nauda said. "You clearly understand all of the basic soulcrafter techniques and others besides. Is developing this room likely to be so difficult?"

That was a question for him, so Theo shook his head. "I don't think so. We need to start with a source of light... you mentioned that you had a fire to generate cantae, or maybe you have something different for your light bolts technique?"

Fiyu nodded and silently led them to one side of her outer wall, a blank area without adornment. She extended a single finger and tapped one of the stones, which began to slide out smoothly as if there was no mortar binding it in place. Advanced techniques like that, ones that demonstrated that soulcrafting wasn't truly just construction, were unusual for first tier soulcrafters. Even Theo hadn't attempted to redevelop any of those skills yet.

As soon as the dark stone came free, a blinding shaft of light pierced from the structure. Fiyu frowned in disapproval and stepped away, pulling up her hood. Squinting his eyes against it, Theo peered inside and saw that there was a crystal shining brilliantly, its power cascading off the walls, which seemed slightly reflective.

So this was the source of Fiyu's light. For her, this level of blinding light was no warm campfire or sign of home, it was both a threat and a stunning attack. As such, it was easy for her to channel cantae into those searing bolts of light. Like everything else about her soulhome, it was well-crafted, both in her relative's design and her execution.

"Will this be sufficient?" she asked. Theo leaned away, blinking the afterimages out of his eyes as he responded.

"Yeah, this is good. We can probably do this without using up a full chamber after all. The important thing is that you're creating a barrier between yourself and environments that are painful to you. Do you have a chamber that would be better suited for that?"

"I am... unsure." Fiyu tilted her head to the side, regarding both of them quietly. "To be truthful, I am confused about certain aspects of soulcrafting and our classes have not been helpful. I am capable of most techniques and my relative instructed me in the proper forms, but I do not understand why. I had hoped that you could offer me an exact blueprint, because I cannot improvise."

"It's your soulhome, so it needs to be your decision." Theo stood back, rubbing his chin and trying to think about where to start. Nauda beat him to it, floating up to gesture toward the entire soulhome.

"Soulcrafting is first about intent. Beyond a few simple rules, such as larger chambers holding more cantae, everything is subjective. What is a sturdy house and what does it look like? Different villages give different answers, and none of them are wrong. What matters more than how you swing a hammer is that you craft something that you fully believe to be a firm soulhome."

"That's oversimplifying," Theo objected. "No amount of belief is going to make a weak material into a strong one. You can't lean two boards against each other and pretend it's a castle, even if you're completely deluded. That's not even getting into how important it is to select the right sublime materials."

"But what makes the right materials? You can't simplify the differences there." Nauda gestured toward the shadows all around them. "If I tried to make my soulhome like this, it would be weak and uncomfortable, because this place seems cold and intimidating to me. But I'm guessing that it isn't to Fiyu."

Fiyu rapidly shook her head. "No, I find it very peaceful. Your soulhome is... too bright for me, but I think I understand how you enjoy it. So you are both right. We all must follow logical rules to craft an environment that is right for us, but our goals will vary."

"It's more complex than that, but yes. We've brought you materials that seem to be well-suited to the task of blocking out light and noise, but maybe we should have talked to you about them first. I know you might be familiar with Ichil, Jake, but you should have spoken to Fiyu first, since her own feelings about light are most important."

Since he didn't really disagree with any of the points, Theo didn't bother arguing and just moved on. "The quality and nature of the materials is important, and we have good ones. I'm confident that Fiyu can think of a way to effectively use them, regardless of individual details."

They both turned to Fiyu and she bobbed her head with a smile. Without speaking, she carefully replaced the brick in the side of the wall and then padded around the side. She stepped into a doorway, paused, then gestured for them to follow. Most of the doorways within were clouded in darkness that prevented them from seeing anything, but the shadows cleared in a room to the left, where Fiyu knelt down on the floor.

"This chamber is for my sensory technique," she explained, running her fingers along the outer wall. "It is the room most strongly associated with interacting with the outside world, for me, and all my sensory cantae flows through it. That makes it a good choice for this technique, right?"

She looked at them expectantly, so they quickly nodded affirmation. Fiyu carefully removed several bricks from the wall, roughly in the shape of the window, and Theo realized that she did fully understand. Still, she stared at it for a time before speaking again.

"The glass reminds me of the mask that Navim crafted for me, so it will stand between me and bright lights. I will place it as a... 'seeinghole'? Window? Yes, window. I see that the adhesive will bridge the gap between the glass and the stone so that the window does not weaken my defenses. But what is the cloth for?"

"That's going to be something called a curtain." He tried to show her, but couldn't touch the fabric and had to demonstrate until she hung it over the window. "This glass is so dark it blocks out most things, but you can open and close the curtain to control the light. Not only will it muffle sound, the fact that it's flexible will allow you to control how heavily the technique is used."

While they spoke, Nauda had been examining something on the other side of the room, but that made her look up. "Is this going to leave her perception of the world dimmed and muted? That could be a disadvantage in combat."

"No, this is where your subjective element of the process comes in." Theo turned back to Fiyu, looking her in the eye as well as he could through her mask in his mental form. "This part is important. You aren't soulcrafting all this to defend against light and noise, but to control it. If you do it properly, you'll still see bright lights, but you'll perceive them intellectually instead of being blinded. Does that make sense?"

Fiyu nodded immediately, as he'd hoped. Since she was already familiar with unusual perceptions, he suspected that this one would come easily to her. She began soulcrafting cheerfully, working with the bricks to create a space exactly the size of the glass pane she'd already crafted.

Occasionally she asked one of them a question, but for the most part she seemed happy to continue working silently. Theo kept floating there to... provide moral support, he supposed. He looked over to the other side of the room and discovered a stone pedestal rising from the floor. That had been what Nauda had been looking at, or more precisely the sphere placed on the top.

"Just why do you know a technique like this?" Nauda asked him. "Unless one of the Nine Worlds is far brighter than Tatian, you've never been in a place that was blinding to you."

"This is a specific version of a broader technique, one that I learned from veteran world travelers." Theo tried to rest back against the wall, but in this form he was never exactly comfortable or uncomfortable, just suspended. "Some of them have an entire chamber devoted to adapting to different environments. If they develop it enough, they could step into any world without the local conditions overwhelming them."

"Hmm. That's a useful technique. Probably not worth an entire chamber on the first floor, but perhaps later..."

"Right. That's why I'm glad that Fiyu could adapt it into a window so easily."

Still working but clearly listening, Fiyu bobbed her head in agreement. She had fitted the window properly, but applying the adhesive took more focused work. Leaving blobs of it off the side might be irrelevant in a real window, but within her soulhome, such minor flaws would only weaken the technique.

After a period of silence, Nauda bent down beside the sphere again. "Fiyu, this is one of those spheres of artistry you mentioned, isn't it? I wish I could feel the inside for myself, but... anyway, this is the heart of your sensory room, right? How does it actually work? What sense are you using instead of sight?"

"Nauda!" Fiyu turned to her with a gasp, mouth hanging open for a moment before it pressed thin. "I... why would you ask that question?"

"Is that offensive?" Nauda looked at her in dismay, then toward him. Theo regretted putting himself in the position of cultural translator, but since Fiyu was too shocked to answer, he didn't have a choice.

"Asking someone about what exact sensory techniques they use is an extremely personal question on Ichil. Think about how vulnerable it could make a person. There's one common technique that involves releasing and listening to sounds..." He chose that one because he was fairly certain Fiyu didn't use it. "If an enemy knew that, they could release counter-sounds and leave a person completely blind."

"I understand that it's a personal question, but..." Nauda floated beside the Ichili woman and reached out, trying to brush her arm. "I thought that we were friends."

Fiyu gasped and flinched away, just slightly. It was a barely perceptible movement, but Nauda saw it and her face fell. She receded so quickly that Theo was afraid they'd all be thrown out of the soulhome, but instead she just floated gloomily in the corner of the room.

Even though it should have been annoying to him, Theo just found himself wishing that he had a way of mending the disagreement. He thought the two of them would get along, it was just difficult to pick worlds more socially different than Ichil and Tatian. Before he could think of anything to say, Fiyu turned around and sat formally.

"I think we will become friends, Nauda. But please be patient with me. From what I have seen of your world, you use that word very easily, as if a person can have dozens of friends." Fiyu shook her head at the absurd thought. "In all my life, I have only held one friend close to me. Touching is also... not commonly done, even among relatives. I recognize that you mean no harm, but I still find it alarming."

"I understand, Fiyu." The relief was obvious on Nauda's face, even in her hazy form. She moved closer, but before she could say more, Fiyu continued speaking.

"Both of you may become my friends one day. Until then, I... do not wish to offend you." Fiyu reached out and took Nauda's hands, though her own trembled as she did so. "I do not want you to think that I dislike you, or dislike people. Your communities here are very warm and loyal. But I... being in them for too long, or even being with you, I quickly grow weary. Last night I was merely tired, not upset with you."

"No, I really understand." Nauda wiped the corners of her eyes, clearly wanting to embrace the other woman and restraining herself. "Please just be patient with me too. You don't need to keep... pouring your heart out like this."

"Thank you." Fiyu rapidly withdrew her hands, but she was smiling again. Unfortunately, both of them then turned toward him, the somber atmosphere tightening around them.

"I don't want you to misunderstand either, Nauda, and get the impression that I dislike people." Theo knelt down and looked her directly in the eyes. "I hate people. People are the worst. They should die in a fire." He relaxed back and grinned. "But you two are okay."

Their laughter was brief but genuine. They sat in silence for a time, and it might have been awkward, but then Fiyu returned to her work. "Nauda, can you maintain open doors between us? Could we all soulcraft together and visit from time to time?"

Wiping her eyes again, Nauda slowly nodded. "I can't create doors like that, but you can tap me in the real world, or I can teach you to knock. It's actually pretty easy, here..."

As she went on to explain the exact technique, the heavy atmosphere finally lifted. Still, when Theo drifted back to his own soulhome, he found himself smiling.