After the burst of gravity element, Rune was fixed on the ground, he tried to lift his arms, legs, tried to roll his body, but the overcharged gravity element was just too strong, totally immobilizing him.

The culprit took back control of the situation and didn’t deprive himself of this ultimate opportunity to escape from the horrendous bubble that took away its perception and hosted an annoying little thing with a burst of momentum.

The gravity trap continued to take effect for a few seconds before Rune was released from its grasp, and it coincided with the moment a fourth monster appeared.

‘It’ll soon be time to go then…’

Judging the situation, he didn’t see any way the situation wouldn’t degenerate into a mess. They had tried before to find ways to pit one monster against another forcefully in hope of resolving this type of situation, but long gone was the time such a simple solution was easily applicable.

They also didn’t really need it, in a nutshell, they could use their relatively small size to become slippery targets and escape any potential chaos.

Astryde and Arik seemed to have come to the same conclusion as him as they slowly disengaged with their respective monster and closed in on his bubble in a practiced way, it wasn’t their first time after all.

When nothing special happened as they prepared their retreat slash escape, like a monster using space element, or one preparing a huge bomb, the two entered the bubble that slowly started to fly up.

Again in a practiced manner, the two waited for Rune to grab them before they themselves grabbed him, allowing them to follow the escaping bubble with all their speed despite having effectively become blind.

The 4 monsters didn’t take long to adapt to their new circumstances as they started fighting each other, seeking to become stronger and gain EP.

This encounter lasted nearly half an hour, a very average time, and it finished in a very average way, with the arrival of a fourth monster.

Overall, it was a good way to start their travel towards site 58, their last stop.

And though the fact that Rune’s cohesion was still taking on a pale green tint, a sign of it resisting an environment wind ether, worried him a bit, he could do nothing but move on and note down how it changed as time passed.

…

In a newly built reinforced concrete building at the center of the Undecided Training Park.

On the last floor or the 4th one, in a big windowed bay that was being used as an office, Adreana was stretching and restraining a yawn that threatened to escape her mouth.

Once her body was back in her control, she swept away the current project that was displayed on her screen and allowed herself to feel relieved.

“And that’s a minor partnership done, only 99 to go.”

Growing a successful company had not been part of her plan. Not at all.

As a Pachin, her parents taught her to love exploring new planets, love designing efficient and optimized FTL engines, and made her idolize those who partook in any exploration-related projects at the seam of known space.

Maybe that was due to them being from a traditional Pachin family that upheld ancient values and them working in the previous Pachin’s Exploratory Front.

But there was a reason she joined the Undecided and didn’t leave halfway. She didn’t have an identity crisis, her relationship with her parents wasn’t negative, neither was she restrained by her family, she also wasn’t forced to marry someone…

She only came to understand, like all the Undecided had, that sometimes the conclusion to something one perceived as mildly inconsequential, like making new friends in a weird new information board’s private forum of weirdos, was in fact the start of something completely new.

It was just natural.

Before the Ether Law awoke, she was a junior in her father’s exploration unit of the Pachin’s Exploratory Front, learning all the tricks of the trade from much more senior employees, as dedicated to the exploration cause as she was then.

As she recalled how her father’s unit came to a stop and announced a break to ensure their safety in the face of the new reality, and how all her family easily transitioned to it, she nearly made an impulsive call to her father.

Only to remember he was probably unreachable. As was probably her mother. They were probably lost in the wilderness.

And also, she had a lot of work to do.

Without saying anything, she decided to switch from furthering partnerships to investigating investments, she felt like it so she did it.

Hundreds of profiles instantly appeared on her screen, and she saw that for the majority, Utopia had already passed over and gave some thoughts. Only the most recent ones were Utopia-free.

“What a workaholic…”

Be it in the partnerships category, the investments category, or even the affiliations category, he was present everywhere.

Going over the few Utopia-free investment projects took the better part of an hour.

Opposite to him, she had to use her experience to judge, check the guide to see if something was tried and true, check online if there wasn’t already a community around a particular study… She had to repeat the same operation for each investment’s plan.

People with unique specialization ideas that need EP to accelerate their growth were low-risk.

People who wanted to open or expand their own establishment and needed EP were medium-risk.

People with weird talents were high-risk.

People who told their life story, more often than not a tragic one, were unknown-risk.

The IGS economy department loved to see EP flow everywhere, Astryde only read a bit about how EP management was a tricky subject as only entities could carry EP and they couldn’t be stocked somewhere secure.

Once she finished actualizing the investments category, she decided to take a slight break and turned on an accelerated news channel on a screen at the side of her office. She didn’t want to take her time listening to people talking too slowly for her.

Praise be to the people who created all the “accelerated” channel designations.

The latest situation that everyone was talking about, or more like, the sociologists talked about, was the budding factionalization of the different government instances.

It was a complex word to describe a simple real situation: Politics.

The flow of immigrants from their native dimensions was unending, the administrative power and manpower needed to keep the order was similarly unending, so problems appeared, and AI core, the miraculous panacea to the situation, wasn't even close to the after-conception planning stage.

So people started to have ideas about how to resolve the situation, and some ideas needed more resources than others, and some ideas contradicted each other, and…

It was also unending.

Add to that a bit of flame fanning by statisticians who released very advanced and fact-supported graphs that explained how more than 99% of crimes were committed by sapients coming from recently integrated minor civilizations…

And that the crime rate was increasing by the day…

Some things were happening, that’s what Astryde understood, and the sociologists loved to talk about it. They loved bringing up pre-Ether Law sociology models to find the differences, what changed, and why it changed like that.

This sort of half-serious, half-comedic, and half-pedagogic programs were a thing she was very fond of, like a lot of other people a priori, looking at the scrolling data tape at the side informing her of the current audience listening or watching this program.

It was then that she received a message from a contact she classified under her “important” category, meaning they were able to go through even her sleep state, where she didn’t want to be interrupted.

[Arik: Just left site 41, Astryde learned a bit more about how to be a time watcher, Rune did something crazy, I’m closing in on succeeding on my own path. I’ll send a video containing everything we went through when we reach the next site. Predicted travel time is 2 weeks at minimum.]

It was Arik, sending a message to probably every Undecided and friend of his that could be reached apart from the two that were with him as of now.

He was the only one sending back news that they were still alive, to the surprise of no one apparently as expecting Astryde or Rune to send news back was unimaginable unless the situation became exceptional on their part or they were asked to.

Drowsily watching the news program, she felt that she was reaching her limit. Her spirit needed to sleep and small cracks had already started to appear under the effects of her perpetual momentum training.

It just so happened that night was falling in this region, so she easily accepted that it was time for her to go to sleep.

As for the hundreds of prospective partnerships she still had to go through?

That was a worry for future Astryde, not present Astryde.

…

*Ding* Cohesion: Specialized Endless Adaptation reached Tier 1 Level 7

The pale green tint that covered Rune simply vanished one day, leaving behind a last leveling notification.

With it departed the opportunity to level his endless adaptation a bit more, but for it to have only gained 2 levels in total, it meant the wind ether really wasn’t that effective.

The wind speed he had continued to measure had kept decreasing over a period of 1 week, until that moment, when they reached around half the distance between site 41 and site 58, where the wind stopped causing a reaction from his endless adaptation.

It happened mid-fight, so he took a cursory glance at his connected screen to know the time, only to remember that he was a crazy nutjob and all direct time indicators had been deactivated or hidden.

He had even been very thorough in doing it.

Faced with the choice of disturbing his friends to ask for something as useless as the current time or waiting and missing a few minutes of precision, the choice was automatically done and he continued to kindly take care of the monster wanting to kill him.

A week of intense fights had only given him a few more percent of efficiency in some places, nothing that could revolutionize his style, so it was like nothing had changed.

‘Calmer? It’s really hard to read behavior like this… Does it have something to support this behavior or is it just its natural disposition?’

Well, nothing had changed in his style, but he still had to occupy his non-existent brain that never wanted to settle down on not thinking when it had computational capacity left to spare.

Now that his strength gave him a minimum of safety, he found himself daydreaming in the middle of a slow and steady fight more and more.

And what could he do to occupy his mind that didn’t need to use 200% of its focus at all times to survive an encounter with a normal average monster in a tier 4 heartland?

The answer was very straightforward.

It all came back to what he was always doing, fighting monsters, except he was also studying them while he was at it, coming back to the behavior analysis he had started to do before they arrived at site 41.

All in all, he was refining his study of the bone monsters while fighting them.

Soon enough, a fourth monster decided to join the fray and the 3 expertly started their retreat.

The number of times their expert retreat had been interrupted could be counted on the fingers of one of Rune’s bony hands, and they all involved things they literally couldn’t do anything against, at least not for now.

This time didn’t appear to be an exception, and for Rune it could even be described as the most normal retreat: No monsters interrupting them, no monsters able to see them, no leveling notifications awaiting.

That’s how most fights ended, and keeping it that way was their main objective once they entered the unknown ground.

With the break resulting from their successful retreat, Rune took the time to make a mark in his observation document, and that sealed the matter of the weird environmental wind ether “attack”.

A few minutes later, a monster entered his perception sphere and with a sufficient distance from the previous fight, he automatically descended upon it, engaging in a fight with it by shaving off what felt like a few thousand armor.

And that started yet another stop that took close to half an hour.

Rinse and repeat.

Again and again.

…

*Ding* Physical Fundamental: Fighting Instinct reached Tier 4 Level 23

*Ding* Physical Fundamental: Body Control reached Tier 4 Level 24

*Ding* Energy Fundamental: Energy Compression reached Tier 4 Level 24

*Ding* Energy: Specialized Cosmic Mist Element reached Tier 3 Level 19

*Ding* Cohesion: Specialized Cohesion Infusion reached Tier 4 Level 38

*Ding* Energy Compression: Provided Energy Defense reached Tier 3 Level 14

*Ding* Energy Compression: Provided Energy Structure reached Tier 3 Level 14

*Ding* Energy Compression: Provided Energy Armor reached Tier 3 Level 14

*Ding* Energy Compression: Provided Quick Compression reached Tier 3 Level 6

*Ding* Body Control: Provided Humanoid Body reached Tier 3 Level 7

*Ding* Body Control: Provided Prolonged Body Use reached Tier 3 Level 7

‘Ah! The cycle is a bit late but as long as I reached it before we arrived at site 58, everything’s fine!’

Already, signs of them entering a security perimeter were becoming obvious. Fewer monsters being the most relevant one.

After close to 2 months of active traveling through the bone region from site to site, the last 2 weeks sharpened their instinct about what was “normal” and “abnormal”, so if they didn’t know they were nearing a security perimeter, they would have asked some questions about why monsters were missing.

‘I’ll wait until we reach site 58 properly before doing my level cycling, it’ll be a good way to start my last big break.’

Procrastinating on reporting his tier 4 and 3 levels, he did other things like thinking about life and stuff while waiting for the next monster, which appeared 10 minutes later.

But it wasn’t alone.

It was being ganged up on by a team of humanoids wearing patroller uniforms.

‘Well, well, what do we have here?’

Arriving close to the battlefield a bit more than 10 seconds later, he landed and let his bubble scatter by itself, giving their perception back to Arik and Astryde, allowing them to understand the situation by themselves.

“Welcome to Rune’s Bone Safari, here’s a perfect example of how the patroller monster squad hunts for their food, the prey has no choice but to comply. Their most obvious advantage is their intelligence and teamwork…”

Feeling like it, Rune continued to make a safari parody while the patroller squad was finishing off the poor bone monster that had the misfortune to enter the security perimeter of site 58.

“What does it feel like for you? To know we’ll soon be left to ourselves completely? Back to using ether towers to get an internet connection and scan lots of areas?” He finished his parody by asking this question.

“Nothing special,” Arik summarily replied with a matter-of-fact tone.

“Excitement for discovering new sites, anxiety about not discovering even one,” Astryde showed her goal openly, she was here first and foremost for time rewinding.

“I totally agree with Sir Arik,” Rune said, “Taking everything as they come is the best way to adventure, no expectations equal no disappointment.”

Arik nodded at the same time as Rune did for his own answer, the two looked like the perfect picture of wise adventurers who had seen enough in their life, trying to teach the young and ambitious Astryde to be more humble.

“They’re finished, let’s join them,” she however didn’t seem receptive to their earnest teaching and changed the subject in a matter of seconds as she left by herself.

“Young people these days, sigh…”

The two ultimately didn’t continue their old adventurer's acts and followed behind her as the patroller squad waited for them after they finished their fight.

Same as the two previous times, and probably for the last time, Rune gave their identity data chip, confirmed they were themselves, and received a direction for where the site was in exchange.

After the squad left, leaving them to go to the site in total autonomy, he couldn’t help but make a comparison between the lone scout they encountered at site 19 and now this whole squad who seemed to have the same job.

“You think this site is still in the process of cleaning and expanding its security perimeter? Seems a bit far-fetched, no?” He made a random late deduction.

“Site 58 has been established a few months ago, they finished cleaning it a while ago, maybe there’s been an upsurge in monsters?” Astryde forwarded her knowledge and adjusted his reasoning.

“Mmh… Yeah. Let’s go?” He didn’t feel like thinking about it anymore.

Once they neared the first protection dome they were let in by a guide, then they were led to the much smaller second dome that hosted the true archeological site.

They didn’t make a special schedule or anything like that, they simply acted as they did in the previous 2 sites, with each going to do their own things.

The first thing Rune did was find and create his own chill haven far from the tumults of the site’s life, opening his masteries to actualize his progression note document.

Masteries

Tier 1 Masteries

Physical Fundamental: Reinforcement: Tier 4 Level 44

Physical Fundamental: Fighting Instinct: Tier 4 Level 23

Physical Fundamental: Body Control: Tier 4 Level 24

Energy Fundamental: Fine Manipulation: Tier 4 Level 39

Energy Fundamental: Grand Manipulation: Tier 4 Level 39

Energy Fundamental: Energy Compression: Tier 4 Level 24

Spiritual Fundamental: Perception Control: Tier 4 Level 6

Spiritual Fundamental: Awareness Division: Tier 4 Level 38

Spiritual Fundamental: Momentum Manipulation: Tier 4 Level 15

Tier 2 Masteries

Energy: Specialized Cosmic Mist Element: Tier 3 Level 19

Cohesion: Specialized Cohesion Infusion: Tier 4 Level 38

Cohesion: Specialized Endless Adaptation: Tier 1 Level 7

Tier 3 Masteries

Energy Compression: Provided Energy Defense: Tier 3 Level 14

Energy Compression: Provided Energy Structure: Tier 3 Level 14

Energy Compression: Provided Energy Armor: Tier 3 Level 14

Tier 4 Masteries

Energy Compression: Provided Quick Compression: Tier 3 Level 6

Body Control: Provided Humanoid Body: Tier 3 Level 7

Body Control: Provided Prolonged Body Use: Tier 3 Level 7

‘Level 44 reinforcement, one level in 2 weeks… My grand and fine manipulation are still keeping up thanks to my cosmic mist bubble and different tests, one level every… 3 weeks? My training schedule works, but the difference is still 2 times, 2 levels in my active fundamentals for 1 in my passive or half-active… Not even bringing up my perception control fundamental…’

He was so used to doing it that he breezed through the procedure he created himself in under 5 minutes. He didn’t go much further nonetheless as he didn’t feel like it, so he stopped at recording his leveling without going further.

‘Don’t feel like continuing… Not really that motivated or inspired to work on my intent, or-’

An idea for what he wanted to do appeared in his mind.

‘I’m in fact very motivated to work on my intent.’

He thanked his past self for having the genius idea of making sure to separate everything neatly, allowing him to never hesitate when he had a stupid idea, and opened his bait note document.

‘It’s just not my cosmic mist intent. I gathered and wrote down so many stupid ideas to test for my bait that soon, it’ll reach critical mass and I’ll never want to open this doc again. Let’s get to it.’