Author’s Corner: Hey everyone! The results of the poll are in, and once again you all surprised me with what you want! Don’t worry, getting this will not make him more OP than any other skill. Enjoy the chapter, as always!

While we were flying towards the asteroid belt, I decided to go ahead and specialize my Deus Ex body. Since this craft didn’t have any mining lasers or drills, I would turn my Deus Ex form into a mining body. After shifting over, I took a few moments to get over the disorientation of turning into a robot before I began buying upgrades. When I consulted with Celeste, she told me how to find the upgrade packages, which would often give free bonuses if you purchased the entire package.

Looking through, I found that there were five tiers of mining packages. They ranged from mining asteroids at the first tier, to mining entire moons or planets later on. Of course, they gradually became more expensive as well. The final mining package costed over a hundred upgrade points after buying the fourth one. The first package contained a basic mining laser and special inventory, which would automatically deposit any minerals I mine into it. The ‘free bonus’ from this package was getting a scanner to detect the location of ore veins.

Curious, I spent an extra ten upgrade points to unlock the second tier, which increased the power of the mining laser, the size of the ore inventory, the accuracy of the scanner, and also gave me an upgrade to my mana and mana regeneration. For this one, the ‘free bonus’ was a small upgrade inventory that I could store my laser in. The third tier of the mining package costed another twenty upgrade points. While I could afford it, I wanted to wait until I actually needed it. With the first two tiers, I should already be easily able to mine asteroids.

With that taken care of, I decided that it was time for a lesson with Celeste on a different matter, so reverted to my elf form and went to find her. To my surprise, she was not on the bridge, but in one of the bedrooms laying down and reading a holographic book. When she saw me enter, she gave a brief shout of surprise and the book vanished. Didn’t she already see me coming through the link?

She smiled slightly at that. “I wasn’t really paying attention to the links, sorry. Got distracted… So, what’s up?”

“I was hoping that you could help me understand my psychic power. I recently gave myself one after studying the auras of psychic humans.”

She nodded her head, sitting up on the bed. “Alright, but for this you should switch to a human body. While any race ‘can’ possess psychic talent, elves aren’t as strong with it as humans.” After she spoke, I quickly changed my body to that of a psychic human. “Okay, now, there are several different kinds of psionic abilities. Most of them aren’t as simple as telepathy, telekinesis, and the like. While they do have those abilities as aspects, they are… broader, you could say.”

“For instance, after I saw that you learned the psychic aura, I added information about it to my research list. One of the most common psychic powers among humans would be called ‘Manifestation’. While on the surface, this seems to resemble basic telepathy, it allows the user to manifest objects with their will.”

“Now, although psychic powers do not use mana, they have their own cost that must be paid. At first, you will feel a mild headache, which becomes a terrifying migraine if you continue exerting your power. If you stubbornly refuse to stop even at that point, blood vessels in your head begin to rupture, causing you to bleed from every orifice on your head. Naturally, the cost that comes after that, for those who refuse to stop, is a painful death.”

I winced slightly as she described these. Most likely, I’d have to go through many headaches before I trained it to the point where I could use the basic version of whatever ability I had freely. “Is there any way to tell what my psychic power is?”

“Well, if we had the equipment. I can make a basic scanner for your psychic power with some of the leftover metal in your grove. Since there were too many types of powers, with new ones being born regularly, I won’t be able to tell you exactly what it is. I will be able to tell you the general type, however. Following that, when you first practice it, you will unlock it as a skill that names and defines your power.”

I nodded my head. “How long will you need to build the scanner?”

“Just a few hours. I already have the plans for it saved, and the workstation doesn’t have anything else it’s working on right now. Until then, don’t try to force it to activate. If you do, you might try something well beyond your ability, and get the heaviest price.”

After saying that, Celeste had me absorb her into my grove so that she could get started on the scanner. Meanwhile, I began cultivating another of my basic affinities, focusing on Void Affinity this time. Though I was unable to make any real progress before Celeste let me know she was done, every little bit helps.

When Celeste appeared in front of me, she was holding a small metal object, like a handheld metal detector. “Okay. With this, I should be able to see what type of power you have.” She held the scanner up to my head and pressed a button. There were several beeps for a while before it settled down. “Hmm… spatial distortion type. So it should be some kind of power based on teleportation. That’s one of the hardest to train, really. But it doesn’t include any clairsentience, so it isn’t meant for long range teleporting. Alright, I think I have just the thing! Pull a rock out of your grove, just a small one. We need to measure your power.”

I shrugged, and did as she asked, pulling a pebble out of my grove and holding it in my right hand before she continued. “Next, try to channel energy from your brain into the pebble. It will feel different than mana, but similar. Both driven by thought and focus, but this is fueled by the mind instead of the soul.”

I nodded, and did my best to follow what she said. I could already feel a small headache forming as I focused all of my attention on the rock. Soon, it was as if I felt a transparent bubble around the rock. Out of curiosity, I tried moving it, and found that the rock did not move with it. So, instead I created another one in my other hand. With this, my headache was starting to get a bit worse, but as soon as I thought about it, the two orbs linked, and the rock appeared in my left hand. However, at that time, the headache I had been feeling rose dramatically, to the point where the ambient lights in Celeste’s room hurt.

“Eeks… looks like your power is really draining.” Celeste spoke softly as she dimmed the lights. I tried to use my healing spell on myself, but found that it wouldn’t work. “I’ll teach you a formula to relieve psychic stress later.” After that, she went quiet for roughly a half hour until my headache subsided. When it did so, I found that there was a floating blue window in front of me.

New Skill Unlocked!Psychic Power: Toybox - Beginner Level 1

Exp: 0.4%

A rare and undervalued psychic power, this ability functions by linking two separate spaces, and transferring any phenomena within one to the other. Difficulty is determined by the size of the linked spaces, the distance they are apart, and the amount of matter or energy travelling between them.

“Got any information on this one…?” I looked to the Deus Ex, who shook her head.

“No. I didn’t bother looking up the more rare powers, because like I said there were too many. I was hoping you’d end up with a common variant, like Blink or Translocation, even Reverse Summon.”

I sighed, slowly standing up. “Well, so far, moving a rock from one hand to the other is enough to give me a massive migraine for half an hour.”

“Actually, I think you might be able to do quite a bit more with it, now that we know what it is. From the description of the skill, it is meant to function as a two dimensional portal, rather than enclosing an object. Try again, but this time only create two small discs and link them before dropping the rock through.”

I was a bit hesitant on this, but it was a new power, and I wanted to test it out too. So, I did as she asked. When I linked the two portals, I felt a slight headache, but not as bad as it had been before. Celeste leaned down and picked up the rock, dropping it where the first portal was. Immediately, the headache flared up, but still not as bad as before. At least at first. Apparently, the sides of the portals were linked wrong, so down became up for the falling rock, which then fell back through the portal and into Celeste’s hand above the first. While one pass might not have hurt much, two did.

Thankfully, she gave me plenty of time for my headache to subside before she spoke up. “Thankfully, you already have most of the materials you need for the psychic stress relief formula. The last material is a fairly common flower found on desert planets. I’ll see if I can find any on the scanner while we’re heading to Gerin. Until then, don’t practice with anything bigger than that rock, not until you are able to create the portals and pass it through with nothing more than a minor headache. And whatever you do, don’t change forms until you have fully recovered from the strain. The slight differences in brain chemistry could cause irreversible damage.”

“...You know, just once I’d like to get an awesome power that has almost no drawbacks… Wouldn’t that be fun?” I shook my head with a sigh, thanking her and walking out so that she could read her book again. Meanwhile, I went off to find Yang and Yo. Sharon would be able to take care of herself for a while, but those two… I wasn’t really sure.

I didn’t have to look long to find Yo, who was still fully engrossed in playing a game of asteroids on the bridge console. Thankfully, Celeste didn’t seem to be letting her do anything that would damage the ship, just play games. As for Yang… I found her huddled up in one of the rooms, sitting on a bed while curled into a ball. Her wings wrapped around the front of her body, and I could tell that she was not comfortable flying like this.

“You alright?” I asked her as I moved to sit next to her, making Yang jump slightly.

She quickly shook her head back and forth. “No… I don’t like this….”

I nodded, patting her shoulder. The simple contact seemed to calm her down slightly. “Do you want me to take you into the grove?”

The demi looked at me hopefully, quickly nodding her head. “Yes please… I’m sorry… I don’t want to be a burden….”

I patted her head for a moment, calming her down again. “You’re not being a burden. I haven’t taken you with me on any flights before.” I did my best to smile reassuringly to her. She nodded her head shakily, and leaned forward to give me a hug before I sent her into the grove.

My next stop, naturally, was to find Sharon and see how she was doing. I was not surprised to find that she was taking this far better than Yang was… What I was surprised was that she was not wearing pants, dancing in her room with music blaring. These walls are incredibly soundproof... She was just dancing in the middle of the room in a long t-shirt, laughing as Chrome stood on the bed doing his best attempt to dance to the music as well. As soon as I opened the door, Jasmine ran out of the room to escape the noise.

Apparently seeing that her kitten had run off, Sharon turned towards the door, and found me watching her. I could see as he face gradually turned more and more red, before she slowly walked up to the door and pushed a button to close it without a single word. “Celeste..?”

“Yes, John?” I heard the voice coming from the ship’s intercom.

“Why wasn’t that door locked?”

“Who said it wasn’t?” There was a faint giggle from the AI’s voice, and I felt like I had just been pranked.