Keynes woke up in the middle of the night. Anxiety slammed his chest like a fist of a giant. He was afraid that Willow Croft would find the twig from the rift and lock him up. An irrational thought, but one Keynes couldn’t get out of his head. He felt like something was wrong with him. His emotions were slowly descending into a black pit of panic. His photographic memory seemed to malfunction and he wasn’t sure what caused his ailment. Lord Earl pushed him to the brink of sanity, but opening the rift was another possibility.

That wrongness.

What if he suffered a backlash? How was he going to heal himself? Panic started gathering inside his mind. He got off his bed, switched the light on and poured a glass of water.

The panic lasted only for a few minutes and then he felt it, something switched inside his mind and he no longer felt fear. He was excited because he’d fooled them.

The twig was small and thin. It looked so ordinary it seemed unreal that this thing came from a different dimension. Keynes sat down and focused on it but no system message or table came. Either it didn’t possess it or Keynes’s Spirit attribute was too low.

Despite the failure to learn more, Keynes didn’t feel upset. He focused harder on the twig. There was something unusual about it. He couldn’t exactly pinpoint the difference as he didn’t have an ordinary twig to compare.

Remembering the burning caused by the rift essence he tried to work it out from there. The rift essence wasn’t visible and wasn’t hampered by clothes or armours. It also affected his entire body, evenly.

He tried to understand how the burning sensation affected him. Tests showed that his body had never been in better shape. So the rift essence wasn’t harmful. He pushed his mind harder again, propelled by curiosity and weeks of murderous training under Croft’s and Lord Earl’s supervision.

He remembered something he’d missed earlier. The rift essence briefly moved inside his body before it settled. Now, did it mean anything? He didn’t know, but he believed naively, that it did. He attempted at sensing the rift essence inside his body but found only an echo he couldn’t touch. It was faint…

At some point, Keynes fell asleep in a sitting position and with a twig from the rift on his lap.

A few hours later…

Kaito Ren switched the light on, waking him up. Keynes’s eyes protested, feeling full of sand.

“It’s not time yet,” he murmured. He had an alarm set at 8 a.m.

Kaito Ren stood with his arms behind his back, the red-haired man looked out of place in the white, pristine uniform.

“You’re working for the World Government now. You must meet our standards.”

Keynes’s mind felt like Swiss cheese. It was full of holes. For a second, he wondered, which prevailing emotion had him in its claws. He wasn’t afraid or curious, he just wanted to sleep. Laziness then. That wouldn’t be new. Keynes hated being lazy.

Before Keynes’s mental faculty fully recovered from the shadow of sleep. Kaito Ren noticed the twig.

“Is that what I think it is?”

Keynes’s eyes snapped open but he wasn’t afraid. He didn’t care.

“Yes, so what?”

“You failed to report it, why?” Kaito Ren’s face showed no anger.

“I guess it’s called stupidity. Didn’t learn anything anyway. You can have it.”

Kaito Ren picked up the twig from the bed. Saying nothing, he gestured to Keynes to dress up.

Five minutes later, they were on their way through the empty corridors. In all of this, Keynes failed to check the time. He absolutely needed a nap. But fate seemed to conspire against him and they entered a gym. The last place in the world he wished to be. He spun on the heel but Kaito Ren’s hand shot faster than a bullet and caught his shoulder.

“Have mercy, man, I need sleep.”

Mercy was in short supply it seemed because Kaito Ren pushed Keynes inside the gym and closed the door behind them.

“You must train.”

“Why?” Keynes countered immediately. He wondered if he shouldn’t just drop on the floor and sleep. “My body is already Level 1. What is the point of training it?”

For the first time today, Kaito Ren’s neutral mask cracked, then completely shattered and he began chuckling. Nothing violent but enough to rile Keynes up. And there it was again. Something switched inside Keynes’s mind and the mix of defiance and laziness evaporated like water poured on a blazing surface. Its place was taken by anger, pure and formless.

“And what’s so funny?” Keynes snapped.

This got a more serious reaction from Kaito Ren. Not that Keynes cared. Fury muddled his mind. The specialist pointed at a ring in a corner of the gym and Keynes huffed. If that arrogant punk wanted a beating Keynes would hand it over to him.

When Keynes’s foot touched the ring, Kaito Ren was already in the position, waiting.

With a growl, Keynes rushed the man.

A punch came out of nowhere, driving a breath out of Keynes’s lungs. He rasped, gasping for air.

What the hell was that? He will regret it.

Keynes jumped to his feet, ignoring the pain. He had never fought and remembering fighting movies didn’t matter. Without a muscle memory, a body was too slow to react to the threat. And so, another punch came, God knows from where, and drove Keynes into the floor.

“I thought you were stronger than this,” Kaito Ren said calmly as he circled Keynes.

“Don’t be so full of yourself!” Keynes roared. Kaito Ren waited until Keynes got up. He struggled to get back on his feet after just two punches from Level 3. This wasn’t right.

This time, Kaito Ren moved slower, allowing Keynes to see the full sequence before a punch connected with his face. It was considerably weaker than the previous two but enough to bring stars up.

Keynes dropped on the floor, his head spun. Anger was fleeting him, no other emotions took its place. Keynes was back and he regretted it, the anger at least had eased the pain.

“I surrender,” Keynes murmured.

“Good.”

“And I apologize for my behaviour.”

Kaito Ren acknowledged it but made Keynes stand in the centre of the ring. Keynes had a bad feeling about this. Luckily, another attack didn’t come.

“Doctors believe you may suffer from a split personality as your mind is trying to cope with trauma caused by the opening of the rift. According to them, this is a temporary ailment. We don’t hold this against you, although we must ensure that you aren’t exposed to the higher-ups. For them, it is often the perception that matters, not the truth. Don’t worry, I am here to shield you from them.”

“Thank you.”

Kaito Ren nodded in his calm way that Keynes started to envy. The man looked like nothing could perturb him.

“Will you report me for taking the twig from the rift?”

Kaito Ren shook his head, his eyes wandered a bit around the gym.

“There is no need for that. Croft and others have their share of samples taken from the rift. The initial tests showed that it is safe to take materials from the rift. They wouldn’t let you inside if it was any different.

“Now, let’s talk about why you must train your body even though you’re growing stronger with each Level.”

Yes. It didn’t make much sense at first. Attributes came from levelling up not from training, right?

The answer to this question was a bit more complex than Keynes expected.

“People who train hard, gain essence slower but upon levelling up, their strength is greater than others of the same Level.”

“Why… no, wait. I think I get it. Essence isn’t only some virtual progress toward another level. It’s more, right? It’s physical. It does something to our bodies. This… how many people know about this?”

Kaito Ren shrugged.

“It is not a big secret if you are asking about this. It is actually a reason why people do not train. Gaining essence is a gruesome and time-consuming process. People aren’t likely to cut on short-time benefits because of the long-time ones.”

“That’s… that’s so wasteful. Especially now, when we have a rift.”

Kaito Ren didn’t comment on that.

“Let’s start our first training.”

Their first session lasted only an hour and was focused on the evaluation of Keynes’s physical strength. He learned another disturbing thing by the end of the session, Level 1s weren’t equal despite popular belief. Kaito Ren didn’t want to or couldn’t go into details but he just said that two of the same Strength attributes rarely meant equal power.

It looked like the World Government had way more secrets stashed away than Keynes believed.

After the training, Keynes returned to his room, deep below the cavern. A shower later, he emerged from the room, deciding to walk around and learn as much as possible. It was only 7 a.m.! He had plenty of time before they were going to take him to another rift excursion. Being only sixteen and having no ongoing duties, Keynes managed to move around without obstructions. The scary soldiers who came with the President were no longer here.

The base itself wasn’t anything grand or complex. It assimilated a large cavern system and built itself around it. The lowest level of the base was off-limits. Above it, were living quarters, hundreds of them. On the same level was a gym, medical ward and… a bar. Above that were two levels of offices and laboratories. The corridors that linked them were wide—arteries of the base—and led to the control room, where Keynes couldn’t enter.

Right above the control room was the cavern with the rift. The guards who were stationed at the door leading to the rift didn’t let Keynes pass without Kaito Ren or someone else of his level. They explained to Keynes that his military rank was a recruit. Not even a proper rank. He asked them why he had a military rank even though he worked for the World Government.

Surprisingly, the soldiers turned out to be more than happy to grumble and complain.

The prevailing reason was bureaucracy and a messed up chain of command. Working for the World Government had its benefits but at the same time, it left plenty to desire. One thing that drove them crazy was that the World Government didn’t possess ranks and so they used the military ranks, which meant very little when it mattered.

He agreed with them. Lord Earl had told Keynes that he’d be reporting directly to Specialist Croft whereas the reality was completely different.

In a hushed voice, they added.

“Take, for example, Captain Ventura. A freaking Rank 6 and he is ordered around by specialists.”

Keynes realized that they were telling him too many things and bade them farewell.

He returned to his room as his stomach grumbled. Then grumbled because he stuffed it too much. It wasn’t enough to dampen his mood though. One thing that stuck in his head after the training session with Specialist Ren excited him. Somehow, there was a correlation between essence and body and Keynes felt like he was a step away from figuring it out. Most likely his photographic memory fed his creativity in this case. But for the first time, he noticed something else. When he was himself, he didn’t possess enough drive to sit down and focus. Curiosity and excitement were there but not strong enough. That was worrying. He believed himself to be industrious and it was a shocking discovery.

I have to figure something out. His memory stretched out, looking for solutions and he found a few. Still, procrastination wasn’t a joke.

At some point, Keynes relented and dropped on a chair. His mind focused inward, trying to touch the essence. The echo was gone. It meant no grind and it pleased him more than he liked.

Switch.

Anger came out of nowhere and Keynes raged at nothing in particular. Or maybe a bit at himself for being lazy. To vent his frustration, he went to the gym and worked himself until he couldn’t stand up. He had to ask soldiers in the gym to help him get back to his room. Yeah, they laughed so hard, they probably cracked their ribs.

To think that he’d step into Harter’s favourite pastime… It felt weird. Back in San Antonio, Keynes viewed a gym as a waste of time and place for losers. After working his muscles into a paste, Keynes’s anger subsided and eventually vanished. Once more, this strange ailment led him where he’d never go on his own.

So the question is, can I control this? Using the personality split to my benefit sounds like a good but risky idea. The last thing I want is my anger to resurface when I stay in front of Lord Earl.

Thinking about Harter reminded him about his family. The last couple of weeks were a blur. Hardly a moment to remember his parents and a brother.

I should send them a message, shouldn’t I?

He decided to talk to Kaito Ren later on about it. He closed his eyes and let his mind drift into sweet oblivi—

KNOCKING!

Keynes groaned, exhausted and suffering from the gym. When he didn’t move, hoping that whoever was on the other side of the door would leave him alone, the knocking sounded again, this time with more insistence.

“I’m coming,” Keynes mumbled, wincing pain away. What was their deal anyway? He still had a couple of hours before the rift recharged. Why did they come to bother him? The answer stood on the other side of the door in the form of a white-haired medium-aged man. A researcher judging by the uniform. A faint spiritual aura put him at the same Level as Keynes and Keynes for the first time wondered how others felt his aura.

“Hi!” the researcher said. “Keynes Kid I presume?”

For a brief moment, Keynes was tempted to lie to get a little of sweet sleep. But the man’s expression was so friendly and, in a way earnest, that he couldn’t do it. Fool.

“Yes.”

“Nice to meet you. My name is Murphy Polloc, I hoped you would spare a few minutes of your time.”

“I…”

Murphy Polloc didn’t wait for Keynes’s reply. He simply walked inside, taking a look around. Keynes was pretty sure that most living quarters were the same here. It was weird but he said nothing. Judging by the man’s behaviour he could be someone important. It was best to stay on his good side, right?

“How do you find the life in the underground base?”

Keynes shrugged then noticed that the man had his back to him so he replied, “I don’t really care. On the bright side, we have a rift to alleviate oppressive feelings.”

It was Keynes’s attempt at being funny. Murphy Polloc didn’t laugh, he simply nodded.

“That’s true. The rift could offer a form of respite for those of us spending too much time here.”

“Discounting the monsters,” Keynes added, hoping that the man would pick up the jest.

“Yes. The monster could pose an obstacle if one ventured into the rift alone, otherwise, our data shows no issues in dealing with the rift creatures.”

Okay. The man was all business. Fine. Maybe this was better. Keynes was exceptionally bad at small talk despite his photographic memory. He would rather cut to the chase and return to the bed. Unfortunately, Keynes’s boldness wasn’t up and by the nature of his character, he prefered staying in the shadows.

Murphy Polloc quickly picked up on the silence, proving to be skilful at reading a room.

“I came here to introduce myself and give you a bit of a roadmap going forward.”

Murphy Polloc glanced at Keynes, searching for a reaction. Keynes didn’t show any. He didn’t see a reason to be surprised. Murphy Polloc’s expression had that earnest, friendly angle that made Keynes feel at ease. For all Keynes knew, it could be the man’s Talent.

Without explaining himself, Murphy Polloc nodded to himself, coming to a conclusion known only to him.

“In the next week, I’d like to spend some time with you and learn more about your Talent and how it interacts with various objects.”

“What exactly is there to see?” Keynes asked, sounding intrigued. “All I can see is the Talent Interface.”

“Think a spider’s web and then imagine your Talent in the middle of the web. Every thread and cluster is a possible evolution of your Talent. Not to mention that understanding your own Talent and its interaction with other things can show you a different perspective.”

Now, this was bewildering.

“Talent can evolve?”

Keynes’s curiosity awakened with almost a physical shift, his tiredness forgotten. He just wanted to learn, or better, start tests right now. Murphy Polloc raised his hands, shaking his head.

“No. Talents don’t evolve but they can be upgraded.”

“Upgraded? How so?” Keynes didn’t remember a single credible source to mention Talent upgrades. Yes. Conspiracy theorists talked about upgrades but at the same time, they said it was possible to change a Talent.

“It is possible to upgrade a Talent at Level 5 but there isn’t much research done.”

“Why?” This didn’t make sense. So much knowledge to uncover… Curiosity threatened to overwhelm him.

“This base has currently only two Level 5s, one of them is a member of the High Parliament, Lord Waxilium Earl and the other one is some mysterious captain that no one knows much about. He also is difficult to work with, or so I heard. How do you make people like them take a part in your research?”

“Don’t they understand the necessity?”

“It’s not that. Random people do not gain Level 5. Even by military standards, only majors are required to be Level 5. That obviously adds mystery to the captain’s identity but shows how high in the social strata these individuals stand. They are in a position to refuse cooperation with us and there is nothing we can do about it. The High Parliament would never accede to our requests.”

Their selfishness baffled Keynes. If they worked together they would be able to understand the system so much better.

“Why don’t the researchers level up themselves then?”

“That’s a topic for another discussion. I am afraid I must return to my work now. I will alter your schedule for the next week so we can start working on your Talent. We can continue our discussion then.”

Filled with curiosity to the brim, Keynes was too restless to return to the bed. It didn’t matter that his body protested, he couldn’t afford to waste time.

Without the twig, he decided to poke around his Talent and learn more.