Randidly rubbed the bridge of his nose as he walked out of the training area and looked up toward the sky. Low clouds hung overhead, slowly building into a rainstorm. A cool wind brushed Randidly’s cheek. I guess it’s better that I realize now that this is becoming a problem. My personal significance turns out to be nothing compared to how much a group can accumulate…

But I suppose that makes sense. Nether is the energy of connection. When it is shared, it flows much more efficiently. My Nether Nebula should be able to continue grinding away for a little while longer, although it might not be comfortable. Which means I’m once more faced with the problem of figuring out how to make a Nether Class…

Randidly pursed his lips as he thought. Three ideas came to mind for proceeding forward. The first was relying on his recently acquired Fatepiece, the Visage of Obsession, to try and intuit how a Nether Class would work by staring at the Visage. It was, after all, a rather strange Fatepiece designed to remove preconceived notions and solve problems.

However, two things stopped him. First, he was wary of the fact that its usage could only be delayed, never stopped. That, combined with the hints that there would be a price for using it while Randidly was in the middle of it, meant that it wasn’t an option that he would easily choose. Plus, it would undoubtedly be more effective to use that method once he had more information regarding Nether.

With more legitimate understanding, having an epiphany would be exponentially more likely.

Therefore, Randidly focused on the other two ideas. The first was proceeding more deeply into the hollow ‘Web’ at the core of the Nexus and seeing if he could perceive the edges of that horrible mass of significance that was present below. Randidly was even more curious about that significance after his current experience with Nether Sickness. Perhaps the reason why the Nether he could sense was so stagnant was because that half-formed baby was stalled out in a similar way? Its body couldn’t withstand the significance that was being given to it?

That thought caused Randidly to shiver. Perhaps what was currently happening with his Nether Nebula was closer to what happened to Elhume’s body. The uncontrolled weight of his own significance might eventually suffocate him.

The other idea was to contact Vualla. She should have been deployed to the Fifth Cohort and would be fighting against the Nether. Not only could Randidly reassure himself about the state of Vualla, but he might also be able to observe Nether forces there and intuit the way Nether could be used. After all, his ability to understand Nether had increased quite a bit since he had last been exposed to true Nether forces.

Even seeing a Nether Beast might be inspiring. Randidly felt an odd temptation to capture one and try and understand it, although he was slightly wary about how close that would come to experimentation on a live subject.

Nodding to himself, Randidly stretched. Then he gestured lightly with his hand and began to form the familiar Nether Ritual. With his Nether seeming to reach the limit of Nether density he could achieve, it was somewhat more difficult to shape it as he wished. But Randidly was in no real rush; the recruits probably wouldn’t throw another chunk of significance like that at him for another few weeks. So if he shaped slowly, so be it.

He took his time making the ritual, really focusing on the details of its construction. And although the material was slightly misbehaving, Randidly also observed the way that his intent flowed perfectly through the branching weaves of the ritual without any entropy. Honestly, he wouldn’t really have described the process like that before now, but now that he experienced the thicker Nether, the connection was just so overwhelmingly superior that he couldn’t help but be shocked the fidelity of intent.

Maybe the reason it’s so difficult to control is that it’s so much more like me, Randidly thought wryly as he put the finishing touches on the Nether Ritual.

Congratulations! Your Skill Nether Ritual (A) has grown to Level 180!

When he finished, he instantly activated it. The sensation of tunneling through space and time to reach Vualla was slightly intoxicating. In a way, Randidly felt like his consciousness was truly traveling through the intervening substance of the universe, rather than just arriving at Vualla like he usually did. The journey the Ritual took was as roundabout as usual, still as secretive-

Two eyes like inverted white triangles against a black backdrop, perfectly even along the edges, with a small blue orb floating in the middle-

But as soon as he felt the vertigo and the Nether Ritual turned strange, Randidly hissed and ripped the woven Nether in front of him to shreds. The connection was barely flickering to life when it was already destroyed. Even still, Randidly staggered back into the training area and spat out a mouthful of blood. His head began to pound as he unsteadily allowed himself to settle down on his haunches.

In the split second that the Ritual had almost connected to Vualla, Randidly felt a sudden and overwhelming pull sideways. Or rather, the thread of his Nether had been caught up in an immense whirlpool of Nether that engulfed the surrounding area. Randidly had then ripped through the fabric of the Nether Ritual, but not before he briefly connected with the incorrect target.

The Nether King looked at Randidly for the briefest fraction of time, seemingly just as surprised as Randidly had been to see each other. Then, without any hesitation, the Nether King had lashed out with a pitch-black lance of significance. The weight and casual power of the attack had been what inflicted most of the damage on Randidly and left him with a lingering headache. His Nether Nebula buzzed, but honestly, it began then to pick up speed; that attack had loosened some of the tightness Randidly was experiencing.

As his body and Nether Nebula rapidly began healing from the blow, Randidly directed a wry smile at the ceiling fo the training area. He used his foot to close the door behind him so no one would wander upon him like this. Next to him, the blood he spat out sizzled on the ground. “Shit… I should have seen that coming…”

Although the Xyrt Brigade might not be familiar with Nether Rituals, there was no way that the Nether forces didn’t utilize them. Perhaps the entirety of the Nether army’s communication was based on the fabric of Nether Rituals. He was a fly that had wandered into a massive web and was foolish enough to be surprised when the spider turned up. If the Nether King hadn’t been so shocked by the connection or Randidly had been a hair slower in severing it...

With a sigh, Randidly shrugged that thought off. Because he still had more important realizations to face.

“Although its shape and the flow of its Nether are entirely different…” Randidly muttered. “That… I’m almost positive that Nether King in the Fifth Cohort is the same one I briefly interfered with at the frontlines. Everything that happened since then… all of the Nether attacks... Am I responsible for those…?”

The muscles around Randidly’s heart tightened. The figure of Ki-Kunot briefly flickered in front of his gaze. Then he remembered the grainy texture of the wooden handle of his shovel as he dug graves along the Hallat River. His emotions, which the Stillborn Phoenix was refining every day, seethed and roiled like a boiling cauldron in his chest. Each was a serpent shocked awake by a loud noise, alarmed and aggressive. But eventually, Randidly pressed his eyes closed and shook his head. He refused to allow himself to go down that Path.

Plus, although none of this could have happened if he didn’t influence the knot of Nether that bound the Nether King, he wasn’t the Nether King. He couldn’t be held responsible for all the destruction that the Nether King had wrought since their paths had crossed.

But it’s hard to be confident about that. Randidly grimaced. If someone knowingly released a terrorist because it was the right thing to do, they would likely hold some culpability toward what happened afterward…

Again, Randidly distracted himself from those thoughts; his emotions were already difficult enough to control as it was, he didn’t need to dwell on upsetting subjects to pass the time. But this time, the new topic was also rather depressing. It seemed that it would be even more difficult to contact Vualla on the frontlines than it had been in the Xyrt Brigade training facility. She was now in an active warzone. Both sides would be on their guard for spying attempts. Especially now that Randidly had been caught red-handed by the Nether King.

He could send a message, of course. But that was just much less satisfying. And Vualla had been abysmal about replying to messages through the entire time they had known each other.

Further reflection was interrupted by the door opening. Helen paused and looked over at Randidly, the pool of blood next to him, and the sparking training sphere, which apparently now was shorting out due to a mistake Randidly had made during his most recent adjustments.

She closed the door behind her and walked over to crouch down next to him. “You get mugged?”

“Yup,” Randidly responded as cheerily as he could manage. The combination of the heavy sense of guilt toward the attack on the Fifth Cohort and the helpless impotence he felt in regards to contacting Vualla meant that he couldn’t do a very good job of fooling Helen. But his longtime companion simply glanced at him, then shook her head in mock sorrow.

“This means work for me. I guess I’ll go find a mop.” Helen pushed off her knees and stood with a determined expression on her face.

Randidly’s mouth twisted at that. “What, Overseer Helen going soft? From what I hear about you these days, you should be making recruits clean up the mess with their tongues.”

“Normally I would. But it’s somewhat different when the blood is your blood, and the humanity that its presence reveals will take some of the bite out of the ominous persona you’ve been developing.” Helen flicked her wrist twice and procured a literal mop from her interspatial ring. “So it falls to me to be the one to mop everything up.”

“You don’t need to tell them its my blood,” Randidly countered playfully. He knew it was meaningless, but talking with Helen did distract him from some of his darker thoughts. Then he paused and frowned. “Wait, do you keep cleaning supplies in your interspatial ring?”

“I’m more concerned that you don’t.” Then Helen snorted and pointed at the spots on the floor where the blood continued to sizzle and spit. The reinforced tiles were beginning to corrode. “You think I can give a recruit a mop and tell him not to think too deeply about whose blood this is? Have you met anyone else whose blood corrodes metal? Jesus, I bet the dumb fucks would try eating it… as though a stomach of all things could absorb someone’s image...”

That forced a genuine chuckle out of Randidly. “You could just wait until it eats its way through the entire Rally Station. Then the recruits could come in here and fill in the hole. Have we trained our recruits in the use of quick-drying cement yet? Might as well put it on the agenda.”

“We’ll have the drywall hung around these Nether Beasts before they can even sneeze,” Helen shook her head in amusement. Then she glared at Randidly as she pressed her mop against the offending blood. “Of course we can’t do that. The fucking rumors that I hear about you when the recruits don’t think anyone’s listening… This is just the sorta shit that will get them to gossip, caustic blood? Ugh… and if I’m being honest… It’s not just the recruits.”

Helen didn’t elaborate on that and instead moved to rub the mop against the sizzling blood on the ground. But she really didn’t have to explain. Randidly’s expression shifted as he sighed. He levered himself up onto his elbow and watched the cleaning process. Within only a few seconds, smoke was wafting upward from the wiping portion of the mop.

Randidly shook his head. “...what are you even doing?”

“Trying to cheer you up,” Helen said, surprising Randidly. She scratched her cheek. “Tatiana told me that you are surprisingly weak to silly shit. So. Here I am.”

Then she continued to mop. The moment seemed strangely surreal, with Helen continuing to scrub the tool against the ground and ignoring the fact that her implement was slowly disintegrating. She hadn’t even used water, just rubbed the mop directly against the blood. The sizzling grew louder; compared to the tiles, the mop head was made of much less durable materials. She scrubbed harder, only seeming to spread the dangerous blood out across the ground and worsen the problem.

Very soon, Randidly was laughing aloud. He didn’t like that Tatiana and Helen had believed it necessary they prepare to cheer him up. He liked even less that they had been correct. He waved his hand and the Stillborn Phoenix paused in its breathing to suck up his blood. Gradually, the sizzling ceased, leaving the only sound in the room to be Randidly’s chuckles.

“Tatiana’s so much better than the soft stuff,” Helen announced. “Next time you get moody, unless you want a spar, you’ll be on your own. So… take care of yourself.”

“Thanks,” Randidly said very seriously. He could feel Helen’s complex emotions hanging between them. Then he flashed Helen a cheeky smile. “But… didn’t I already take care of the blood problem on my own…? It’s not like this time you-”

Helen pressed her lips together and broke the wooden handle of her broom across Randidly’s back, earning his raucous laughter.