Sebastian Stain was busy as he got the tower back in order. Nimh’s rampage had left quite a bit of damage which needed fixing up.

Stain's E Rank's that had hidden from Nimh and Keira were put to work and in quick order, the Tower was tidied up. Though repairs would have to be put underway at a later date. Resources were scarce in the undercity

Outside of righting his home, Sebastian got to work rebuilding. The undercity districts that had been controlled by the gang lords needed oversight, and Sebastian had always believed in using capable people to make his life easier.

The problem was that Nimh wouldn’t want him to reinstate the same controls Sebastian had previously utilised. Which meant restructuring.

Luckily there was no one left to replace them, or he may have had a riot on his hands.

Uncertain of his next step, he decided to listen to the quiet voice in his head that had whispered to him since his defeat.

He summoned five E Ranks from his remaining force, ordering them to stabilise the districts. They were strictly ordered not to harm or take advantage of anyone. Just take steps to keep the peace and prevent the F Ranks or the rare E rank from causing trouble.

Then he started brainstorming ideas on how to make the undercity more Nimh’s liking.

At the top of what was once Wolfgang, the gang lord of the Shadow Park, home, sat a man and a young woman.

The young woman looked poised, eyes closed with the breeze catching her chocolate brown hair. The pale sheen of her skin was dotted with sweat, her brow furrowed in concentration.

“Relax.” The young man said softly. “The harder you try to seize it, the harder it will be.”

The two had been seated there for an hour, the young woman trying to grasp the subtle existence which was her spirit. The young man coached her the best he could.

Which, to Nimh’s displeasure was harder than he had expected.

He had offered to help her find her own spirit well only to be refused immediately. Though Nimh had felt no distrust or defensiveness from her refusal. She just wanted to do it herself.

Keira, for her part, was not one for shortcuts. Nimh did not mind that, it was a good state of mind to have. But it meant she would take a while to make any progress.

Since he was largely useless to her until; she managed to utilise her spiritual energy, Nimh had spent the majority of the hour quietly meditating. The alien energy he had tapped into from his mind well had become gentle, though he still struggled to find a use for it.

It had been Friend’s words that had helped him to make any progress, for which he was thankful.

After seizing the alien energy in the Realm of Thoughtful Heights his memory became vague. He remembered pieces of a conversation, but nothing that made sense.

He did know, however, that the cognitive arts had three foundations. Emotion, Willpower and Comprehension.

After feeling the sheer power of Emotion fuelling him the night before, Nimh could understand its potential. It was like a massive source of untapped power, ripe and ready to use, though if he used it up, like last night, he would pass out from mental exhaustion. It was potent, but it had to be used wisely.

The other two, he would need to work on as he had no idea how to approach them. Though he thought he may have a clue about Comprehension.

Gently, Nimh drew that alien energy to his eyes as he looked out to the world, to the side of Keira. Like the previous night, his sight delved deep, though luckily the sheer vastness of the sky before him was not so stressful on his mind.

Too few details to latch onto.

With an effort, he began changing the scope of his vision, narrowing it into a fine focus, expanding it to encompass the vast sky before him.

Finally, he turned that sight onto Keira and saw her more clearly than he had expected. He saw the focus on her face, the tensing of muscles as she struggled with her task, and he saw the anger building up in her.

Nimh was coming to realise that Friend was right. This world was not well aligned to the Realm of Infinite Dreams. If it were not for Nimh’s existence and previous training as a spirit invader, he may not have access to his spiritual abilities either.

Though, unlike in his home world, the weak alignment did not result in a practical sealing of the well. Nimh could feel Keira’s spirit well, untrained, and untapped. It was weak, weaker than even Marcus’ had been.

“Hey, I’m not that bad,” Marcus argued. “And didn't you say you were going to teach me?”

Holding back a sigh, Nimh turned his focus inwards to Marcus.

“I already gave you instruction,” he said silently. “Within the well, channel your spirit and make a form with your limbs. Make it anything. You have a spiritual body, which means you can manipulate it at will. All you have to do is want to do it.”

Marcus pouted, returning to the spirit well to practice. Not that Nimh thought it would do the spirit much good. The man seemed to have the concentrated will of aworms, with half the spine.

But still, he offered the spirit advice and instruction.

As he had since he woke up a few hours ago. He had come up here to clear his head after dealing with Marcus’ failures, only for Keira to find him. She too wanted training and he had complied.

Nimh had been trained to be patient. It was one of the hardest lessons Daerin had beaten into him. As it turned out, Darin had not done as good a job as they both assumed.

But Nimh bit back his frustrations as he coached them both. All the while, he trained his newfound abilities in the cognitive arts. Basic as they were.

What he wanted was to return to the Realm of Thoughtful Heights and ask Friend about them. Or he would have, except the last conversation he had with the Transcendent had left him disconcerted.

Her attitude and demeanour had changed between his visits, leaving him to wonder if it was the same person.

Putting aside the question of if he had been duped, Nimh tried manipulating the alien energy. He had no name for it, so he had just started thinking of it as mental energy. He would ask Friend if he ever met her again, but for now, it would do.

It had a similar feeling as his spiritual energy did, though it was also more tangible, like vital energy. Handling it was strange, like holding sand. The tighter he held it, the faster it slipped through his fingers, but if he tried adjusting how he held it, it blew away.

He could channel it through his body to an extent, sharpening his senses on a profound level. It did not make his senses stronger but seemed to use them as more of a medium, engraving what he saw, smelt, felt, tasted, and heard into his mind.

Already he had an uncomfortable knowledge of Keira’s breathing pattern and Marcus’ annoying voice. And a perfect image of Keira’s body which he had tried to burn from his memory with no success.

The result of his new, profound senses was a headache. Thus the meditation to try and reduce the sensory overload. He suspected he was in for a tiring day.

What he really wanted to do was to practice his forms with his mental energy bolstering his senses. He felt the experience would be something else.

Unfortunately, that was not going to happen.

From Keira’s pocket, a chime echoed, breaking them out of their practices.

Keira flushed as she took the device out of her pocket, reading something on it.

“It’s Sebastian,” she said. “He requests a meeting to discuss the future of the undercity.”

Nimh nodded, standing up and stretching. “It’s past time to do that.” He acknowledged. “I should have done it last night instead of leaving the way I did.”

He paused, looking at her. “Keira,” he began. “I owe you an apology. I made some statements when we first met, and I reacted badly when I found out just how wrong I was. The slave contracts…” he let his words drift off.

“It’s okay,” Keira smiled. “You’re an alien so you can’t be expected to know everything.”

That had been another thing Nimh had avoided talking about. Though, since Stain had spilt the beans on what he was, Keira seemed to have taken it in stride. Which left Nimh somewhat concerned.

“Keira,” he started. “What do you know about spirit invaders?”

“Only what I gleamed from Stain last night.” She said. Nimh didn’t sense any deceit from her.

“And you’re okay with that? Me being an alien?”

Keira shrugged, getting to her feet. “The Prime is one of your kind, so I guess you can’t be that bad. And I think I can trust you to at least protect your own self-interest.”

Nimh raised an eyebrow at that, and Keira smirked.

“You said it yourself. You need people you can rely on. You’ve already invested this much time and effort into me, it would be a waste to just get rid of me. And you want me to take over the undercity, right?”

“Oh that,’ Nimh said, remembering his offhanded command to Stain. He had said that partly to keep Keira away from his while he figured things out. That Stain had actually done what he had commanded, and Keira had followed suit was a surprise. That Keira actually thought he wanted her to take over the undercity was more surprising.

“Actually, I have another plan for you,” Nimh said, seeing a glimmer in Keira’s eye dim slightly. “Relax, I have no intention of making you do something you don’t want to do. I’ve been meaning to ask you if you have any plans.

“Don’t you need me as a soldier?’ Keira asked confused.

Nimh laughed. “You want to wage war against your own society?” he asked.

Keira looked annoyed. “No, but you plan on conquering this world and you even said you need soldiers.”

“And you think that is you?” Nimh asked.

Keira paused a moment before shaking her head. “I don’t want to kill anyone.” She admitted.

“And that is why I don’t want you as a soldier.’ Nimh said softly. “You care about people, don’t you? The children, seeing them the way Wolfgang left them, and me killing them, it hurt you. Didn’t it?”

She nodded and Nimh placed a hand on her shoulder.

“Training you to become a soldier would be counterproductive. It would kill a part of you that is more precious than you can imagine. Once I have conquered this world, I will need people like you. People that care. But before that, you also need to be strong enough to survive.”

Keira looked up at him, her blue eyes firm and determined.

“I have something that I would like to do,” she began. “Something that I need to discuss with you.”

Nimh smiled as he beckoned her to the stairs.

“Let’s talk about it on the way to the tower.”