“A life-sized sculpture, eh?” Gaius looked at the young man called Na-Tann from head to toe, and then at the five other people behind him. “I’m not going to lie, but my definition of life-sized is something my height and nothing else. You guys are a few heads taller than me. It’s going to take quite some time.”

“No worries,” Na-Tann replied airily. “You guys agree with me, right? No problems whatsoever, no?”

He dragged out the last word, his eyes falling onto the people behind him, who nodded rapidly. Gaius regarded the little display of hierarchy right there, and arched an eyebrow. “Are they your underlings?”

“Subordinates,” he corrected. “I’m just first amongst equals.”

“Nice to know,” Gaius replied. “Now, since you want me to make a sculpture of you guys…you lot need to come back in five days so that I can replicate your facial features accurately.”

“Sure, will do,” replied the young man.

“Still,” Gaius mused, “why do you want a sculpture of yourself? That’s going to make people think of you as a weird person, right? The visitors to your house might…”

“Oh, don’t worry about that,” he replied. “Anyway, for your convenience, we’ve already prepared logs our height.”

A few more people carried logs into the makeshift courtyard, and after some huffing and puffing sounds, five logs had taken up residence in one corner. A photo was pinned onto every log, for Gaius’ reference, and after checking that they had done everything they wanted, the others glanced at the young man, who nodded.

With a snap of his fingers, a man, dressed in a suit that didn’t seem all that different from Gaius’ own, walked up to Gaius and handed him a case with both hands. With another respectful step back, he blended into the group of men and women behind him.

“A down-payment.” Na-Tann replied. “Fifteen hundred energy salts for each of us; we’ll pay a down-payment of seven hundred each. We’ll pay another eight hundred each five days from now.”

“Good enough. I’ll carve out the best sculptures you guys will ever see,” Gaius replied. Although he had kept his face straight, the boy knew full well that even a hundred energy salts were enough to buy a gourmet meal for three months straight. His first customer had shown up wanting a life-sized sculpture for one thousand and five hundred, which was something he’d never expected…granted, he didn’t think that someone would want a life-sized sculpture in the first place.

I suppose this just goes to show that the artistic crafts are highly valued in Cybral. More importantly, how does one even earn that much energy salts? Is there even a salt mining business somewhere?

“Good to hear that, Craftsman Gai-Us.” Na-Tann inclined his head, and swept out of the courtyard. His departure sent the curious onlookers scattering; a bunch of curious neighbours had come over when Na-Tann’s entourage had entered Gaius’ courtyard.

The boy shook his head, and then brought one of the logs over. Picking up his knife, he glanced at the photo pinned onto the log, and then began to make little marks on it. It was necessary for him to do this, or so Nakama said, when she was teaching him how to carve properly.

The marking process took longer than he expected, partially because he was thinking of Nakama and Isabelle while doing so, and the sky had turned orange when he was done with all five logs. During the process, a few curious kids, around six to eight years old, had entered his courtyard to watch him work in silence.

Gaius didn’t mind their intrusion. It seemed that watching him prepare his materials was more interesting than whatever entertainment the kids usually had, but it was odd that they didn’t ask questions.

Making one last notch on the lower half of the log, the boy kept his knife and turned to the three children who were still watching. “You children want some dinner?”

The three jumped. Two of them glanced at each other, and then shook their heads. After shouting that they’d come back tomorrow, the two ran off, leaving one child at the age of six behind.

Gaius glanced at the little boy curiously.

“What’s your name?”

The kid shook his head quietly, and Gaius felt the beginnings of a headache. After a moment, he asked, “Do you want some food?”

“Y-yes. Please.”

“A shy one, hm. Where are your parents?”

“Not. Around,” he replied, dragging his right foot across the ground. Gaius measured the kid up close. Cybral was a world that catered to one’s mental image, so clothes and all weren’t an issue. Impractically designed dresses were the norm here, as were highly elaborate costumes that should only appear during prestigious social events.

If one had to liken one’s starting clothes in Cybral to something, it would a set of starter equipment in video games.

But the thing that drew Gaius’ attention was the horrible state of the boy’s clothes. This was the first time he saw a kid who was dressed in literal rags. His shirt had more holes than cloth, while the shoes on his feet were in bad condition. The shorts he wore…the less he thought about it, the better. This wasn’t actually possible, since people usually had a firm image of themselves. Gaius, for instance, was still wearing that formal suit of his, but he could be wearing nothing and he wouldn’t feel any different.

“Looks like you picked up someone interesting.” A voice came from beside Gaius.

“Senior?”

“Well, you finally addressed me the correct way,” Weiwu replied. “I’m heartened.”

“Okay, but what’s with this kid?” Gaius asked, his thumb pointing at the boy, who was looking at Weiwu.

The old man squatted down in response. “This is someone who has lost their sense of self. I told you about the use of the original Orb’s souls as ether, right? When people here pass away, they inhabit gemstones in the form of ether. Once the ether in the gemstone is used up, the power returns to virtual worlds like these to start a new life.”

“So…the use of ether and gemstones by the people of the Orb now serve as a reincarnation cycle for the people here?” Gaius asked. “That sounds very risky.”

“It isn’t a good solution, but it is the only one I have,” Weiwu replied. “Sometimes, a gemstone isn’t expended fully, which means that the soul within is fragmented. Nothing happens if the gemstone is expended within a month, but past that…”

“The fragmented soul is forced to return here.” Gaius breathed out.

“And the result is someone with a malformed ego,” the Chanter of Innocents replied. “There’s a mechanism to retain fragmented souls after they pass on from the various virtual worlds here, but for their current lifetime, they’ll face problems like an incomplete mental image.”

The old man gestured at the child. “This boy is one of them.”