When Mira returned, she had seven small books clasped tightly in her hands. She placed two of them in front of Angie, another two in front of Lindsay, and then brought the remaining three to Nate.

She handed him the two he had been expecting and then held up the third book. “I told you to go through the list carefully, that the benefits behind some of them weren’t as readily apparent as you might think. Brick Jones is the one who brought the potential of this particular energy skill to my attention.”

Nate had thought she was trying to give him a hint earlier, but he hadn’t seen any skills that would help him in that way. Then again, that maybe should have been a clue that he needed to ask her for her help on the matter, like she obviously intended.

She glanced over at the girls before handing the third book over to Nate. “Keep this quiet. Remember, each of you only gets two skills. However, Brick is certain that this skill will help Nate with his current project.”

Taking the thin book from her hands, he carefully read the title embossed on the front. ‘Basic Ties’. He grabbed the pamphlet and scanned the list for the entry on the support skill. Once he found it, he read the description once, and then two more times before looking up at the teacher in confusion.

“I don’t understand. The description says that it reveals the ties that bind. That’s all. I don’t see how that would be useful to me.”

Mira went back to her desk, and only after making sure that both girls were paying attention as well, answered his question. “That is a very good question and leads into something that you three need to keep in mind whenever you come across an energy skill in the future. How will the skill change and develop as ‘I’ use it?

“Not all skills change in ways you might expect. Take this particular skill, for example. Its primary use historically has been for monitoring companion bonds, merchant oaths, and things of that nature. However, that is only if you keep it pure in regards to its original purpose.”

She ran a hand through her hair before she continued. “While I did learn about this from Mister Jones, I did confirm it through my own sources, so the information is good and does not apply solely to this skill, regardless. If you grow and change the skill, the ties that it reveals will be between your affinities or meditation arts instead.”

“That would be very helpful indeed,” Nate admitted. “Though, what about afterward? It would no longer be useful after that. It’s a lot of work to only throw it away right afterward.”

She shrugged. “Remove the skill, or perhaps try to change and evolve it again, so it stays useful.”

“How exactly would he go about changing and evolving it that much?” Angie asked.

“By using it and his desires for the ability while doing so. It is the same method for all energy skills, in fact. However, you need to keep in mind that there are limits to how much each skill can change. An attack skill is not going to suddenly become a healing skill, in other words.

“That is why it is so important to find skills that work within the framework of what you are trying to do. We have a certain amount of freedom with the skills, but we need to use it wisely. Each skill takes a lot of time to upgrade and change.”

She glanced up at the clock above the door at the back of the room. “Alright, you need to start reading these quickly. Unlike your meditation arts, you are not allowed to take pictures of these. The actual skill is in the first chapter of each book. Once you memorize the skill, you can try to absorb and press it into your core. Just make sure you have truly memorized it first. All of the information in the book after that pertains to the skills usage and tips in changing and evolving it in various ways.”

With that, she moved behind her desk and sat down to do some work on her laptop. While she did that, they commenced reading through the first chapters of their chosen energy skills, again and again. Making sure they were thoroughly memorized.

Mira hadn’t mentioned why it was important to have it so ingrained, but it wasn’t hard to imagine the consequences of embedding an energy skill wrong.

Thankfully, their orientation class was a three-period class for the first two weeks they would be in it. They were still in the first week, and only halfway through the first period, so they had plenty of time.

It took Nate twenty minutes to memorize the information for the healing skill. With the armband of basic health he always wore, and the sessions with George fixing his meridians and broken body, he was already intimately familiar with how the skill worked.

Raising his hand, he waited until Mira looked up before speaking. “I’ve memorized my first one. How do I go about absorbing the information and pressing it into my core?”

This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.

“Make sure you have it truly memorized, because what you are going to do next is very easy to screw up on.”

“I do,” He replied confidently. “I’m already rather familiar with the healing skill.”

Understanding came into her eyes when he mentioned which skill it was. “Alright then, what you need to do is envision each word being written onto your core using your qi. Once you have finished writing all of it you need to press it into place and your core will then absorb the skill into whichever available slot you wrote it on.”

“Doesn’t that mean that I could potentially create my own skill then, if those are the steps?” Nate asked her.

“There is a certain amount of understanding needed for its initial creation. However, if you believe that you can create a skill, certainly give it a try.” She told him with a grin.

“I take it everyone thinks that when they are told the process?” Angie wondered with a smile of her own.

The teacher nodded in good humor. “The first thing everyone thinks when they learn the process is, ‘oh, I can do that myself. Ultimate skill, here I come.’ Trust me, I was no different when I was in your position, but there really is more to the initial skill’s creation process than that. Some sort of unseen legacy exists that gets carried over and helps us learn them.”

They talked about the specifics for another couple of minutes before Nate decided it was time to write the skill onto his core.

He carefully followed each step of her instructions and focused inwards. Slowly, the passages of the basic healing skill began to appear on one face of his core. For now, he was keeping everything on his main core. He could see about transferring them later -if that was even possible- to his backup core. Right now, he just didn’t want to do anything out of the ordinary.

Maintaining his focus throughout the entire process was the hardest part of inscribing the skill. It was fine, detailed work using his qi in such a manner.

Writing the skill took several minutes, but once he was finished, the rest was nearly effortless.

A simple mental push was all it took to finish the job. The words flashed in his mind’s eye and began to compress onto the facet of his core. Within moments, the words had vanished entirely and been replaced by a runic symbol he had never seen before, and yet was intimately familiar with. The symbol represented everything that he currently knew about the skill and would change with him.

The runic symbol itself belonged to no human language that he had ever seen before. For all he knew, each symbol might be entirely original for each person.

Opening his eyes, he saw that had taken fifteen minutes for him to write and absorb the basic healing skill. It had been a tiring experience, but there were still two more that he needed to do that day.

Setting the first book to the side, he grabbed the one Mira had given him at Brick’s request. He would leave his attack skill for last. This support skill had more utility toward helping him in overcoming the current issues he was facing. It would still be hard, he was aware of that, but getting started was almost always the hardest step.

This one was going to take him a little while longer to memorize and understand. He didn’t have the prior experience with it that he had with the healing skill.

While he was working on that, Angie and Lindsay both began working on inscribing and absorbing their first skills. The two discovered how much work and focus it required to finish doing just one skill. Immediately after, they started on the second one alongside Nate.

By the time the class had ended, they had finished absorbing both skills. Nate barely managed to finish getting his attack skill inscribed in time. In actuality, the bell rang just seconds after he finished putting the skill in place. He had just barely made it in time, not that he would have stopped at that point in any case.

Regardless, his head possessed a dull throbbing ache to it that spiked with every step as they headed off to lunch. The bracelet of basic health was helping, but it would still take a few minutes for his headache to go away. He had really pushed himself to get all three skills memorized and absorbed in one sitting.

“Ugh, remind me not to do that again,” He complained after they had gotten their food and sat down at an empty table. “Doing three skills in one go like that really takes a lot out of you.”

Lindsay raised a brow as she took a sip of her chocolate milk. “I’m surprised you were even able to, honestly. The amount of qi each word requires as its being written, and then when it's being absorbed. No offense, but with your current core, I wouldn’t have thought you would even have enough qi to do three skills in a row.”

This time, it was Nate’s turn to raise a brow in surprise. “What are you talking about? I mean, sure, each of them required a fair bit of qi to do, but I still have enough left over that I could safely manage one, maybe even two more.”

Angie threw a cherry tomato from her salad at him. “Don’t lie. Doing those two took most of what I had. I have no idea how you managed to do three. I’m with Linds on this one, in that I wouldn’t have thought your core would have enough qi for it.”

Nate popped the tomato into his mouth and ate it, using the moment to think. He hadn’t been lying. He really did still have that much energy left. The only explanation he could think of was because of his backup core. However, that was not something he was willing to talk about in the cafeteria. Besides, George and his parents had told him to keep that secret to himself.

Which he intended to do. It was sad that he couldn’t tell the girls everything, but that was simply life, it seemed.

He shrugged as he swallowed the salad projectile. “Maybe you just used more qi to create the skills than I did. I don’t think each skill requires the same amount of energy. They are each a different length, with a varying number of words. I imagine that has an impact on the overall cost.”

The table was quiet for a few seconds while they thought over what he had said.

“Hey, have you noticed that no one has come over to talk to us this week?” Lindsay asked the others. “Normally, we are always getting bothered by annoying guys during lunchtime. It didn’t even get better when Nate started eating with us, and yet, suddenly, no one is approaching us. Don’t get me wrong, I’m fine with the peace. I just want to know what changed.”

“You got your cores?” Nate offered.

“Possible, but no, I don’t think that is it. There are plenty of kids here who could create their core at any time if they wanted. They would simply be of a lower quality as a result. The divide shouldn’t be large enough that they would all simply stop talking to us,” Angie analyzed.