“Do you think we only contacted and partnered with specialization path organizations? What do we gain in directing people to them? Recognition? That’s it?” Leading him by the nose, Adreana was completely controlling the flow of the conversation.

She was the one with the knowledge Rune wanted after all, so what could he do other than follow her agenda?

“Can’t you just tell me the answer? I’m sure you’ve done a marvelous job with the Undecided company, I’m sure you’ve created synergies everywhere and that they’re working perfectly fine, but what I’m interested in is the surface, I’m too stupid to be interested in the rest,” pleading for her to stop teasing him with half-answer and pedagogic guidance, he really wanted to follow what she wanted but he was a bit too stupid for that.

“Then go ask Utopia, I’m sure he would entertain you with pre-chewed food. But I’m not like that, and stupidity can be cured too, thus that’s perfect. So? Let me also tell you we partnered with the Ether Laboratories, the Martial Supreme Dojo, the New Energy Institute, and the Psychic Union,” refusing to give in, she just gave him more hints.

“So… It must be something general… But it’s not like we have something unique, do we? No, really, I don’t know. I don’t know! Even my previous answer sounds stupid, it’s not like you need to pay to enter an organization!” Taking a big gulp of the weirdly-named drink he had ordered, Rune stopped thinking in the direction he had been thinking until now.

As he continued to think, Adreana remained stubbornly silent, refusing to give him the answer after hinting at the answer so much.

‘Is it even about training? Probably not… But what else is there of interest in the park other than-’

Something dawned on him.

‘The park?’

Feeling that he had found something, Rune changed his focus from his glass to his perception, and more precisely, he started to listen more closely to the groups of people taking a break.

“I’ll give a go at the spiritual powers arena again…”

“Why not try to break a tier 4 gardener cube again? We had a blast last time! It was…”

“I don’t understand why the golden dust dome is so popular, I’m sure if I try…”

“Someone created a new ‘unsolvable’ energy puzzle and posted it on the confrontation board. I think I didn’t show my face for too long so they forgot about me…”

“The collision corridor is fully booked for today? Then what should we…”

He didn’t need to focus far to hear and confirm what he thought was a possibility, so after he felt it was right, he looked at Adreana and gave her what she wanted, “Did I reverse the answer? That’s why you said it was very distorted? It’s not us who send people their way but them who send people our way?”

Clapping her hands mockingly, she changed his possibility into a finality and started waiting silently for him to continue developing his own thoughts.

“They send misguided people who want to change their entire career but don’t know how to go about it? Because obviously, for some of them, they thought their career choice was completely right and they couldn’t have possibly made a mistake, only to realize months or years later that what they were doing had become a chore. Does that sound right?”

Confident about his conclusion this time, Rune was sure he had found something. At least in his mind, this inference not only took his previous conclusion into account but also fitted in nicely with the “lots and lots” of partnerships established.

And in answer, Adreana allowed a true smile to blossom on her face, “Now you got the core reason we used to create all those partnerships with much much bigger organizations compared to us. Still, I think you pretty much summed up what the Undecided had been up to since you left.”

Now that he had confirmed and understood what took place over the last 2 years, he had to admit he felt a bit awed by the direction his 3 friends who had helmed the company had taken.

They didn’t expand and they didn’t end up stretching themselves too thin. They just took the core concept the Undecided adventurer’s group created together, the training park, and pushed it ever onward without deviating or transitioning into a money-making factory.

Still having something to say, Adreana continued after taking a sip of her own drink, “So in the end, while you could say the park has changed a bit, it only changed for the better, and only in execution. We still help people train and we sustain a relaxed and welcoming loose community around same-minded people who want to train, but now we’ve also started assuming the role of an orientation forum.”

“Woah… I was joking before, but if the training park is now also acting as a retraining park, the reach must have increased sufficiently for you to create a true web of connection, right? And when you succeed at retraining someone into his true talent vocation, then-”

Rune suddenly made a random connection in his mind.

“Oh, dear, isn’t that the snowball effect Utopia loves so much?!”

He then proceeded to explain this random development to wide-open mouthed Adreana.

“People get retrained and enter their new specialized path organization, retrained people reach to aspiring people that want to retrain in those organizations, aspiring people reach to the park and get retrained, rinse and repeat!” Exaggerating his reaction dramatically, he really appeared shocked by this development.

Facepalming at the degree of exaggeration, she advocated for a change of air, “If you want, if you want. Anyway, if you want to know more about what happened to the IGS in general, then we should go see Tizi, let’s go?”

But before she could stand up, Rune asked, “Tizi?”

Which prompted Adreana to facepalm harder than before, followed by an accusing finger pointing at her idiot-ish friend, “Our resident gardener path woman you wanted to say hello to! Her name was written on the guide she sent you!”

“Ah~~ Let’s go then!” Ignoring the fact that he hadn’t read her name anywhere and that it was probably his fault, he stylishly pointed towards the south area.

Exiting the central area which had been expanded to accommodate more than ten social areas bordered by shops which sometimes served 2 sides or even 3 or 4 for the miraculously-placed ones, Rune and Adreana joined a path that took them straight to the south area without having to make useless turns.

Having connected to the park’s network long ago and done a preliminary tour before chilling with his little brothers for hours, Rune wasn’t surprised by the new non-domes areas that gathered lots of people.

More than that, he also wanted to try all those fancy new training areas! Spiritual powers? Gardener cubes? Momentum engine-propelled collision corridor? All those sounded just right for having a blast for weeks.

Nonetheless, while the training park had expanded in terms of surface area over the years, it didn’t expand exponentially, so it only took the two less than 2 minutes at Adreana’s speed to arrive at where a gardener path would obviously be once someone really thought about it.

As for what Rune saw from 10 kilometers away? It was just people punching, kicking, energy beaming, elemental bombing, anything really to try and make giant cubes made of all sorts of materials collapse or lose a chunk of themselves.

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The area that was logically named “Gardener Area” on the park’s map was split into two: A “violent” training area and a gardening area. One area for the gardeners to grow their own materials, and one other to put them to the test under the training fire of hundreds, or thousands if they hadn’t collapsed by then, of people.

‘It’s really just a freaking material science research area, look at those massive containers… Are they even containers at this point? H1, He2, Li3, Be4, B5, C6, N7, O8…’

The training area was very simple in concept as it was just an area that served to host the gardeners' creations.

The majority of those creations took the form of massive 5-meter high cubes, some were spheres, some were a bit too atypical due to their properties, but apart from those last ones, it was a traditional training field where people could get a taste of what the gardener path could do.

For the gardening area though? It was a material creation path after all, so they needed base material to grow their own, and with the technology of the IGS, it wasn’t hard at all to pretty much solidify… Anything.

And for simplicity, it seemed that the IGS, or more probably the gardener path organization, had decided to solidify every chemical element and make them available in self-contained containers that only needed to be provided with electricity.

The Ether Law now allowed everyone willing to learn how to use their energy to do pretty much anything without having to worry about the potentially disastrous consequences, so with that fact backing the gardeners, Rune wasn’t surprised when someone entered the H1 container and came out with a chunk of… Solidified hydrogen in hand.

The number of people present in the gardening area was just a bit over 500, a relatively impressive number in his mind, but he didn’t have any statistics under his eyes related to the gardener path, so he wasn’t sure.

At least, compared to the thousands of people trying to destroy cubes, 500 seemed to be an appropriate number, it was a specialization after all.

Feeling a bit itchy on seeing so many people having fun, he told himself he would surely go punch some cubes once the next chat was finished.

Entering the gardening area, Adreana guided him to a field where a purple-haired woman was “watering” a small crystal cube by feeding it her energy and adding dozens of chemical elements from the side via energy tendrils.

Slowing down as they approached, Rune could see the familiarity Adreana had with the area as she just headed straight to the woman, even cutting into the fields where other people were growing their own cubes.

And no one really seemed to care.

‘So it doesn’t matter if we interrupt the gardening process? Or does she just ignore it because… Because?’

Not able to come up with a logic that explained how interrupting a crafting path process, he glanced weirdly at Adreana, which to his surprise answered his unasked question.

“Growing materials is a very concentration demanding process, so they’re all too focused on their craft to take notice of us. It also takes a long time for the first session to be finished, so it’s preferable to just straight up tell them we’re here for them.”

“Oh…” As he had only read about the theory behind this path, it was all new practical knowledge for him, so Rune unenthusiastically replied as he started to use his brain to think about it.

One day maybe he would read up on the gardener path in practical depth, but that day hasn’t come yet, it was after all a much more demanding task than just reading up on the simple theory behind the entire path.

Once they arrived next to the purple-haired woman, which was probably Tizi, Adreana waved at him to stop while she approached closer, eventually arriving in range of touching her.

Even at this range, the woman remained completely oblivious of what was happening until she received a flick on her forehead that made her energy armor layer flicker to life.

“What?!” Like she had been woken up from a nap, her head jerked up and looked left and right before zoning in on the culprit.

“Ana? What are you doing here? I was having a marvelous time trying out a new tetra hexagon mixed-crystal structure, what would warrant interrupting-”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever. I brought you a partisan of the cause, he wants to know what’s happening behind the scene, and he wanted to encounter you personally too,” dismissing her friend, Adreana, for reasons unknown to Rune, started to distort the truth of the situation.

And for yet more unknown reasons, Rune was happy to follow whatever his friend was doing as he bowed slightly while adopting a naive happy smile, “Hello.”

“Oh! So he’s a noble too? Is that a gathering of nobles? Are we conspiring against the minors again? I already came up with thousands of ways to destabilize the IGS at its foundations to start discriminating against them even stronger, which one should we use?” Like a gatling gun, the purple-haired woman started speaking as if a dam had been broken or she had too much to say.

“I have the latest incriminating criminality stats if we need! Just fresh from the most suspicious forum I could find! Guaranteed supported by facts without sources! I’m sure you’ll be-”

“Yeah, yeah, I know you love it but this guy here isn’t-”

Hardly had Adreana interrupted her friend again and was advancing her ploy that the third party of this conversation found a certain term used to be most fascinating.

“So I’m a noble? That’s so cool. What’s my rank then? At least a duke, right?” A naive smile harbored Rune’s face as he spoke in a similarly naive way, not understanding what he was talking about at all, having only a vague idea of the term “noble” having been used somewhere in the news long ago.

“Hu… Ana?” Still maintaining her smile after it twitched a few times, the woman looked in askance at her friend, starting to realize something was wrong.

“Well, you’re no fun Rune,” as if she wasn’t at fault at all, Adreana looked accusatively at her 2 friends before relenting and starting the official presentation.

“I introduce to you: Rune Tudor, a founding member of the Undecided, an avid adventurer who just came back but is already preparing for his next trip, someone who looks like he reads all the news of the world but in reality never knows what’s really going on, a genius at intent creation but he can’t stay in one place for long so it doesn’t show, and also… Because without that point he wouldn’t be unique enough!”

Making the hype climb, Adreana finally arrived at the climax of the ridiculous introduction she prepared for her friend.

“He’s shy and asocial! All to say, if you want to get to know him more, you have at best 2 months before he disappears for years.”

Blinking a few times as she processed the information while keeping her smile, the purple-haired woman finally asked, “And what about him being a partisan of the cause? Him wanting to know what’s happening behind the scene? Him wanting to meet me personally?”

“Oh, the last 2 of those are true while the first is just a distortion of the truth, he’s a partisan of a lot of causes after all, anyway!” Putting an end to her ploy, she looked at Rune and introduced her friend.

“She’s Tiziana Elwine, a very successful investment made by the Undecided company and a good friend of mine. She’s a bit clumsy in everything that isn’t related to gardening and can’t stop talking once she starts so don’t hesitate to interrupt her.”

Seeing as Adreana was talking about her, Tiziana stepped forward and put her hands on her hips seductively while winking at Rune cheesily, “I’m a politician by education and a silver gardener if you’re wondering, so does it mean Arik and Astryde also came back? I would sure love to meet them too now that I think about it. Was your return eventful? The world sure changed while you were underground and focused on-”

“I said you were allowed to interrupt her Rune,” cutting her friend off in her tracks, Adreana gave a practical example of what she just said.

“Since when are AREC ranks used in an introduction? Is that normal?” Raising the most curious point in Tiziana's self-introduction, he directly dove into what he wanted to know the most.

“I wouldn’t say it’s a generality, but between high-performers, it’s often used as it represents where you are located compared to all the other people of your own profession or path,” Tiziana explained, “There are of course hierarchical implications behind it too, and the system has already proven its value repeatedly when putting people with years of experience less than others at silver from their induction.”

Not being interrupted by Rune who was listening, Tiziana took it as a clue to continue talking about it freely.

“Personally I would say using the AREC ranks in an introduction is a good thing, it doesn’t differentiate between people based on anything other than capability, so isn’t that the best differential thing? The meritocratic concept sounds much better than a totally egalitarian one or a birth discriminatory one. I’m sure the IGS had thought about it, and they-”

“I said you were allowed to interrupt her…” Infusing a bit of energy into her voice to make it more impacting as she repeated the same line she said a few seconds prior, Adreana again halted her friend’s attempt at continuing on a political rant she knew she would eventually come to do.

“Well, I’m more of a listener, so just listening to her talk about something I asked is just what I want… As for if she digresses, that’s the fun of finding someone to tell me what happened and not look it up online, isn’t it?” Rune reasoned, explaining his point of view.

“Hahaha! Hush now Ana! Someone is in need of my expertise! Why don’t we sit down while we’re at it? If you want to know everything that’s popped up since you left and not just the surface, then I have a lot, and I mean a lot! To talk about!”

Finding pleasure in being on the right side, Tiziana ignored her friend's slightly frustrated expression and got an elaborate crystal table, cloud-like chairs, wooden glasses, and even fluorescent drinks out, “Help yourself.”

Not showing any of his shy sides, Rune sat down directly and served himself, “Ok, so the AREC ranks aren’t just a simple classification… And what was it about me being a noble and the minors?”