Lycra's yellow eyes shone with excitement.

Win had energy in her hands as she moved them both around Reid's skull. "There's... nothing wrong? That doesn't make sense, unless - maybe you're being affected by a skill I can't sense with the suppression collar? But, no - there's nothing that I know of that wouldn't at least have..." Her face was still filled with worry as she continued talking to herself.

"I told you, I'm fine - well, there's the ca-... never mind. I'm fine."

The start of the explanation had gone about as poorly as Reid expected. Lycra immediately believed him - and Win believed he was suffering some sort of mental episode or the effects of someone else's skill, and had spent quite a while searching for a cause. Her outright refusal to listen had slowly turned into receptiveness, so Nyx was starting to pour on her 'convincing arguments'.

"Okay, now tell her she's moving her energy like a Vhauxhilli Mongrel that's never heard of Arinelea's law."

"Nyx says you're moving your energy like a Vhauxhilli Mongrel that's never heard of Arinelea's law."

Win gave him a defensive look. "It's Arinela's Law - but how the hell would you possibly know advanced mana application theory? And I'll have you know I can move energy perfectly fine when I'm not wearing a suppression collar."

Her face softened, and her eyes were conflicted as she gave Reid another once-over. "This... really isn't a trick, is it?"

Reid held up a finger to wait for Nyx's reply.

"Tell her I graduated an opal robe at Zoenuth, and she shouldn't correct her elders. I was a student when Arinelea proved her thesis, I know damn well what my upperclasswoman did and how to say her damn name. Then tell her that she's a disgrace to her lineage if a little collar can make her forget her basics. And tell her the only apparent thing I can sense about her is her air of laziness. Make sure you do it word for word."

Reid repeated the line. Win looked confused, offended, then deep in contemplation - still concerned, but considering what it meant if his story was legitimate. They'd left the details of how exactly it had happened vague, but Win did know Reid was subjected to something that left him incapacitated for a long time, and Nyx had helped to 'wake him up' - but also got 'stuck' to him in the process of doing so. Her mouth twitched as she soundlessly talked through the possibilities to herself.

When she lifted her gaze, Win's eyes were serious. "You knew next to nothing about the universe when we all laid down to sleep. Now, you are rattling off high university knowledge like you walked the halls. I know you're not trying to deceive me yourself - and I would prefer for you to be fantastical than crazy, Reid -" She took in a long breath, "so I am going to trust you." She stared at him for a moment, then nodded and let herself fall into a seated position, then her eyes went to the top of the cavern. "An ancient wizard's soul trapped in your own ethereal space is... Mhm. I am lost for words."

Reid put a hand on her shoulder. "Thank you. Now that I have both of you believing me, we can finally get started." He took a few steps away, then smiled. The big talk had gone fairly well, all things considered. Win might still have some reservations, or would be looking for signs of mental tampering for a little while - but he had buy-in from both of them. That meant he could start the next phase, where Nyx would have receptive minds for her instructions and hopefully they'd all be able to grow stronger together.

"Our first step is to get comfortable and get settled here. We only have enough ration bars and bottled water to last us the next two weeks, but what we all have to do is going to take longer than that. Which means, we need to find food, water, and places to sleep that aren't so haphazard. There's a few spots i think we can collect water in here, we can dress the moles in this den and down the tunnel for extra food, and there are enough intact things in the trash piles that we should be able to build some basic shelters for ourselves to stay comfortable."

Lycra was all eager smiles. Win had gone from concerned to curious. "How long are you trying to stay down here?"

Reid grinned. "However long it takes the three of us to learn - and grow."

#

Dressing the moles had been surprisingly easy work - at least for everything but the king. That one was difficult to butcher and slow to cook because of its innate toughness. It was an interesting bit of knowledge around ranks and grades - the meat and bodies of different grades contained different levels of nutrients. Eating one king mole steak was the same as wolfing down multiple G grade ones. He hadn't considered that food requirements meant rations for G grade wouldn't be the same as rations for F. Reid realized he'd already seen this at play, with the rations on Thad's ship. The only way it made sense for the portion sizes to have been so small was if more nutrients were packed into the smaller space. He also guessed that what he needed to consume would raise with grade, just like the nutrients themselves. That meant he would need to cycle any stockpiled resources every time he ranked up.

They'd ended up cooking nearly all the moles right away, because the storage rings they had were capable of 'preserving' the cooked meat. Nyx and Win both offered explanations on how the subspace the rings were connected to was temporally dilated but limited by overall energy contained within objects. Reid only understood that time pretty much didn't pass inside storage. Reid could keep the meat in there, fresh or cooked, for decades before it would cool down or go bad.

Of all his gains, Reid considered going from pocket jerky to 'freshly' grilled mole steaks one of the largest leaps.

He took out another piece, and tore into it. The table and chairs he sat at were a mismatch of salvaged, mostly-intact pieces of furniture that also included bedding and some portable cookware they'd turned into a little 'camp'. The parties that had ventured down and been killed in this cave were not all prisoners, and some items had been of high enough quality that time had not yet deteriorated them away. Each of their trio had found a few valuable baubles in necklaces and rings that were now safely socked away in their storage. There was metallic armor, but it was inferior to Reid's bone pieces - as were the weapons. They took and distributed both anyway, with the intention to sell them whenever they were above ground again. Win said hers would come in handy if other threats presented themselves to the miners. Reid disliked her continued expectation that she wouldn't - or couldn't - get free, but he respected her privacy and refused to pry.

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His favorite find so far was a chest of F-grade clothing that had survived almost entirely intact throughout the years. There were some thin spots and fading where dyes had aged, but he and the others were in fabric that wasn't a jumpsuit. He even found a set of robes that fit him, with a hood to cover his head. His second favorite find was soap. There was a small pool of water in an alcove down the side of the cavern, fed by some source above, with a small hole that drained further down. They'd all washed themselves and their garments off in the pool - and replenished their liquid supplies from its source - but soap was a game changer. He'd definitely started taking the shower facilities in the main cavern for granted.

Nyx and Win were both incredibly interested in the book piles, and Win had spent much of her foraging time searching through for any legible slip of paper. They'd only found a handful. Half a dozen pieces of hearty parchment were rolled and sealed - and Win brought them to the group rather than simply claim them for herself. They were promissory notes of some kind, which meant they could be turned in for monetary value by whomever had them in hand. Neither Reid nor Lycra wanted to draw any attention to themselves by walking into a bank with long-lost money, and they eventually convinced Win to keep all of them for herself, despite her protests that she'd never be able to claim them.

The other notable find was - of all things - a children's book. One Lycra had practically begged for.

'Mana and Me - The Basics of Crystal Carving' was about a young girl's adventure in making small tools she could use to play with friends. It was intended to help schoolchildren identify the simplest formations and shapes that could be drawn onto or carved into mana crystals in order to allow them to have certain functions. Lycra's excited, too-fast babbling on the subject conveyed to Reid that the shapes and 'runes' were all about how the natural energy within the crystal was stored, organized, and allowed to exit the structure. It showed basic instructions for doing things like making a crystal into a flashlight, letting it draw off energy in the form of heat, using crystal for refrigeration, and a small engine one could make to move a model spaceship. Lycra had a pile of raw crystal he pulled out of the walls himself to practice what was in the book - and growing mounds of flashlights, hand warmers, and engines without models to sit in. He was enraptured by the simple contents of the work, and poured over every detail like it held the secrets of the universe.

When they weren't scavenging in trash, Nyx had Reid parrot instructions for Lycra and Win. Lycra was started on swordplay lessons and tips, and Win was made to write out a number of rules and laws that meant next to nothing to Reid, but she seemed to get something out of it. And then there were the... special instructions.

Nyx had continually insisted Lycra was a 'smart little oyster' during the swordplay lessons she'd started him off with, and was nearly as excited as he was for today's learning. They'd had some issues at first in how much attention Reid paid to the detail in Nyx's wording and explanations, and he expected some of the training time she'd parroted through him for the past few days was actually just done to get Reid to the point where he wouldn't miss anything important once they got to the truly difficult portions. They'd reviewed the book Lycra received, checked out the child-sized engraving kit that was in the rear of the thing, and then quizzed him on his understanding and knowledge so far. Post-quiz, Lycra had graduated from 'smart little oyster' to 'prodigy' in Nyx's eyes. She was in the middle of a long, drawn discussion on warnings and guidelines for etching.

"Okay, she says that you need to be careful with the engine propulsion methods, because what's in the storybook is a simplified version of things. It doesn't account for the actual engine assembly itself, so the direct power it calls for doesn't work at scale. And she wants you to be careful with the engine runes themselves." He traced on a piece of paper. "This shape - like an elongated egg - is very finicky. If your hand is shaky when you do the outline, it creates a reverberating reaction within the crystal that can cause problems. If the whole thing is shaky, crystals can actually explode. It's good to make a break in the egg with four lines like this-" He sketched out what Nyx described, "If you think you might have reverb issues. That will allow things to de-escalate properly. Always do four - more or less will just ensure the thing causes a more violent reaction."

Lycra's teeth were visible as he furiously scribbled notes down in a journal with old, discolored pages.

"Okay, next safety lessons - the light. Nyx says the formation can go wrong here and here. The first could give you an electric shock if you don't properly flare the two connecting lines, and the second is the eyeball looking one. If you don't make the corners proportional to the rest of the design, you could end up forcing the crystal to expend all of its energy violently, which would just blind everyone looking at the thing, or make an even worse shock." Lycra eagerly nodded along. "The warming etchings are more tricky. They're normally very stable, but if you ever mistakenly re-use a warmer for different etchings, you can cause a volatile..."

Lessons continued that day with his little friend until both of them had to go to sleep. Lycra's journal was half full in notes and shorthand Reid didn't recognize, but Nyx was confident she'd shared enough information to keep him busy for a good, long while. She'd even worked alongside Win to give instructions on how the wide-eyed student should distribute his available stat points. The following day, Reid and Win had to practically drag Lycra away from his crystal work just to eat. He spent every other moment practicing, pulling crystal out of the walls, or collecting loose ones off the ground.

While Lycra worked on his etchings, Win received her focused instruction - on energy control.

Win's advanced lesson was less on theory, and more on practice. There was apparently a famously difficult proof of concept called the tree of knowledge, where someone had to use a large number of tiny, concentrated strands of mana to build a three-dimensional tree structure visible to the naked eye. Between the theory instruction and her current task, Win had changed her tutne and actually admitted that energy control was never her strongest area. She took her own notes and nodded eagerly at more references Reid didn't understand - all while struggling and failing to create the simplest of roots on her tree of knowledge. Nyx claimed she'd already seen marked improvements in Win's energy control after a single day of focused instruction, and left her with a bit of wisdom.

"The tree of knowledge isn't just a parlor trick, Winnie. You can do it well, or do it poorly. Roots require depth of knowledge and purpose - and if you seek perfection in your task, all further energy must flow through them to create the tree. This is why they must be so plentiful and thick. The bark and core of the tree should be made resilient, and powerful. Branches must reach for the sky as we reach for knowledge, and leaves must soak in information as their real counterparts would the light. If your tree is strong, outside magic will not topple it but nourish it, and its leaves will turn towards the greatest sources of knowledge in a room. That is the outcome you seek - not a trick, but a treasure. Proof of your aptitude and mastery. Practice, and keep going. I will check your progress when Reid has downtime."

Win went off for her own self-guided improvement based on Nyx's notes. Lycra cheered himself on when a freshly made flashlight was powerful enough to shine all the way to the far wall.

His friends had their own work to complete, which meant Reid was finally alone to begin his own instruction. He tried to keep the childish eagerness out of his voice. There were so many things Nyx could teach him.

"So what are we going to start with? Truths of the universe, or maybe a roadmap on how to get more powerful?"

"Bah! That will come. We begin with your disguise."