Preparations for the planned performance lasted for no short period of time. After two Aestean moons, a complete calendar month, a new Ruixsi season began.

Axln wasn’t even certain what the point was of tracking such seasons, there was still no actual sign of anything changing. Quite simply, it just felt like they were having a holiday for the sake of having a holiday. Aestus might have more dramatically held no impact between cold and cold.. but the current void phase of Ruixsi ensured that the elements were still too weak to demonstrate any real change either. Supposedly though, that would change eventually.. once Taeqhyx came around once again to ensure the elements flourished. Of course, that would depend on chaos having not claimed conquest before that occured. This did mean they didn’t have forever with which to just wait.. but there was certainly no reason to hurry. This might be why she was actually open for once to the idea of actually attending one of the student’s parties. In fact, more than attending, she was actually scheduled to be their mixer. Now, after all this time, she still wasn’t anything amazing. Figuring out creative mixes was still something she remained really bad at. Where she excelled was how much the entire process had her remember complete songs at will. She could then prepare any song with any previous arrangement she had already memorized. That’s no small thing either, considering how many parties she had been to.. how many songs she had witnessed. She could almost pretend to be a professional simply with consideration in how many variations she’s memorized.. how many thousand.

Her work had also continued on the other side, with Sophie introducing her to an almost equal count of songs in turn. Holi was pretty much acquiring the things wholesale.. and not even at cost. Then there were also all the professional DJ configurations on everything.. also not exactly acquired with consent. At one point though, she had the entire synth structure for every song memorized that she didn’t even need such songs anymore. Her memorization was so skilled, she was able to go to Ruixse and recreate the songs there as just another song stored into the little instrument. That’s actually going to be part of the party too, playing a bunch of songs that honestly might as well be flagged as Terran Mythos and getting even that done right from outright memorization. It was how she looked fresh, she could easily pull 10 songs no one had ever heard of and actually present them correctly. Cross-culture transitions were possibly the hardest part, but at least she wasn’t that bad with the creativity required there. That helped too, because she had also done the same thing in reverse for Aestus. Jacking into the equipment, recreating the same complete sequence, suddenly there’s another Ruixsi song on Aestus. She even eventually removed all records of the originals she had illicitly acquired.. though her ability to reproduce everything anyway made that a rather mute point.

Rosa meanwhile felt like she knew four different ways of speaking. Ruixsi speaking, Aestean speaking, Ruixsi singing, and Aestean singing. Of course, she was not only equally good at the first two, she was actually equally remarkable at the second two. She’d invested considerable effort into rediscovering whatever singing voice she had supposedly just forgotten, and then had matched her progress in the other world. Suffice it to say that she had already become quite popular in the academy, especially in the creative culture field. That’s generally what was considered the fine arts over in Ruixse.. almost the same thing. Even in areas she wasn’t any good at, the students there loved when she showed up, inviting her to even build an ambience with which everyone else could work within. The absolute demands on her voice had been rough, quite honestly even with both worlds, but she had really gotten skilled at singing for long periods of time. To her, professional singing wasn’t any harder than talking at that point. It really was simply the four ways she could speak.

Of course, such was not the only accomplishment she had gained through all of her efforts. At the same time, she had attained considerable skill in handling musical instruments with her hands. Much more than just the originally projected single instrument, she had shown a lot of skill in a large variety of them. She did have a lot of problems handling some of the larger instruments, and she didn’t exactly enjoy instruments she struggled to sing while playing, but there were few other exceptions to her musical abilities. She did really love the piano, but found it a bit unwieldy to work with. Bowing and plucking instruments were really fun too, but mostly the more mobile ones. One of the Aestean instruments she found was of a model said to have derived from a couple of things once called a keytar.. which was supposedly like taking a guitar and giving it a mini piano or something.. and a collegno.. which was a violin that worked the same way as a piano. The entire concept of such an elegant piano inspired her so much that she even created a Ruixsi version of the same thing that was an actual instrument. Once complete, she made sure to give it a proper Terran Mythos name by sharing the same name as the original, a Kellegno. It was practically played like a harp, looked related to a violin, and worked like a piano, absolutely perfect for her.

Of course, most of her attention had been taken by such progress in music that she hadn’t managed to devote much time to other creative cultures.. or fine arts.. or whatever. She had shown some talent in a few other different areas at least, especially drawing.. but she hadn’t had much opportunity to fully investigate such additional potential yet. She had invested so much into music that it had almost overtaken her entire schedule. She was so famous that there were people in the academy trying to have her do musical work for the entire academy. Her talent was excessive enough that she’s already received a number of tutoring requests.. opportunities where she would actually teach other people how to do what she did. If she wasn’t careful, she could end up an instructor herself. As things stood, she had already accepted one request she found very difficult to refuse. She was actually going to be attending the same party Axln was invited to.. and she would be performing live to Axln’s music. This would be the first time they would have ever worked together with their musical research.. and it was going to be with an audience.

Axln took consideration of the warning about the whole concert curse ordeal, wondering if this would even count. It wasn’t exactly a concert.. but it might be close enough. The whole event was practically a rehearsal for the real deal, so it might be a smart idea to rehearse their countermeasures as well. Such would be how their chaotic being would contribute to their efforts. Axln and Lyun both arrived at the appointed early hour with all of the right equipment. Quite honestly, the gear they were using here paled in comparison to some of the actual stuff they were getting ready. The only authentic contribution present was Lyun’s kellegno. During setup, Lyun took an opportunity to review the list of songs Axln was preparing to use for the party, so that she could ensure she would remember the lyrics and melody. She didn’t have everything as memorized as Axln did, but lyrics were her thing.. that she had down really well. Meanwhile, she might not remember most of the melody.. but when the music started she just instinctively knew what to play anyway. Her creative capacity was outstanding, enough that she could create brand new melodies at a whim.. even if her lyrical compositions still might need a lot of work.

By the time the party started, both of them were ready and already going at it. Xwyhr had in fact told everyone that she had taken care of the mixer for the party.. but at no point had she told anyone who the mixer would be.. or that there would be a special guest to go with all of the music. Their side of the whole gathering committed most of the attention of all those in attendance. Not only that, but the number two place for the same was the cell’s of those present as they spread word about what was going on. Quite quickly, the place was outright packed to capacity.. beyond capacity. People were gathering outside even just so they could be close enough to hear. At one point, administration had to get involved because of how dangerously packed everything had gotten. Typically, a party like this would have been broken up if it had lost control like this.. but administration instead began simply regulating the density and organizing people, working directly with the event’s host to ensure that proper conduct was met. The whole thing didn’t start off being official.. but it became official. Axln knew that such an outcome was absolutely unheard of.. and pondered if such a turn of good fortune may have been chaotically engineered.

Once the party concluded, the crowd began to disperse. Axln even found her sister talking to someone from administration, potentially hearing something about officially becoming an academy event coordinator. However, her attention was quickly divested when she noticed even Jhez had been present at such a student party. He had actually not been one of the original guests, but had shown up after hearing the news along the grapevine. His choice time of arrival had not left him with the best perspective, but he had managed to post himself not far from the door regardless. Randomly wearing casual clothes and the most goofy of hats probably had left him standing out far less than a teacher would have normally given such circumstances, he honestly looked like yet another student right now. A smile masking her need to giggle, she went over to Jhez to discuss his opinion of how well things had gone.

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Lyun herself was smiling as she shook her head, not missing how that had transpired either. She had witnessed Xwyhr on a cell earlier, and had her own guess in how Jhez might have gotten word of everything. Xwyhr was very obviously feeling accomplished right now in that regard. Not only was her sister obviously having some of that fun she’s long wanted, not only has her sister gotten really close to Jhez in the process, but now she would be making waves in handling official social events. The girl seemed to love to organize fun, so that was obviously a great accomplishment. Lyun herself may have picked up from the same example, her own instructional connections providing her an opportunity to have Axln get some recognition as well. It seems being considerably skilled at memorizing vast quantities of information regardless of subject.. or even talent.. happens to be very valuable in instructional efforts. Of course, there is also the concern in being skilled at working with students.. and any of the teachers who had presented such concerns will be left with rumors aplenty asuading any of such worries. Neither of the two siblings knew about that either.. but mostly because she wasn’t actively working towards anything in particular. If however any of the teachers ask her to inquire on Axln’s willingness to teach.. then that might be a reason to involve the others. At the very least, such redirection had so far been reasons aplenty to have people not consider her for teaching. She liked reclusive atmospheres much more than having to interact so directly with several other people.

Actually, that had been her greatest struggle so far too, performing in front of a bunch of strangers. In that light, she had done really well.. considering that was more people than she had ever handled before. To her, there was still a distinct difference.. she wasn’t interacting with such people.. they were just a background who happened to be appreciating the same enjoyment she was. That was really probably not an appropriate outlook for a teacher, but that’s perfectly fine for a performer. Even exposed to all of the details, she felt Axln had a social demeanor that had grown through the entire process.. a social talent Axln may not have had before. Visibly, that wasn’t even something past Axln would have had, not with all of the self-isolation. Kori suffering reprisal for simply being a conduit had prevented any real social outreach there either. However, just because it hadn’t been a thing before didn’t mean that Axln wasn’t actually potentially socially outgoing. Quite certainly.. that’s where things were going all of a sudden. All of these parties were getting to the girl’s head. She could tell because she herself was quite introverted.. and had felt Axln was also introverted. Nothing about how Axln was now felt anything except a repressed extrovert.

This was possibly one of the goals she had set out for while trying to envisit her own creative expression, to learn if there was anything similar being repressed in Axln.. and in that she felt she had found something after all. A social niche.. something herself could only struggle to understand.. but even that was probably fair. Axln herself had struggled to keep up to all of her own musical ambitions, she could at least endure social atmospheres enough to give Axln the support needed to achieve a sufficient social expression. This however had an added difficulty, one which made such a problem even harder in the other world than it did here. Axln might have broken out of her shell here, ready to interact socially with numerous others.. but Kori wasn’t exactly so fortunate to be in a position that made such a thing easy. Kori was a conduit, which didn’t make her any less of a person.. but that wasn’t how the average human thought. Being social would still be exceptionally challenging when most people treated Kori like trash.

Fortunately, that has been a problem that had bothered her from the very beginning. Putting in the effort to prove that conduits should be treated like decent people sounded like a great use of their time to her. Viably though, there was no way such a thing could be achieved anytime soon. Now, there was also the consideration that she personally wasn’t all that acquainted with very many conduits, lending a subtle bias to her consideration. However, maybe a sense of bias was all that would be needed for now. Even just proving that Kori herself was not the same airhead that people thought she was, that Kori was actually a really cool person.. that would do things. Even having the average humans accept one conduit as a path to having humans start to accept others.. that could yield a great long-term plan. However, this would require the skill of someone who was really good with people and the whole social deal. Her sister was a prime candidate for the whole thing, though even Drew might have a couple of good ideas. Drew wasn’t honestly the most socially outgoing, he was just good at leading a team. Sophie on the other hand was almost as much the social face as Xwyhr was, having grown really good at dealing with people as a result of her work. Of course, Sophie wasn’t the most excited with social ambience either.. but she was still good at it. It was a dilemma Lyun had grown accustomed to.

For now at least, she had managed to get all of her equipment packed up.. and even the stuff Axln had managed to spontaneously neglect. They were ready to move on from this.. actually, they might be ready in general. Quite honestly, the only things they still lacked was in equipment.. and the last few pieces of their set were due to be completed in maybe a day or two if everything went smoothly. Meanwhile, Drew had actually managed to requisition everything they needed. It was fortunate that none of it needed to be actually delivered to Hypertech.. considering that doing so would still be challenging. Instead, everything was ready for shipping to whatever location they picked and would be easy to expedite in ten minutes from any last moment requests. They could do so at any time now.. and maybe next night would make for a great opportunity. The artificial lighting of the night would build up a great sense of atmosphere. The hardest part would be in trying to make sure they could ensure everything occurred without problems.. especially problems involving having their actions predicted. Velvet remained their greatest threat to this whole endeavour, something they would have a very difficult time dealing with. Velvet had already been able to anticipate one of their intercepted deliveries before, preventative measures would be far more difficult.

“Axln, it’s late, could we just get going already?” “Oh, uh, right. Sorry.. I’ll go pack up.” “Don’t worry, I already took care of that while you two talked. Technically, Jhez might deserve a bit of rest for himself too, I hear he’s got a class project to arrange for a few of his classes for the cosmology fair.. and some of the other teachers have wondered if he might have forgotten about that.” “Jhez might leave a lot of stuff until the last day, but it really wouldn’t be fair just assume.. wait, where did he go?” “He ran off already.. around when I mentioned the fair.” “Oh, well, I guess that’s for the best.” Lyun was giggling as Axln returned from checking to confirm that Lyun indeed had everything accounted for and was ready to go. They brought everything over to their little underground domain and packed everything away appropriately. With that taken care of, they both settled into another round of suspended sleep. The daylight that greeted them provided them with an opportunity to confirm that everything was in order and to assure that they would be ready to execute their plan on their next return. Dusk then returned them to the academy and the aftermath of the dawn’s party.

Jhez and Xwyhr were completely unreachable for the entire dusk. Of course, when it came to Jhez, that made sense.. between regular courses and the previously mentioned fair.. he had a lot on his plate. Xwyhr however was the irregular one, who had always found time to step away from her studies to do other things.. regardless of even the intensity of such studies. Lyun however made use of her new connections to discover that Xwyhr had been excused from her classes that dawn so that she could attend an orientation at administration. It really did appear that the girl was unexpectedly going places. At this point, even beyond her graduation, she already had a career at the academy potentially lined up for her. She might not be the only one though. Lyun discovered through those same connections the invitation she had projected she would need to offer to Axln. Quite honestly.. Lyun had wanted to bring the whole thing up with Xwyhr first.. leading her to a bit of hesitation. However, she also realized that such efforts would interfere with their already ongoing projects. Her responses to such inquiries were then that they already had significant academy projects to look into for a little while longer, but that she would bring up the matter with Axln once they had enough of an opportunity to appropriately consider it.

Of course, these same connections were well aware of her project.. the whole musical concert that would garnish the attention of the foundry. There wasn’t a single soul who objected to such terms, only a fountain of eager support. She was even given plenty of opportunity to spend that dusk in a very formal rehearsal room, an area with which the two of them could practice for the big stage they would be taking to come nightfall. It was even the first time Axln had even been within such an environment, though Lyun had been here for a few of her class lessons before. The room was capable of both holding a sizable audience and providing sound suppression.. so in all actuality they were able to practice in an area that felt like a public stage.. but which didn’t gather them any audience at all. Axln visibly looked out of place at the sheer immensity of the whole environment, far bigger than those parties she had been going to. Meanwhile, Lyun realized that her next performance would be in an environment like this.. just with countless people taking into their audience.. potentially even more than the party had garnished. She even stumbled a few times in her performance at first, in this realization.. but quickly corrected such mistakes. There would be countless people listening.. but none of them people she would have to directly interact with socially.

There wouldn’t be room for such small mistakes either, not once the real deal came. There was too much counting on their success already, everything had to be as flawless as possible.