We finish our first morning of training exhausted. Physically as for Mewtwo as well as mentally for us both. The forest defenders seems to focus on Mewtwo's mental capacities for a start, as it seems he should be able to do far more than he is doing right now. As for me, they are trying to hone my reflexes. The following afternoon is spent resting and slowly advancing the main quests while also preparing for ourselves for the next day of training.

And as the night comes, Mewtwo decides to go back to sleep, while I continue to advance the mystical agriculture line of quests.

And that becomes our new standards for the next week. Morning becomes spent training with the forest defenders, while we use our afternoons to advance our quests.

Each morning of training helps us discover more about ourselves. Something neither of us realized we should have done far earlier, but we realize would have been unable to do so without the grace period granted by the Trio Sanctuary. Our bodies are capable of far greater feats than we expected. By the end of the third day, Mewtwo is able to overcome half of the gardevoir coven, while I am able to dodge about thirty percent of the projectiles sent my way.

The more we work, the more we realize how shunted our potential is. It is one thing to possess great strength, it is another to be able to use it effectively.

Through the task of dodging arrows, I learn to use all five human senses beyond anything I experienced before and even discover more from that have laid dormant within me. I slowly begin to detect Owl, even within the foggy edge of the forest. Even when the fog itself seems to try and hamper my digital senses. At first he is but a different shape in the fog, little more than a trick of the light at first glance, but with each days, that shape sharpens, until I am able to lock on him and follow his absurdly fast movements.

This does not help me overcome his onslaught of arrows, but it does help me mitigate it. By day five, I am able to almost consistently choose which arrows should hit me.

He changes his method once more after that, mixing real arrows in the volleys of training ones, just so he can confirm my claim. By the end of the week, I am able to discern through noise and speed of approach which arrows are real and which are fake.

Mewtwo, on his part, slowly discovers how to shield his mind and even overcome another's own. Pokemons beyond the Sanctuary only survive by being either fast enough to run, or strong enough to fight back. And not all pokemons are considered equal by the humans outside.

Whether it be the League trainers or the Hunters, some types are considered prime targets for materials, partners, experience or all at the same time. Psychics fall into that later case. From what they have seen and what Princess told, psychics drop vast swathe of experience to hunters successful in their hunt, along with materials able to be made into psychic resistant gears, or mind-rending weapons. For the league, pokemons with psychics often become powerhouses able to stop much of their master's attackers with their minds alone, making them frighteningly effective living shields and weapons to order around.

And the easiest way to hunt down a psychic is to overpower his mind. The elder gardevoir relays how some of her scars came from Hunters weapons. Mewtwo felt multiple shivers as she retold the feeling that came with each strikes, a distant melody always followed them, bringing more shivers. Those weapons are parts of the reason her robes never grew back. Yet they also allowed her to grow so much stronger in a a short time.

So it came to no surprise that, at the end of the week, with Mewtwo able to consistently overcome the entire gardevoir coven powers all at once, that the elder would unveil one of the very weapons she spoke of. Mewtwo tells me he physically felt the wrongness emanating from the short blade he had been shown.

A blade made of translucent grey material shaped like a teardrop with glowing yellow dots within, with sharp white blades on its side and a handle looking more like a tentacle than anything else. A blade that was made from the remains of a malamar. The elder gardevoir, which Mewtwo learned was named Corail, explained to Mewtwo what would be the next step in his training. He would be asked to train his moves while also being, at first, prickled by the knife, then slashed, and finally stabbed. That last part had him worried, but the coven reassured him, they would be making sure he would survive the entire process. After all, each members of the coven had all gone through the same process, and still survived.

For me, they would continue to train my reflexes, mostly because they have few ideas on how to actually train me. Few pokemons know how to use tools as weapons. There was a discussion of learning how to fight from Chok the machoke, but I was not made aware of when that would happen.

On the quest front, we both managed to advance our self-assigned lines. I did have to unlock the next step by making the arcane attunement chip, but once that was done, most quests that followed were easily cleared by Mewtwo alone. The only thing that chip did for is add six new slots for the six primal vis crystal, while also adding a counter for the local available aura in the air, which allows me to craft recipes that would normally require an arcane workbench.

For my side of the quests, I have managed to upgrade my bonsai chip to tier three. The only way to obtain higher tier essence is to combine four of the lower tier with an infusion crystal. The problem comes from the fact that the infusion crystal has a limited amount of uses, and due to its requirement of a diamond, I am already trying to aim for the highest tier of infusion crystals, the master infusion crystal. Once I have it, I will no longer have to bother with crystal durability. Still, that means I need to collect more inferium essence, a lot more of it.

And I do mean a lot. The highest tier of essence is called insanium and needs more than a thousand inferium essence just to make a singular one. Still with the bonsai chip, production is ever ongoing, so that is a little plus here.

For Mewtwo, with the guidance of both the system and the thaumonomicon, he has advanced enough to begin actual thaumaturgic experiments.

He has made a weird lens thing from gold, manasteel and quartz glass that is called a thaumometer. It allows him, and me when he finally let me use it, to see some of the hidden aspects of many a thing we had. Slowly we can see the aspects that make a lot of what we possess. May it be ingots, raw materials, and even ourselves.

When I scanned him, I was given knowledge of aspects related to the mind, elemental powers and more, while when he scanned me, he got an onslaught of tool related aspects, along with energy and metal.

This tool allowed him to realize how some of our creations work, and that the aspects play some important role in it all. And as he though about it, realizing that we had found crystallized aspects in the form of vis crystal, maybe the aspects could be extracted somehow. This realization lead to the thaumonomicon suggesting dissolving the materials in a special apparatus. Mewtwo though about that for a minute and after scouring our recipes, realized that a cauldron could work. Once the cauldron was made, and following another hint from the thaumonomicon about using salis mundus, Mewtwo created a crucible.

The crucible, a large metal pot with arcanic symbol all around its lid, can, with water and heat, dissolve anything thrown within into its base aspect components, which the thaumonomicon calls essentia. Those can then be recrystallized into vis crystals of the corresponding aspect by throwing little slivers of quartz into the boiling.

A small worrying part is that each times we do recrystallize the essentia, or we synthesized something, some weird purple smoke is generated. After some more experiments, Mewtwo suddenly declared he was feeling something weird in the air. At the same moment, a little warning appeared on my HUD telling me about something called flux build-up. A new entry consequently appeared within both the thaumonomicon and my tutorial.

It explained what the purple smoke, as well as flux are. Flux is what happens when dissolved essentia is released to the atmosphere. It pollutes the local arcanic aura and stops its natural regeneration. The thaumonomicon remains rather sparse and mostly curious as to how this will develop, while the quests give no hindsight into what it is, so... we'll consider it safe... ish for now.

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However, most of our quest advancement slows down even further when we begin our second week of training. Instead of only the morning, training becomes a full day work. It appears that the new protections offered by the Trio Sanctuary are able to free most of the forest defenders time. So most of our research and advancement stall as we are forced to work on our personal improvements.

This time, the routine continues for three weeks, but our improvements are coming faster.

That hand to hand training that was in discussion has been confirmed and I have spent my afternoon training with Chok as well as a one-armed mienshao whose name I do not know, and the mienshao does not seem to want it shared. The morning training has become even more arduous, as Owl now mixes live arrows and energy attacks in the dodging training. I no longer have the training wheels, and have to adapt as much as possible to choose which damage to take. Although with each sessions, I feel ever closer to being able to avoid most attacks.

In the afternoon, the sessions with Chok and the mienshao often turn into a one sided beating, with me trying desperately to defend myself and them hammering me until my body gives up. Still, with Owl training, I am at least able to dodge their most basic attacks.

More and more I learn. As the second week ends, I am able to match the both of them when they hold back, and hold up at least a minute when they go full power. I am also almost able to dodge most of Owl attacks, although I still get hit when he unleash barrages of attacks.

For Mewtwo, the second week allows him to develop something he had not really touched on yet. His abilities. Pressure and unnerve, two pokemon abilities that to this point, he had kept mostly shunted, only ever using either once or twice. With a good part of the gardevoir coven having trace, they are able to emulate either abilities to show Mewtwo how it feels and how to react to it. Pressure allows Mewtwo to force his opponents to expand more energy to come after him, while unnerve stops them trying to use items to heal or cure themselves. Mostly berries though, although when he tried it on me later I became unable to even think of eating or drinking, even with either food or drink in my hands.

They also begin his training to resist the effects of weapons made to take down psychics.

He takes to them surprisingly easily in the eyes of Corail. Neither of us reveal why that is, but we do send a little thank you to Chaos for his trial.

When we are alone one night, he reveals to me that the effect is similar to when we gazed upon the god's eyes, although far more muted than that experience.

His training has moved from prickles to slashes almost instantly. Which he easily resists, to the point that Corail decides to forego the supposed adaptation period and moves straight to stabbing.

The first time he experiences it, even I hear his scream from within the forest edge. That night I carry him back to the cottage. The spot Corail chose for the first attempt was his left leg, and the pulsing wound left behind made me wince each times I looked at it. Although they did heal it, it still remained inflamed for the entire night, only disappearing in the morning.

As this training is supposedly taken by every members of the forest defenders, it makes me wonder how they do it on pokemon of a more frail stature than Mewtwo. In the case of Mewtwo there is a lot of him that is relatively safe to stab, but what about, skinnier pokemons? Do they never move to the stabbing? Is it because it would just instantly kill them? What about more ethereal pokemons ? Do I even want answers to these question?

No, I decide, and leave these questions be.

While Mewtwo becomes unable to work on the thaumcraft quest-line due to his constant fatigue, I continue to advance those I can. The nether is still left alone, I do not even want to think about it for now, but the mystical agriculture quests are coming along nicely. Thanks to my bonsai pot chip being tier three, I am able to have multiple inferium seeds grow at once. I have also started creating some resources seeds. First on the list were water, dirt, and wood as the easiest I could do, then I made coal, stone, copper and iron as well as nature on top to secure some basic resources. I wanted to make some related to animals, but I need soul jars and a weapon made with soulium metal, which is found in the nether, so that is going to have to wait.

We have also started preparing for the trials. We decided that we would do both back to back, so I have started stockpiling food, as well as growing it. Turns out the bonsai chip works for all sorts of seeds, crops and even saplings. So I have slowly been growing our supplies of food. This gives me some peace of mind as it means I will be able to feed both me and Mewtwo when we have to leave the Sanctuary.

We have also given a heads-up to Princess about our endeavor. She has started gathering her subjects' questions and her aide is working overtime trying to assemble them into as few questions as possible. The more we can maximize the knowledge we gain from a single answer, the better.

By the end of the third week, we have both learned much about ourselves.

While Mewtwo is a legendary pokemon, with abilities that put to shame most pokemons in the Sanctuary, I am a machine with absurd power beneath my skin. As we have worked during these three weeks, we have also been leveling up and upgrading ourselves as I completed as many quests as possible. Mewtwo has finally broached the level one hundred, which immediately catapulted him even further as the achievement for doing so gave him a hundred candy XL. He has been consuming them slowly, to avoid overdosing, but the results are absurd. now beyond level 150, he is able to hold his own against a lot of the members of the forest defenders.

For myself, I have been strengthening my defenses, reflexes and my sensors. My development is slower, but the difference is still noticeable. More and more Owl projectiles become easier to see and even predict. As much as the decidueye is trying to be as random as he can, I am starting to see patterns in his attacks. My body is slowly becoming close to impervious to Chok blows, and my reflexes are almost on par to the mienshao. They all seem impressed by my adaptability, and I am as well.

When the fourth week starts, we are finally told that the next phase will be joint training. Although the the leader, Ugo the pangoro, expectations were not met as he expected them, he deems us ready to be able to work together.

As he knows that us leaving the Sanctuary will be problematic for our raid timer, he organizes little hunting games within the forest edge. Mewtwo and I are dropped in the middle of the foggy barrier and have to return back to the forest. We would be judged by how hurt, tired and weathered we are when we return.

The first attempts are only hampered by the forest defenders, and we pass with flying colors. The difficulty ramps up when the defensive lines of the forest are unleashed upon us. The trevenants guarding the edge show us they were merely holding back when we first entered as their true power shine. Each trees become a potential foe, and when the labyrinth made of teleporting walls gets reactivated, and we have to escape somehow while being actively hunted, we start to realize how dangerous the outside could be. And Although we never achieve what Ugo calls an instant death scenario, we still fail more and more as the difficulty ramps up.

One time, we spend the entire day trying to navigate the teleportation labyrinth while Owl, Blair and multiple of their subordinates harass us. We get sent back to the start multiple times as we are forced to rush headlong into teleportation walls, and have to avoid our hunters on our way back. Needless to say, that was a fail for us. Another time, we get cornered by Ugo and multiple fighting types, we barely manage to escape and return within the forest, but our potential wounds and tiredness earns us another fail. Where we outside the Sanctuary, such situation could lead to our enemies whittling us down until they could end us. That one was the closest to an instant death scenario we ever came to.

However, other times, we shine by our strength and resourcefulness. While Mewtwo can fly, I can build and during one run with the labyrinth, I decide to try a strategy using that very capacity.

From beneath my feet, I build a column of stone blocks and then bridge all the way into the forest. Mewtwo floats me down and we pass without a single injury. The next time I try that strategy, flying types harass us and we are forced to defend ourselves. The strategy still somewhat works, but weaknesses quickly show themselves. After the first time, Mewtwo has to dedicate more of his power to defend me as I build, while I am unable to help him back. Also, I am a single step from falling, which may prove fatal in the long run. When Ugo unleash bug types to scale after us, I realize the possible limitations of the method.

Yet there is more that could be done, I realize. What about making walls? Marking teleportation spots? Quickly raising defenses against attacks. Hazards, traps, defenses. My builder tool has much to offer.

These training sessions last for another three weeks, and by their end, we have learned many survival skills vital to our survival.

Mewtwo has also been able advance his thaumaturgic experiments. With his boost in power, and the fact that training stops either once night falls or we manage to complete it three times, we have some days when we can work on our little quests in peace.

Mewtwo now sports some fancy goggles when he works, as it allows him to see exactly what is within his crucible at any given moments as well as a pendant which allows him to sense the arcanic aura the air with further clarity. The pendant validates the vis stone quest.

However, there is only three days left before the outside the sanctuary, a week will have passed. As such, it is time to do the raids and give the citizens of the Sanctuary some answers. Our first trial shall be knowledge, as Princess has asked for that one first. As much as we have warned her that the answers might be shorts and unhelpful, she still asked for it to be first.

And so, as we stand in the throne room of the ruler of the Sanctuary, we activate the knowledge trial.