Randidly floated downward in the Web, the hollow spine at the center of the Nexus, his eyes narrowed as he carefully monitored the churning mass of chaotic Aether that was blasting up from below. At this depth, there basically wasn’t any wall fixtures that provided a reprieve from the seeping gloom. He had already gone past the place where he had helped temper Heiffal and his crew for a week, seeking to draw closer to the weight of significance at the core of the Nexus.

In terms of absolute distance, Randidly wasn’t sure how far he was from the bottom. But at this point, even ten meters deeper downward had Randidly’s Grim Intuition warning him that this was a dangerous descent.

Still unwilling to risk losing himself for a time in this mass of significance, Randidly slowed himself and grabbed a cord so he would not fall any further. There he carefully examined his condition and discovered Grim Intuition wasn’t exaggerating the threat of this space; it was currently a negligible effect, but Randidly could feel some of his ancillary thoughts vanishing into that mass of significance below. Thoughts without a sizable backing in significance or emotion were too light to currently resist that pull.

It was easy to extrapolate from the fact that even Randidly was currently being affected by it how someone could have their mind deeply wounded by direct exposure. The Nether Nebula in his chest furiously churned, almost as though it was trying to justify itself in the face of the obviously much larger Nether stewing below the Nexus. Thick veins of Nether flowed through his body, struggling to ground him.

Randidly settled himself onto a cord and adjusted his mental state. He watched the steady ebbing of some of his ambient Nether away from his body through half-lidded eyes. The core of his Nether Nebula was safe, but some of the Nether that flowed through his veins was being steadily leached away.

Whatever is down there is strong… Randidly reflected.

What was peculiar about the process was that the flows of Nether left his body from strange angles. They then wound their way downward in peculiar spirals. Randidly couldn’t determine any rhyme or reason for the methodology, but since it was strange he studiously observed the stolen Nether. Perhaps in the future, this spiraling absorption would help him make sense of how to utilize Nether more generally.

But when it seemed he had seen the same curling spiral over and over, Randidly turned his attention inward. His skin continued to darken, the Aether here volatile and frothing against his body. Into that horrible churn of this by-product energy Randidly opened himself and dumped the emotions that had been steadily refined by the Stillborn Phoenix over the past few days.

As had happened previously, the almost gelatinous emotions were partially inert as Randidly released them into the surroundings, having been refined down to a condensed form. But as the emotions encountered the raw Aether and more impurities were introduced, the substance seemed to catch fire. The entire process was invisible, but Randidly’s newly tuned senses could detect the way that the energy flowing upward had increased in image ‘temperature’, as it were. The violence and desperation of the emotions shot sharply upward.

I hope I’m not inciting any riots in the Nexus...

Shaking his head slightly, Randidly turned his attention to below, looking into the flowing river of Aether runoff. Then, with the Stillborn Phoenix almost trembling with excitement, he began to breathe deeply of the dubious flow. Yggdrasil quickly wove a net of branches to filter out the energy and leave only the emotions as the Stillborn Phoenix greedily drank.

Congratulations! Your Skill Tide of the Void (L) has grown to Level 251!

Congratulations! Your Skill Abomination’s Grim Vigor (M) has grown to Level 364!

As Randidly sat and waited for the Stillborn Phoenix to sate its appetite for emotions, he reflected on the current conundrum afflicting the Grim Chimera. With all the tempering that he had put the Grim Chimera through in the past month, he had greatly hardened its exterior. While the recruits had been running laps, Randidly had been within his nearby training pod, experiencing a physical strain almost triple what they were enduring to continue to push his own limits. The process was excruciating, leaving his arms and legs covered with giant, oozing gashes akin to the result of ripping away a scab prematurely.

Despite all that force that he used, the rough exterior of the Grim Chimera only grew back hardened even further. He was a butterfly stuck within a calcifying cocoon, strengthening his own prison with his struggles.

Now, Randidly wasn’t worried that he would be stuck in this form permanently. But he did realize that it would require a powerful dose of necessity that he couldn’t generate for himself in order to escape this form. Unfortunately, it seemed like the Grim Chimera was going to stubbornly refuse to abandon its new, crusty visage until it had to.

Probably will need a mid-fight power up… god, one of these days I’m going to fight someone who attacks without pausing to revel in my struggles and I'm going to be punished for this, Randidly grimaced. Then he received a message from Helen, calling him back to the Fifth Cohort Rally Station. So he finished up the emotional absorption and returned to the Overseer housing facility.

The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

He found them within the great hall on the ground floor, which was generally used for meals. Almost all of Randidly’s subordinates were gathered, immediately warning him that something wasn’t quite right. In addition, the air in the wide gathering hall was heavy with worry. Randidly frowned. “What happened?”

“The situation in the Fifth Cohort has deteriorated,” Helen said immediately. “Lady Iellaya stopped by while you were gone and explained some of the gruesome details, but she wants you to speak with her directly for all the information. For our purposes, we are lucky that our deployment hasn’t been accelerated. She just wanted to stress that because the threat is becoming much more legitimate, Military High Command won’t be able to protect our elite group as planned. They will be deployed in high leverage situations, as was advertised when they determined the Aether allotment for the project. So our training had better be effective, for all our sakes.”

Randidly mulled that over for a few seconds. His first thought was of Vualla, who should be deploying with the Xyrt Brigade to that area shortly. But he didn’t dare contact her until she was off of the Xyrt Brigade compound. Still, Randidly understood Vualla’s personal strength. She would not die easily.

It didn’t completely alleviate his anxiety, but it did allow him to shelve it and turn to the issue in front of them. As for whether their training methods would be effective… Randidly’s emerald eyes flashed with grim satisfaction. “You’ve finished the screenings, right? How prepared can we make them in the next three months? How do they compare to the people of Earth?”

Helen and Heiffal exchanged a glance and Heiffal stepped forward to speak first. “Compared to the people of Earth, these recruits have several distinct advantages. First, their base Stats and Skill Levels are, generally, almost one hundred higher across the board. They have already been honed by professionals in terms of combat theory. In addition, they have had years to develop their individual images to the point of being capable. Of course… there are associated drawbacks. They have a relatively rigid idea of images: many were bewildered when we asked what their images want. Others cannot think of a single idea for how to improve their images. Perhaps even worse, very few have handled legitimate challenges in the past. There have already been a few… mental breakdowns, especially amongst Helen’s group. The mental strain of actual combat is foreign to them.”

Helen cleared her throat. “Luckily, there are some observable signs to give us a warning of an impending breakdown. So it isn’t too much trouble to handle them. But the group I’m dealing with… they have a relatively weak resolve, to begin with. I can beat them into shape, but I don’t believe they will continue to improve on their own after the training. So the short answer is yes, we can boost their capability past being able to handle a few Nether Beasts. But the bottom 40% will never have a hope of rivaling a Nether Gatekeeper.”

Randidly pursed his lips and glanced at Heiffal. “What about your group? If we don’t have even a few who can hold their own against Nether Gatekeepers, it’s going to be hard to honestly refer to the unit as ‘elite’.”

“There are quite a few promising seeds amongst our group, but I will say… the preconceived notions about images are holding a significant portion back.” Heiffal glanced again at Helen. “Honestly, I almost think we are going about this exactly the wrong way. We do have three months, after all. I believe it might be better to break down the talented recruits with Helen’s methods and cultivate determination in the weaker ones with accomplishable physical training. Success breeds confidence. Once we have them all at a similar base state, I believe these recruits will grow explosively.”

Randidly grunted. “And in terms of potential, will these recruits be able to rival you and your men within three months, Heiffal?”

“Individually? I doubt it. I haven’t seen much evidence of a team spirit amongst them. But there are several who could easily surpass me within that time. If they embrace emotion as a part of their image and start opening themselves up to change… they could surpass me within a week.” Heiffal replied.

Randidly drummed his fingers against his thighs as he considered that. He should meet with Lady Iellaya and discuss the details of what was actually happening on the frontlines as soon as possible. But If he agreed to the switch in training methodology, it would probably require that they lean on Randidly’s own images to accelerate the process. The actual elites were all quite capable; they wouldn’t be easy to breakdown. In addition to that, Randidly still wanted to explore the Stillborn Phoenix a bit more before he exposed the recruits to it. But it would probably help their acclimation with emotions.

Randidly glanced at Helen. The look in her eyes told him that she agreed with Heiffal’s assessment. Rather than trying to immediately improve the recruits' power, it would be better to attend to their foundations first.

Back to basics, then.

“Fine, let’s switch,” Randidly said. “Which means we are trying to send a message to the recruits with their performance in the first challenge against other recruit groups. Meanwhile, start rewarding the high performing recruits with Darkstar Coins. Heh. We will need to make that first individual who uses it part of the spectacle, but I’ll make sure they benefit. Any other ideas for shifting the training?”

Muareth stepped forward. “I think one way to spur immediate change is to mix sparring with Heiffal’s warriors into the normal training regimen. The sooner we can make the recruits realize how weak they are in comparison to veterans on the frontlines, the more quickly they will focus on improving. Especially when they will feel like they are physically more powerful than Heiffal’s crew.”

“Besides,” Heiffal added, “We don’t have many more constructions planned; my boys are mostly sitting around doing nothing. They can plan out training regimens, but it would be better if they got to stretch their legs a bit while doing so. Fighting the recruits directly will give them more knowledge of their Skills.”

No sooner had Randidly nodded in agreement that Helen frowned down at the ground. “Actually… speaking about the construction… I think I have an idea. Let’s give the recruits some stake in the game.”