After a bit of a trek up to the top, Nicalua finally arrived at the square.

This town was much bigger than the pile-dwelling he used to live in, even if really, after getting out of there for just a few months he knew that that place should have been called a hamlet.

Because of this, and the fact it wasn't made of putrid wood on top of a runny marsh but of cobbled paving, the square had a proper structure and function.

At a side an artificial stream of water both emerged and disappeared underground, a clear new addition as the stones that made it were still pale and without algae; the women could usually be seen cleaning clothes by beating and rubbing them against wooden rubbing boards or filling buckets with the water to bring them home.

Wooden planks as smooth as possible were all over the place where children would crowd over them, cheering or fighting over the best spinning tops each of them brought.

Near the center the lads that were not yet old enough to be taken to work were playing with leather balls in hilarious moves supposed to impress the girls squealing at the side.

The buildings surrounding it were shops and cafes that would appeal to the elderly and the occasional couple.

Today instead, there were rows of stands selling foods, clothes and all manners of trinkets that could appeal to the local people with their exoticness, taking them form their usual activities and bringing a sense of activity to the air.

There was no festival going on though, the presence of the caravan bringing new items alone was all it took to awake the stagnant town; probably even if they didn't bring anything interesting the people would still come just to talk just to hear about the big cities.

A middle-aged woman clothier was energetically bargaining with a local that looked like her mirror image but with different wear, the mole on the right side of the chin was on her left side too.

Then she noticed Nicalua and quickly accepted the trade before turning to him.

"What is it my boy? It's been a year at best, we haven't even completed the full route, there's no need to worry about not finding a good teacher."

Nicalua was about to join her and help her selling when he noticed a building on the other side with a girl about his age sitting restlessly behind the counter. The position marked the place as a shop of some kind, but although many were in the square no one was entering it.

Intrigued he started.

"Sorry Aunt Nana, I'll just go around clearing my mind."

The woman had the widest grin Nicalua had ever seen.

"You can't fool me boy, I have seen how you stared at that girl over there."

"N no, it's not like that."

"Look at you, all embarrassed. She is really pretty, you have a good eye. Now go."

Speechless, he turned around and entered the strange building.

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The tall doors were secured to the sides with thin ropes.

On both sides of the small area before the counter were short rickety wicker chairs; above them on the walls were strange paintings on wood tiles, consisting of disorderly lines of colored paint that seemed to represent sometimes some strange animal while sometimes a wide landscape.

Behind the girl against the wall were half consumed bottles of colored glass, but no writing was on them to support the only plausible option of the place being a brew bar.

The rightmost corner of the wall had a short opening with free hinges suggesting the past presence of a door.

The excited girl had her dark hair in cute thin twintails that took away some years from her already youthful oval face with baby fat still on the cheeks. Her boyish attire with tight fitting suspenders still didn't look out of place on such a androgynous figure.

"Hello! What did the caravan bring? Oh how I hope for a metal hairpin. Wooden ones splinter after a couple of months and that's it. There's no reason to decorate them. Maybe with motifs made with that metallic lucid paint. And a metal butterfly on top. A couple of flowers with a rougher paint to contrast would be good too..."

"Ahem! Shouldn't you be trying to sell me whatever you have here? What even do you have here?! Why is no one going inside?"

The girl was still distracted by the noises outside, but a grimace started to appear on her face.

"Oh. Well, it's because father doesn't want his 'dea that will revolutionize Mental Cultivation' to be forgotten."

The interested Nicalua her single source of entertainment in this drab environment, she finally dedicated herself to the conversation.

"You know, father was actually a teacher of a Mental School of the big city nearby, Raggia. But one day he started to teach his theory as the objective truth of the world and was fired."

The melancholy and slight resentment in her voice couldn't be hidden from her words.

"I I'm sorry. You don't have to tell me if you don't want."

She was slightly surprised that such a understanding boy of her age existed and suddenly she got embarrassed from her brash words.

"Ha-haha. No. You don't have to worry.

Ahe-em. Anyway, were was I?! Right. Well, even if he taught his theory at school father wouldn't have been punished, after all he was recognized to be a able teacher and anyway the matters of the mind are vague and what a person feels is best for them is what he should pursue with little exceptions, so I can only blame father.

By the way, my name is Prilla."

She extended her right hand in greeting with a slight blush to her face.

With a bit of awkwardness at the forwardness of the little girl, Nicalua quickly shook it and got to the point.

"I'm Nicalua. So, you were saying..."

"Hehe. Yeah. Well, in short, he said that the five aggregates that make up the mind are material form, feeling, perception, volition and sensory consciousness, each influencing each other and inseparable from the other.

Even if not necessarily described as these five, it's said that at the higher levels of Mental Cultivation you have to choose between discarding or fusing all of the mental components.

So to make the process as easy as possible the components of the mind have to be cultivated to roughly the same level. Because of this, declaring for a fact the components is seen as taking responsibility for the future path of Mental Masters and no school wants risk their reputation by crooking the path of thousands and seeing their philosophy decline because of a easily avoidable word."

Describing his plight in Mental Cultivation, Nicalua asked for advice on his situation.

"I don't really know what could be afflicting you, but father's theory aside, other schools of thought also say that some components influence others, so my advice is just make as many experiences as possible and reflect on them as much as possible.

Of course, these experiences include both being alone resting your mind and, you know, being with others... and doing things... with them!"

Her bright red dimpled cheeks really didn't help the brash girl at hiding her intentions, but the 22 year old mind of Nicalua didn't find this situation funny at all as he was the one trapped in it.

But if the advice of someone who just heard a teacher was this helpful already, he would really need to enter a school.

With his talent, he would need to at least reach the first level of Mental Cultivation to be considered by them.

Uhm, his mind had already learned to avoid a difficult situation by wandering about, he really was making massive steps ahead.