They didn't have many possessions between the three of them, so it was easy to pack and transport everything by taxi. Riley chattered away on the ride, enthusiastic about her new career. The way she talked about manning a small cafe, one would think it was a prestigious appointment in a government agency.

"So it's like being a cook, too. Except some of the ingredients are special."

Darius grunted in apathetic agreement. "And what about this aura training?"

"We'll find out soon enough," Hector said.

"Do you think I'll earn enough credits to pay for my own rent?"

"Probably, but you know I'll help if you need it," he responded to Riley. The disjointed three-way conversation had grown old to him. Both Riley and Darius wanted Hector's attention. It wasn't quite to the point where he'd say they were competing over him, but he didn't always enjoy the constant demand placed on him as the friend both had in common.

It was a burden he had placed on himself. He intended to fix both of his friends and the constant frustrations were part of the cost for that. The fact that Darius prodded Riley to ask him to accompany her on a trip earlier was a fairly minor sign that the two of them were forming interpersonal connections.

Fortunately, they arrived at Tian Tower before Hector could lose his patience. They each claimed their assigned small room and Hector latched the door to his for a few moments of privacy. He fell onto his new bed and smiled up at the ceiling. Getting individual rooms may have been the best decision he'd made in weeks. Constant togetherness was not something Hector enjoyed.

The joy of being alone lasted five minutes before Darius knocked on his door.

"I want to be in the basement early," Darius said in greeting.

It was like the freshman year of college all over again, when everyone wanted to move about in packs on campus. Hector suppressed a sigh. He really needed to find more excuses to do things alone. "Sure. Let's go now."

"You should come too, Riley," Darius said.

"Me? I don't have a good aura though."

"That's why you need to go, obviously."

On the second sub-floor, there were already a handful of Xian standing in a circle. They were having a conversation about payment rates. "It's eight hundred thousand for a deployment of just three months."

"But the risks," another man whined.

"Aren't that bad," the first man shot back. "Most soldiers sent to Aes die of miasma poisoning. If your body enhancement is halfway decent, the ambient miasma is nothing to worry about."

"I'm worried about the monsters. They're starting to have morphic deviations. I heard that means the soul of Aes is becoming corrupted."

The first man shrugged. "If you're so terrified, then go get a normal person job."

Everyone in the circle laughed as the second man scowled. He obviously wasn't willing to go to such extremes as having a normal job in his efforts to avoid danger. Hector inserted himself into the circle. "You could always delve the dungeon. It's twenty thousand credits per run."

"Waste of energy," the second man proclaimed. "With all the cultivating I do, I'm not lowering my reserves unless it's for real money."

Hector raised a brow. "An hour for twenty thousand in the dungeon can't be worse than three months on Aes for eight hundred thousand. The credit per hour –"

The first man interrupted. "Don't talk credits per hour. That's missing the point. Three months on Aes is one patrol a week. The rest of the time you're in camp. They even provide some wine to keep Xian in fighting shape if your reserves drop too low."

Despite the man's exhortation against doing any calculations, Hector did some quick mental math. The payout for an Aes deployment was forty times greater than a single delve. There were about twelve weeks in three months. Forty divided by twelve came to a little over three. Three delves a week would equal a deployment. Monetarily, at least. Maybe receiving the occasional bottle of Tian wine made a big difference when you considered the cosmic energy cost. Hector wasn't good at calculating that expense for other people. His own cultivation rate was ridiculous enough to skew his perceptions of what should be possible.

Esther arrived with a couple other people and called them to order before she'd even finished walking over from the elevator. "I've got a tablet computer in my hand. Enter your name, your domain statistic, and your aura statistic on it. Be honest so we can do this safely."

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When everyone was done signing in, Esther looked over the list and began pairing people together. Hector found himself facing the first man from the disagreement he'd interjected himself into earlier. "I'm Wayne," he said as he eyed Hector. "Your stats must be weak for a level five if you're paired up with me." Wayne was at level four.

"My name is Hector. I put my emphasis on improving my body and mind."

"I can see the body worked out. You've got a lot of meat on you, too. Anyway, do you know what we're doing or should I explain the process?"

Hector smiled. "You should definitely explain what we're doing here."

"It's actually very simple. We take turns wrapping each other up in force cables. It's domain versus aura. The pressure forces the aura to get stronger real fast. Just make sure to respect your limits. Though, come to think of it, your body might be able to handle anything I can dish out. Still be careful. Esther can be a nightmare if you get on her bad side."

Wayne led the first round of their aura tempering practice. The man wrapped a cable several times around Hector's torso. Hector flared his aura and resisted a steady squeeze. After about ten minutes, he was beginning to feel like his aura aperture was on fire.

So they switched roles. Wayne lasted about thirty seconds before instructing Hector to ease up with his domain. "What is your domain statistic? We can't be a good match."

"Two point nine," Hector said.

Wayne tilted his head. "No, seriously. What is it?"

"I'm telling you the truth."

"You've got to be mid threes at least."

Esther looked over at them from where she was resisting someone else's domain. "Hector looks to be roughly at the peak of three in his domain. You just think he's stronger than his statistic because he uses an advanced technique to form his cables."

Wayne scowled upon hearing that assessment. He was in a poor mood the rest of their practice session. They alternated roles several times before Wayne eventually called it quits. The man left while muttering about 'cheating with overpowered insights'.

Riley joined him a few seconds later. She'd not had much success with the training due to the extremely low levels of her aura and domain. "That's great that you have a special domain technique. Did you learn it in your dreams?"

"I think calling what I do a technique might be overselling it," Hector said.

"And what would you call it?" Esther abandoned her own training to join them.

"Common sense, I guess."

Esther snorted. "Show me."

An eager audience formed around him. A touch self-conscious, Hector formed a cable. The watchers called for him to do it slower, so he began again, this time moving at a sedate pace and pausing on occasion to allow them to see what he did. They crowded closer, acting like he was doing something impressive.

It was really just the logical response to a couple of observations he had made. First, the forms established by domains leaked energy from sharp edges – places where the flow of energy had to turn too quickly. Second, strands became much less efficient as they grew thicker. Taking those as a starting point, Hector developed a method more efficient than Volithur's sloppy attempts.

He used thin strands of cosmic energy as his building blocks, then braided three of them together the same way he'd made friendship bracelets as a child. That was too thin for most applications, so the ropes thus constructed were then braided together three at a time to create a cable. The real trick was to make sure the contours of the various threads fit together in a complementary fashion. It had taken Hector a while to get the feel for it, but at one point he spent a lot of time practicing cable formation. The other thing he did to limit energy loss was to curl the ends of his strands back on themselves so that they bled energy into the hollow spaces formed by his woven cables rather than letting the energy leak into the environment.

His method was composed of the obvious steps to take if you wanted to minimize energy loss. Hector thought he had done a good job honing his dexterity at weaving the cables, but the underlying strategy was nothing special. It was simple stuff.

A woman squinted at him. "How is he aligning the threads like that?"

"Never mind that, I think the way he's dumping the waste energy into the cable interior will let him draw most of it back into his soul when he's done. It's brilliant," a man said.

"I've never seen someone braid strands out of other strands," another muttered. "I don't think I am ready to handle such a complicated technique."

Hector frowned at the crowd. They were impressed by this?

Esther laughed at his expression. "Your variety of common sense may be less common than you thought. If I didn't have first-hand experience with the horrendous cables that Matthias makes, I would assume you learned the technique in your dreams."

"It's not a technique," Hector insisted. "This is just…."

"You're a genius on top of getting his insight," Darius moaned. "This is unfair."

Hector rolled his eyes. The fact that Darius could be jealous of a hack to make cables more efficient was rich. The guy had a powerful chaos bolt. What need did he have of an efficient domain?

Esther clapped her hands. "Well, I think we know what you're going to do your lecture on."

"My lecture?"

"We do amateur lectures in the lounge to share tips and techniques, remember?"

"And I'm doing one?"

She patted his arm. "You're going to do great."

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