Chapter 31: Silver Linings

Without Underground matches to fill his schedule, Rick wasn't entirely sure what to do with himself. It hadn't been that long ago that he hadn't had fights at all... what had he done before then? He had a few hobbies, mostly ones that didn't cost anything, but he couldn't fill his entire schedule with just those.

There were clear limits on how long he could train effectively. It might sound dramatic to meditate for years, but studies showed that the efficacy of each hour of meditation was less than half of the previous hour. Likewise, his body wore out and needed time for recovery after physical training. If he'd had an infinite budget, maybe he could have accelerated those processes, but for now he needed to work with them.

Rick ended up going back to the library a few times, asking Heather for more books. Though he had enough techniques he needed to progress that adding more would split his efforts, that didn't mean he couldn't improve his knowledge base. He spent a while reading about the complex interrelations between lucrim, ether, and aura, which he'd thought he understood but actually only had a vague sense for.

For a while he also got further into the Graham's Stake core. It was remarkable how it grew without him needing to do anything, providing him with a steady, if small, supply of energy. Apparently Perpetual Souls used similar techniques to provide their endless energy, though that status was absurdly far off.

Though he was tempted to invest more in the core, since he enjoyed the internal supply of lucrim, he thought that his core combat abilities were more important for now. Besides, the books revealed that there were many other techniques aside from Graham's Stake, some with extremely complex results or huge risks that could make or break someone's entire lucrima.

All of that would have to be figured out later. For now, he focused on the few things he could control.

No training was going to transform him overnight, but he slowly realized that he did have useful options. Maybe not directly related to power, but he could remove certain inefficiencies in his life, he could improve his overall situation. The only challenge was finding them.

That day at work he had a chance, if he dared. Rick struggled to stay focused during the dull hours of normal clients until Lisa showed up. She smiled brightly when she saw him. "Hey, Rick. Ready for our sparring today?"

"Absolutely."

They went through their usual routines, pressing one another hard. Though she was still unquestionably stronger than him with 54,000 lucrim, the gap in their combat ability had declined. He still lacked the overall grace and edge of her high total, but his offensive and defensive cores had vastly increased in strength. Not to mention that he had been throwing himself against powerful and experienced fighters over and over again, which had significantly sharpened his skills.

In a real fight, the winner would probably be determined by psychology, not strength. But this wasn't a real fight, just sparring. The point was to push each other to the edge, to exercise both body and lucrima to the limit. Now that he was strong enough that she didn't have to hold back so much, it was actually more fun.

When they finished sparring, they were both sweating and gasping for breath, so they just dropped down onto the mats. Lisa grinned over at him, flush from the exertion, and he had to resist the urge to grin back. If he did, Jimmy would roll his eyes and make cracks about not getting involved with their clients.

Actually, Rick had in mind something that Jimmy would hate much more. He wasn't sure how to bring it up, but Lisa made things easier by starting the conversation. "How is Melissa doing?"

"She's still well - not only is her condition stable, she's strengthening the shell." The void also seemed to be growing in strength, but since it hadn't had a negative impact so far, he tried not to worry about it.

"That's a relief to hear. She's a great kid, so I wish her all the best."

"On that note..." Rick lowered his voice, speaking just loudly enough for Lisa to hear. "She does still have problems with holding her lucrim too tensely. She could probably use your help again."

"Oh, I'd be happy to!" Lisa lowered her voice automatically to match him, but judging from her expression she didn't get why.

"I've been thinking about that. I'd prefer to be able to compensate you for your work - don't object, I'd feel more comfortable that way." Rick took a deep breath and, after a glance toward Jimmy, just went for it. "It occurs to me that you also want something from me, but maybe we could arrange to... do things directly, without anyone in the middle."

Now she got it, her eyes flickering to where Jimmy read unknowingly. "You're suggesting trading sparring for massages?"

"Those two probably aren't equivalent, but we could figure out some sort of exchange rate, right? I never see you use any of the other equipment here anymore, so you'd save money on your gym subscription."

"It'd also be easier if we could meet anywhere, anytime." Lisa was nodding slowly and he let himself feel a bit of relief: it seemed like she was open to the idea. "Maybe we should discuss the exact details somewhere else, but... yeah, I think this could be better. Thanks for the idea, Rick."

With her smiling at him, he decided to keep going. "I hope this doesn't make it creepy, but... you do have massage techniques that can restore lucrima damage, right? I've been trying to make plans, and some of the best ways to develop might be pretty rough on me..."

"You thought that was going to come off as creepy?" To his relief, Lisa gave him an odd smile. "For one, it's my job. For another, I spend a lot of time going into homes that are armored little fortresses with guards. By comparison, visiting you and your sister is downright homey."

"Good. Then... you'd probably better go for now, but you have my number, so we can figure things out when we have time."

"Sounds good. I look forward to it, Rick."

With that, Lisa left the gym for the day. Rick was afraid that Jimmy might figure out what he was doing somehow, but the next week Lisa canceled her subscription while he wasn't in, and the day after that Jimmy didn't say anything about it. Though Rick had expected that losing money would get through to him, perhaps Jimmy really didn't care about that, either.

In any case, once they got the details figured out, that was a straightforward improvement to his life. He and Melissa got access to an excellent massage therapist in return for doing what he'd been doing anyway. Since Lisa really did benefit from their sparring, he didn't even feel like it was cheating, just a fair exchange.

Unfortunately, he hadn't come up with too many other improvements that were such obvious win-wins. Life tended to be a zero sum game in a lot of ways, and he lacked the resources that made it easier. Without the additional money from matches in the Underground, he didn't have much extra to work with, so he couldn't buy philosopher's elixir or even serum to recharge himself.

Just when he was starting to think things were going too well, he got a strange letter in the mail: a note from Melissa's principal. Apparently Melissa had been involved in some kind of fight, though it was unclear about the exact nature of it.

Governing her behavior wasn't his job, but legally he was responsible. Rick puzzled over that note while he trained the rest of the day until Melissa got back home. He waved the note in her direction when she entered and she let out a groan.

"Oh, god, they really sent you a note? If it was anybody else, I'd be so embarrassed."

"I'm not really sure what even happened." Rick held the note in front of his face and let his eyes run over it, as if it would say something new. "I guess if you don't want to talk about it, that's fine. Did they deserve it?"

"Haha, not really. But I want to talk about it." Melissa threw her backpack on the floor and plopped down onto the couch. "Okay, so... there's this girl called Jenn who is kind of a bitch. Not like over-the-top bitch, but I've never really liked her. When we were in L.E., we ended up on opposite sides of this lucrim dodgeball match. You know what that is?"

"Everybody who has ever been in school knows about lucrim dodgeball. It's the easiest way for the teachers to do nothing for a whole period."

"That's true," Melissa said, "but I don't mind, because it's fun. Anyway, Jenn really went after me this time for some reason - actually, the reason was that I snapped back at her for making fun of my clothes, but whatever. The important thing is that she decided to cheat. Her lucrima got fully developed early, so she likes to use it on people. But this time...

"Well, it didn't go well for her." Melissa hesitated in her story, glancing at him. "She used lucrim to throw a ball really hard, so I used mine back to stop it. She figured it out and got pissed, and... that's when... basically, Jenn tried to knock me over with her aura, but instead I kind of... burned it. She ended up falling down and losing a chunk of lucrim."

Rick had been listening quietly, obviously supportive of his sister, but as he understood at the end his eyes widened. "You mean that you used your ether void to destroy some of her lucrim."

Melissa winced. "Yeah, I guess so. I mean, I didn't intend to, it just happened naturally. Do... uh, do you think I could end up doing that accidentally to people? Would that make me a threat?"

"It's not very likely. Most likely it only worked because Jenn is untrained and the best attack she can manage is just flooding aura. That's not much different than when I flow some lucrim to you." What he left unsaid was that such a flow shouldn't have been able to hurt Jenn. He wanted to say something more, but had no proof at all for his instinctive reaction.

"Do you think I'm gonna get in trouble, Rick?"

"No, you're probably fine." He passed the principal's note over to her. "They didn't say anything about further disciplinary action, and in any case they already know about your condition. If Jenn tried to press charges or anything like that, she'd have to deal with the fact that she attacked someone who's 'disabled'."

"Dyurr, that's me! I'm differently abled!" After crossing her eyes and sticking out her tongue, Melissa returned to looking serious. "But what does it actually mean? The idea that I have a little flame inside me instead of just a soul-sucking void... well, it might seem dumb, but it feels a lot more pleasant. I never thought that it could hurt anybody..."

Rick considered the matter for some time, his theoretical knowledge insufficient to make a judgment. Eventually he decided that it might be better to simply perform an experiment. "Let's try to recreate what happened and see how it goes."

They gave it a few attempts, but as he'd suspected, they all failed because Rick's strength was refined for combat. Yet when he felt his sister's aura, he did feel as though something was wrong. Though it might come off as merely her condition to anyone else, he knew that it was more.

The ether void that had once threatened her life was growing. More than that, it was developing in a new direction. He had no idea what that meant, if it would be fatal or possibly even beneficial, so he just told Melissa what he knew. She listened somberly, then spent a while thinking.

"Rick... I'm not an expert on this at all, but I can tell you how it feels: this feels right. I don't think I'm going to get myself killed this way and I feel healthier than I have in years. But if there's a real risk to you or anybody else..."

"No, I don't think that's likely. Come on, let's try something else."

This time he tried harder to lower his defenses, let her aura slide into him. It didn't work, because she lacked the experience. Frowning, Rick tried a different tactic. He extended lucrim to her, as he had once done in order to alleviate her condition, but instead of raw lucrim, he tried to connect a channel directly to his Lucores.

Instantly he felt a scorching and tearing sensation. Rick reacted so violently that Melissa shrank back with a high-pitched noise, eyes wide. He rushed to apologize, but to his surprise she grinned.

"Whoa, that was crazy! A bit like what happened with Jenn, but yours was way more intense!"

"I think we replicated it, a bit." Rick had to shake his head as he accepted that his theory was at least slightly correct. "Basically, it seems to me that you're in control of the ether void."

"Really? If that was true, I should be able to throw it at people or drain all their lucrim or other awesome things."

"Not like that. But instead of the void consuming you - or maybe cannibalizing would be a better word - it's maintaining a stable nature. Your shell is holding firm, but you can still pass lucrim to and from it - you'd die otherwise. If you ever end up with others' lucrim, it gets sucked in."

"That's crazy." Melissa sat back and thought about it. "You never did answer: does that mean I'm a threat to people around me?"

"I don't think so. The same skills you need to keep yourself alive are the ones that you need to keep this under control." Rick smiled encouragingly at her. "But you might have stumbled onto something useful. Let's repeat the experiment."

"But... won't that hurt you?"

"Yes, but training hurts too. Every time my lucrima is exposed to intense conditions, it grows back stronger once I recover. Well, your ether void is a condition that it's barely experienced before, so I have a lot of growing to do."

Grinning as she understood, Melissa quickly cooperated. For once, things went as smoothly as he'd hoped. Though it took effort to lower all his defenses and make contact, once he did, his lucrima faced an entirely new type of damage. The first day he had to spend time recovering after only the third attempt, but he did better the day after that.

Over the next week they modified their usual schedule, adding the strange form of training to their usual chatting and TV watching. Each session left him feeling a bit scorched, and threads had been torn from his foundation, but he rebuilt each time. It was like a more controlled version of the damage she had done to him during her crisis, and it had equivalently impressive effects.

Though the effect declined over time as he adjusted to exposure to the ether void, it still left him with a far denser foundation. Not only had it increased its rank classification, he had a great deal more lucrim to invest. Since he hadn't been planning on such a benefit, he decided to put it all toward Graham's Stake. That was an investment in both their futures.

Maybe it wasn't a legendary technique or an overpowering Birthright Core, but it was nice to have an advantage all his own. Smiling to himself as he repeated his exercises, Rick brought up his profile again:

[Name: Rick Hunter

Ether Tier: 17th

Ether Score: 215

Lucrim Generation: 26,300

Effective Rate:    19,310

Current Lucrim: 201]

[Rick Hunter's Lucrima Portfolio

Foundation: 3100 (Lv IV)

Offensive Lucore: 4500 (Lv III)

Defensive Lucore: 8000 (Lv VI)

Bunyan's Step: 3650 (Lv II)

Graham's Stake: 5275 (Lv II)

Aura Leech: -4504 (Stage II)

Aura Leech: -2486 (Stage I)

Tracking Bond: 100 (Lv XIII)

Gross Lucrim: 26,300

Net Lucrim: 19,310]

He couldn't be sure exactly what had done it, but he'd moved up an ether tier as well. This was pretty good for growth mostly on his own, and it would create a strong basis for development in the future. If he did ever gain wealth or unique medicines, he'd be able to take advantage of them instead of the benefits draining into his flaws.

The improvement in his foundation was especially satisfying: it now used only 12% of his total generation rate. After so many years being told his foundation was sloppy and inefficient, it now felt solid and powerful. He actually found himself wondering what the end goal was, since surely it didn't make sense to keep reducing the foundation further and further. It was the basis for the rest of his power, after all, so it was necessary to some degree.

Just as he pulled out his phone to research the subject, he received a text message. As he read it, Rick realized that his time of relaxation had ended:

I'm back, dearie. I expect to see you in the Underground as soon as possible.