This time, Shogai used the map.

  There were still a couple of hours left until evening, and Shogai figured he could use that time to meet some people he wanted to talk to. Mira's mother, Scott, Zinnia and Xero. He'd been given the addresses of the latter three. Xero and Scott both lived in Gongadion, same as Mira's mother.

  Jade was behind him, feeling just as guilty about Mira. She was fine with travelling, but the hundreds of tunnels on the Nexus map just confused her. In her defence, Shogai wasn't doing a lot better. He tripped over every other rock on his way to the surface.

  They emerged somewhere north of Gongadion, in a well hidden cave. So this was where Sekara had escaped to after Ryukyu torched her. Was there a cave like this outside every city?

  The city was just as loud as it was last time Shogai had visited. But it was nothing compared to Sunden. Travelling had really opened Shogai's eyes to the scale of the rest of the island, let alone the world. In fact, it distracted him long enough that he didn't realise he was near Mira's doorstep until he'd made it there.

  Jade knocked on the door hesitantly, and could hear movement inside. After a minute, Mira's mother opened the door a crack.

  "Hello you two. Mira's friends, right?"

  "Right. We're here to apologise about, well…. May we come in?"

  Mira's mother looked around the room, before deciding to let them in. She nudged aside an extra pair of slippers out of the doorway, and frantically tried to tidy herself up.

  “Oh, look at me, such a mess. Can’t have Mira seeing me like this…”

  She combed her hair in the mirror, but to no avail. Shogai got a close look at her. There were dark patches under her eyes, which were crazed.

  “She’ll be home soon. Have to make sure everything’s ready…”

  She stumbled over a chair left in the middle of the room, and fell onto a plate left on the floor, instantly shattering it. She looked at her hands, now dripping with blood, and muttered to herself, “whoopsie…”

  Shogai immediately rushed to her, helping her up. She thanked him, and said that she’d become such a mess since Mira had left. But she kept emphasising the same fact.

  “She’ll be back by sunrise. That’s what she said. She’s just a little bit late.”

  Jade had a terrified expression as she looked around the ruined house and the broken woman. Her face then turned to curiosity and she eyed a closed closet door. Shogai looked at it. It was swinging slightly, as if it had been recently swung shut. That, plus the slippers by the door that weren’t there last time, and Shogai knew who was in that closet. Mira’s sister, Nifa, was here. And she didn’t want to see Shogai.

  Suddenly, it made a lot more sense how Mira’s mother hadn’t grievously injured herself being alone so long, especially since it took only moments for her to break a plate. Nifa must have been keeping an eye on her. Shogai cleared his throat to address the woman in front of him.

  “Miss, we wanted to apologise… for making Mira late to return home. She was… out… because of us. And she encountered some issues because of us. We- I would give anything to have been the one… delayed instead of her. Please, next time you see her, tell her we’re sorry. We’re so, so sorry.”

  Mira’s mother blankly blinked. “OK. Well, she’ll be home by sunrise. You should stay, I’m sure she’ll forgive you. She’s very forgiving. Just like her sister, right, Nif-? Oh. No- I’m alone here. Nifa said she didn’t want you to know she’s here. I’m sorry Nifa!”

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  “Thank you, miss.” Jade shook her hand, careful to avoid the cuts, and walked away for Nifa’s sake. Shogai looked at the closet to see a bright green eye looking back at him, which quickly vanished when it saw him watching. “We’ll be going now. If you see Nifa, tell her we want to apologise to her as well. She didn’t deserve this.”

  “Of course, Mira’s friends! You know, she’s always been bad at making friends. She’d come home all healed, so I’d never know, but the bullying was-” Another crash was heard as a chair was knocked over.

  “Ma’am, please take care of yourself. Get well soon.” Shogai was looking at Nifa when he said that. The sooner they left, the sooner Nifa could help her mother. The encounter deeply disturbed Shogai.

  Two whole months, and Mira’s mother had been mentally wrecked. Expecting her daughter to come home, as she promised. Why didn’t Shogai just tell her the truth? That would have been better for her, right?

  “Shogai! Jade!” A voice was calling out their names. The two of them turned in surprise to see Xero, in all his joy, waving at them. He rushed up to the duo with a giant smile.

  “How have you been?”

  Xero lived in a modest place, considering his compensation for his service. It was just an average house in Gongadion. On the nicer side, but you’d never guess the richest man in the city lived there. To Shogai’s surprise, Zinnia opened the door to his house.

  “Oh! Shogai, Jade! Great to see you two!”

  She let them inside, and immediately served them tea. Xero explained that Zinnia visited him occasionally. They joined Nexus around the same time, and were basically siblings.

  “How’s Nexus? You’re not getting tired of the missions yet, right?”

  Jade laughed, “Tired of the maps, more like. How did you ever figure those out?”

  Zinnia smiled in return, “I never did actually, but don’t tell Nemean that. I’m the healer. I’d just follow the others. No feeling is better than supporting your friends. Your family.”

  “Glad you’re settling in alright. Personally, retirement doesn’t suit me,” Xero said, as he sat down in a chair. He emphasised his point by pulling his daggers out of his belt. “Can’t ever get used to not wearing these. Feels vulnerable, you know?”

  Shogai could believe that. Xero was young, mid-20s maybe, and already set for life. He’d for sure get restless.

  “I guess a benefit of all this free time is I can write to my friends more often.” Xero gestured towards a desk full of letters, papers and quills. “They live abroad, so I can’t see them very often.”

  “Abroad, like to the human island?”

  “The place our species lived before coming to Tenebris? Know much about it?”

  “Yeah, I read up on it. It’s apparently over a hundred years ahead of us, and all the technology and machines of Nexus come from that island.”

  “Spot on. I don’t know the details of the agreement, but it goes something like this. Nexus, namely Nemean, has an alliance with King Casi. He rules Tenebris, but we’re a very independent island. He occasionally sends guards out here and there, but he mostly manages with across-ocean trade. The mainland is a large island called Cerek. The deal between Nemean and Casi states that we protect the island and his people in exchange for this tech, which we get via trade. So we need to make sure we upkeep our side of the deal. Has Raven told you about Elano’s Heart yet?”

  Shogai nodded, but brought up something that had crossed his mind. “Elano’s Heart is meant to just enhance your powers, right? So why did it give me this second form? Defence stance.”

  Xero stood up and walked over to his desk. He pulled out a piece of parchment with some writing on it.

  “I had the same question. I’ve theorised that Elano’s Heart has nothing to do with defence stance. Your power isn’t super strength like you thought it was. It must be form shifting, or stance shifting, or something like that. You’ve never had to be defensive before Sekara, so that’s why you never awakened that form until now. The activation requirements may be something to do with a high heartbeat, but Shogai, this is what I meant by potential. If this is true, you could have hundreds of potential powers built into one ability. That’s incredible.”

  Shogai thought about that for a moment. Hundreds of powers sounded really cool. But he could barely use defence form right now. He said he wanted to master his current forms before trying new ones.

  “Smart call.” Xero said. “Even your current two powers alone are far more than I could have. By the way, are you still Outer 6? You could totally rank up.”

  “Rank up? Against a Nexean?”

  “Shogai. You are a Nexean. Next time we meet, you’d better be in a different room.”

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