“What do you mean by ten hours?” Her girlfriend reiterated in a nearly screaming tone. That certainly didn’t do Agatha’s mounting headache any good.

  Depths, fractures, crown in the heavens! The dirty-blond girl cursed mentally in quick succession. I really, really need to train my mind more. An hour of training shouldn’t give me this bad of a headache. I now understand why retired soldiers aren’t flying around. A headache like this isn’t worth any fucking time saved.

  “Ugh… well…” Agatha mouthed slowly as she gathered her thoughts and partially held the gathering bile in her throat. “Hasel told me that the speed of this contraption should be around two or three times that of a galloping horse. So playing it safe and saying two and a half times…”

  “That makes around one hundred kilometers per hour, and Knight’s Ascent is around one thousand kilometers away in a straight line, so ten hours.” Christie completed her sentence.

  “Yes.” Even though the lithorist finished with a sigh, she was thankful for her girlfriend’s interjection. She just didn’t want to think for at least five minutes.

  “So…” The redhead looked around at the picturesque sight of the clearing they had landed on. Birch, oak, pine… So many trees and different types around that Agatha couldn’t name them all. “Where are we?”

  “Oh, I decided to take this training opportunity to do an errand that I forgot about.”

  “An errand in the middle of nowhere?” The gorgeous, tall girl crossed her arms.

  Is the headache making me stupider or is Christie even more beautiful than normal? The warm clothes she wore made her plumper, if anything. Normally, people wouldn’t find that attractive as the standard of beauty was fat for men and skinny for women – both of them on the short spectrum too – but for Christie, it just made sense. She was very tall, almost taller than her father by now – and she still had a bit of growth left in her – and because she had a build so lithe, it just made sense that she should be broader to support all that height. That was to say, Agatha wasn’t against the idea of a wider Christie. Loved it, in fact.

  “I mean, middle of nowhere is not exactly wrong,” Agatha giggled, “but that is a bit of an overstatement.”

  “So where are we then if it is such an overstatement?” Christie started to remove her cloak as it was summer and they were no longer moving faster than horses high on the air. In fact, the abrupt change in temperature was making Agatha feel very hot.

  “Malachite,” the petite girl revealed.

  “Oh,” the redhead stopped removing her clothes for a second. “Are you sure you want to go back? Did you forget something at your house?”

  “No, not at all. And trust me, animosity is not lost between Malachite and me. But there is still one person I want to salute in Malachite, and I did not get the chance last year. Actually, I want you to meet him.”

  “Consider my curiosity piqued, mock sapphire,” Christie smiled as she hung her cloak on her forearm. “But do not tell me just yet, I want to be surprised.”

  “Well, there are not that many choices around for it to be a surprise, but you do you. But give me the cloak, there is no need for you to carry it,” Agatha summoned her full agate in front of her in the shape of a platform.

  “Was your head not hurting?” Her girlfriend said with a hint of worry, hesitant to remove herself from the thick and heavy cloak.

  I feel like I’m dying inside, someone drove a chisel into my eye socket, and then another person hit me with a sledgehammer on the back.

  “Not a problem,” the villager said with a smile on her face. “It is just a Speed Control Anchor series, Christie. Three commands when my maximum is five now. And you know it is trivial for me to go one below my limit, imagine two free slots.”

  “Well, you are the only one who knows your limits…” Christie dropped the coat on the platform, even if ever-so-reluctantly. “For the record, you are not going to slap anyone senseless, are you?”

  “Do you want me to?” Agatha asked eagerly and the nouveau riche squinted at her. “I mean, noooo. Not at all, the idea has not appeared in my mind, not even once.”

  Christie snickered. “You are lucky you are cute,” then she kissed the petite girl on the forehead. And that was when she was already bending down.

  Depths, if she gets any taller, she will be kissing the top of my head… And while Agatha would love to say that Christie could kiss her wherever she wanted and she would enjoy it all the same, the seamstress-in-training preferred it if her girlfriend didn’t make her look like a child while doing so.

  “Lead the way then,” the redhead pointed forward.

  “The village is that way,” the dirty-blond girl snickered as she pointed backward.

  The tall girl flushed a bit but kept herself silent, marinating in her embarrassment. Treading in the forest was easy after all the training both of them had gone through, especially because it was summer. It could get more treacherous in autumn – the undergrowth was no joke – or winter, but now it was trivial. Agatha saw some children playing and hiding behind the trees from the corner of her eye, but Christie failed to notice them.

  It’s scary thinking that I can now summon my agate five meters away. I can’t quite summon it next to them, but I can get pretty damn close. The concept of a lithorist death zone wasn’t anything new; she had been aware of it since the beginning of the first year, and now she was to start the third one in a short while. But it truly was a scary notion, that of being able to summon your agates in a big bubble around you. Wait, does Amplify Summon upgrade the summoning range?

  Agatha quickly applied Duplicate and Shape to her platform so nothing noticeably changed, and with her new unsummoned agate, she applied Amplify to Summon.

  Fractures, nothing at all, the lithorist sighed. Well, I guess not everything interacts with everything. Though I would have expected something, maybe a faster summoning time. But I guess that one is already instantaneous.

  Her sapphire summoned on the canopies of the trees, but alongside with Watch and Control, Agatha was able to stealthily direct it on top of the children and then applied the Sound command to make a ‘Boo!’ sound. This was actually her first time using the Sound command, but as always, if there was something Agatha of Malachite was good at it was winging things and doing them first try.

  “Ah!” The children, a girl and boy duo, got scared shitless and started running frantically to the village.

  “What was that?” Christie finally noticed the children and her eyes snapped towards them.

  “Just a couple of children playing,” Agatha giggled sadistically. “Parents just let their sons and daughters roam freely in the forest.”

  “I wish that had been the case for me…” The redhead sighed. “When I was little, dearest father only allowed me to go outside accompanied. Though truth be told, I was sickly as a child, so I considered it… justified.”

  “Well, lucky for us, you are no longer a child.”

  “Indeed. Nor sickly,” she chuckled. “Now let us make haste, we are taking far too long, and the sun might come down at any moment if we keep this pace. You could have landed us closer to the village…”

  “That was part of your father’s deal with these series. The fractured contraption is too loud and garners too much attention. It is partially supposed to be a military secret, so that was why I landed so far away and flew so hard.”

  “Hard?” Christie arched a brow.

  “High, flown so high,” Agatha corrected. “Why in the depths did I say hard?”

  Her girlfriend shrugged. “The human mind, as unpredictable and undecipherable as always. But if anything, I would prefer too if we flew higher.”

  “Well… there is that,” the azure-eyed girl added with a hint of a blush. “We need to employ just a tidbit of subterfuge.”

  “Understood,” the agate-eyed girl smiled at her and then held her hand. “Then let me enjoy your hand before we need to hide another thing.”

  “R-right…” Agatha’s blush intensified. Perhaps they had come out with their relationship to their parents, but there was no need to show that to the inhabitants of Malachite.

  The trek to the village wasn’t that bad as Agatha had only landed the fractured contraption a kilometer away. A bit of distance, but definitely nothing insurmountable. If anything, the walk did her good. Silence, fresh air, and good exercise to keep her body energetic and her mind awake yet relaxed. She could feel her headache slowly fade away.

  “I did not have the chance to get a good look at it last time, but it is certainly even smaller than I thought,” Christie said once the trees cleared out and they had a line of sight to the village.

  A pretty big and open line of sight as they had emerged from the side where all the fields were. Even if her mother wasn’t a farmer, Agatha wasn’t unfamiliar with farming as they had a patch of potatoes behind their house plus a couple of chickens to mitigate as much as possible the dependence on food spending while not needing to dedicate time to tending their miniature farm. Huh, now that I think about it, where are the chickens? I mean, they were kinda old… Huh, I think we ate them for our birthday. Agatha realized that they had a bit too much chicken for her and Christie’s seventeenth birthday. Oh, well. Some people would be saddened to have such companions gone, but she was well aware that chickens weren’t pets, just food. Especially when they no longer lay eggs.

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  “I feel a bit… overdressed,” Christie said as they walked up the dirt path leading to the village.

  “In what sense?” Agatha pried.

  “There is more than one?”

  “I would say that there is an overdressed sense of layers of clothing and one in the quality of the clothing.”

  “Then I guess it is both,” the redhead giggled.

  “Either way,” the dirty-blond girl let out a soft chuckle, “it is fine. I mean, look at me, I am wearing the academy’s uniform. At least your clothes are travel clothes, so they are not that highlightable.”

  “Now I understand why you chose this attire if Malachite was our destination. You wanted to boast, mock sapphire.”

  “I mean, that much is true, but the uniform is pretty cozy and warm, so it works more than well enough for a flying outfit. Though I should add a helmet and a scarf to it.”

  Christie opened her mouth as if to speak, but no words came out of it as she noticed people on the horizon. Gasping people at that.

  “S-should we be here?” Her girlfriend entered bunny mode at the sight.

  “Yes.” So Agatha reciprocated by entering soldier mode as she affirmed taciturnly. “They are looking at me, not you, dummy doll. So do not worry about anything and just follow me.”

  Just in case, Agatha summoned her split agate inside of the pile of clothing being carried by her other agate and used the Watch command to check on her back. There was a bit of comedy in having someone so tall following someone so short, but as soon as they had stepped well past the murmuring housewives, they stopped paying attention to the student duo. I had the clothes in hand, but I should check if there’s a way to make agates invisible. And if there is… fuck, that’s a scary thought.

  They garnered a bit of attention and a gaze here and there, but there was no one stupid enough to intercept them. Probably the performance I put on last year, that should’ve minced them a bit.

  Agatha guided Christie to a shack on the other side of the village. She could have landed the aircraft closer, but in her defense, it was hard getting a sense of orientation when your whole life had been bound to the ground. The petite girl stepped up onto the porch and knocked on the door.

  “Who goes there?” A crinkly voice shouted over the door.

  “It’s Agatha!” She shouted back.

  “Ah, little sapphire!” The voice called back and Agatha could see Christie smirk from her Watch command. “Come in! Door’s open!”

  The dirty-blond lithorist so and she was met by an old man sitting on a worn armchair with a small coffee table next to him full of wood carvings and curls.

  “Mister Krugger!” She announced happily, almost childishly.

  “Agatha!” The carpenter stood up from his armchair with a grunt, dusted his lap, and met the girl with a hug. “’Tis been a while since I last saw you! Kinda disappointed here to hear about your shenanigans last year, yet not being able to find you anywhere.”

  “Sorry, sorry,” she chuckled. “We were pressed for time when I came, and I could only meet with my mother.” And totally not because I forgot about you. Agatha did have the poor inclination to forget about anyone who wasn’t herself. She then broke the hug and highlighted the necklace on her neck. “I wanted to thank you for your gift!”

  “Glad you still have it, little sapphire!” He also chuckled, but also squinted. “Though, where’s the actual little sapphire?”

  “Outside,” Agatha beamed him a smile. “Come on in, Christie! Mister Krugger might bark a lot, but he does not bite!”

  “Since when do I bark?” The old man harrumphed.

  “Well, there’s a half-skinned log there…” And then promptly groaned audibly at the girl’s humor.

  Christie made her way inside along with the lithic platform, but she winced a bit when she heard Mister Krugger’s groan. She blamed Hasel for that attempt at humor.

  “And who might this fine, fine lady be?” His eyes turned wide open when he saw the redhead.

  Watch out, old man, that’s my girl you are ogling at. Of course, Agatha didn’t say this aloud. Not because she didn’t want to reveal that piece of information, but because she knew for a fact Mister Krugger wouldn’t try anything. He was just an old man being a dirty old man.

  “Christina Valasela, pleased to meet you, Mister Krugger,” her girlfriend didn’t show any hostility and extended him a hand. “Agatha has told me a lot about you.”

  “I hope they were good things,” he crackled.

  “At least I only heard the good ones,” Christie smiled.

  Hmm, I guess being educated and civilized in your speech allows you to talk with people in an easier manner. Agatha had definitely not expected such an easygoing welcome, but she was rather pessimistic whenever she wanted.

  “For example,” the redhead continued once the handshake was over, “she told me that the necklace she wears was made by you. She always sleeps with it and always has her lone agate kept there.”

  “Yet again a mention of her little sapphire, but I have yet to see it.”

  “Christie, can you grab your coat?” Agatha pointed at the platform with her eyes.

  “Of course.” The moment her girlfriend did so, the lithorist recalled both of the agates she had summoned.

  “The little sapphire,” the petite girl moved her hands around with a bit of theatrics, “is here.” And summoned her whole agate on the palm of her hand.

  Mister Krugger arched a brow at the sight and then chuckled. “Well, that definitely isn’t a little sapphire any longer. How in the depths did it get this big?”

  He pointed at the glorified glass ball with his open arms. The big sapphire perfectly fitted Agatha’s hand as it was the size of her own head, with its six centimeters in radius.

  “Well, for one, an increase in Strata. Which is yet another reason why I must thank you for your gift. Not only is it lovely, but it allowed me to kickstart my progress.”

  “Yeah, I know I cheated the process a bit there,” the former military engineer chuckled. “But only a bit! I said nothing about it if someone asks. But yeah, I figured you would need all the help you could get at the Skyscraper Academy. And talking about it, it looks like you’ve done well considering you’re still wearing the uniform. Pretty neat. Far better than the one I had when I was serving myself.”

  “Yup, doing fine in the academy. I’ve had a hiccup here and there, but now I’m going strong into the third year.”

  “Third, huh. Nearly halfway done with your education, little sapphire! Heh,” he snickered. “The term now feels more appropriate now that you have this big sapphire on your hands.”

  “Well, I certainly don’t expect my agate will be bigger than me, but I wouldn’t be against it.”

  “Who would be?” Mister Krugger smiled. “But I must ask, what’s your Strata? I’ve never seen agates that big on their own.”

  “Oh, yes. I’ve been told that my agate grows a bit faster than others per Strata.”

  Terráquea’s words actually were ‘Your agate follows cubic growth instead of linear one,’ which was just a fancy way of saying that her sapphire got bigger due to its outstanding quality. Agatha would argue that growing one centimeter in radius was actually linear, but she comprehended what the researcher meant by that.

  “So?” The man arched a brow. “What’s the actual number?”

  “Oh, Fifth. Fifth Stratum,” Agatha said nonchalantly.

  What followed was one of the funniest reactions Agatha had ever seen. First, the old man’s eyes shot wide open, then he was left agape, and subsequently let out a drowned groan of utter confusion.

  “Fi… Fifth-fifth Stratum?” Mister Krugger coughed gnarly as he got the words out of his mouth.

  “Hey, hey!” The petite girl rushed toward the old man and patted him on the back. Not being quite enough help, she also guided him back into the armchair. The carpenter repeatedly hit his sternum with his closed fist. “Are you okay, Mister Krugger?”

  “That, I’m not,” he coughed again, but this time proved to be final. “What in the depths do you mean by the Fifth Stratum?”

  “Sactly that?” She tilted her head in confusion. The lithorist couldn’t understand what was wrong. Everyone had told her that if anything, she should have a higher Strata. Terráquea, René Dago, Hasel… They all expected her to reach a Strata higher than them due to her special circumstances, so she could only see this Strata as a stepping stone for her goal. Whatever that may end up being. At least Eighth Stratum, that’s for sure.

  “Show me those five command slots at once!” The former engineer barked, not believing her claim in the slightest.

  Ouch, Agatha mentally recoiled at the lack of trust, but she had no reason to ignore that command. The best way she had to show her command slots – especially without causing a mess – was using the Duplicate command, so she did just that.

  Duplicate. Duplicate. Duplicate. Duplicate. Control.

  Normally, you couldn’t apply the same command to an agate barring some exceptions, and Duplicate was one of those. Any command given prior to the Duplicate command would be ‘innate’ to the agate and irrevocable. There were some advantages to that, but also massive disadvantages, as those duplicated commands still had a mental tax associated with them. Unfortunately, one couldn’t commit tax evasion on the rocks.

  Duplicating duplicated agates meant lots of agates. It was exponential growth. Also exponential division on the mass of each individual agate. And even then, each individual agate was still slightly more massive and heavier than her original little lone sapphire.

  The Control command she added just so her many agates wouldn’t plummet to the ground. And it also allowed her to do pretty tricks with them as she orbited harmoniously around her. This type of synchronous movement looked spectacular, but it was intuitively easier to perform as you were just basically printing the same movement on all of the agates.

  “So,” the Fifth Stratum lithorist said as she was surrounded by a ring of orbing sapphires, “what do you think?”

  “I… Depths, girl,” Mister Krugger pressed a hand against his forehead. “You truly have made it. Ugh, I’m getting a headache just from seeing it.”

  “Are you faring well, mister?” Christie asked, closing onto both of them at the armchair.

  “Yes, lady. Thank you for the concern, but I’m fine,” he then sighed and groaned both at the same time. That was a polite way of saying that he sounded like a shalesnapper’s death rattle. “Don’t y’all look at me like that, I’m really fine. Just… surprised. Fifth Stratum, fu-fractures…” Agatha almost giggled as the carpenter held his tongue to not curse. “At one point, I dared to think that the help I gave you with the necklace would be so minimal that it would matter for nothing. Now I’m speechless. Fifth fractured Stratum.”

  “I understand it is, certainly, a megalithic achievement,” her girlfriend started, “but why does it afflict you that much?”

  Mister Krugger snickered. “Lady, I’m on the Fourth Stratum myself. I’m sixty-four, almost one toe in the grave. Yet our little sapphire here has beaten me already in only two years.”

  “Different situations and hardships,” Christie spoke softly. “Agatha has a single agate to pour all her focus on, and she was accepted into the Skyscraper Academy, which allowed her to focus on her agate far earlier and for longer than a standard military education might have allowed.”

  “Yes!” Agatha added, not wanting to see Mister Krugger this deflated. “Like you once said, ‘the wise look at stones, the morons shout at them’, and I have had a lot of time to look at my agate.” She looked at the sixteen dancing perfect spheres. “Agates,” and corrected herself with a smile.

  “Yes, definitely,” the old carpenter chuckled at her antics. “Glad for your kind words, ladies. And even more so for your gratitude, little sapphire. I just gave you a piece of wood I carved in a day, I don’t deserve that much.”

  “No, you deserve far more!” The seamstress-in-training frowned at him in mock rage. “Here!” She took a coin out of her uniform – where she had sewn several pockets and coin purses – and placed it on the man’s wrinkly hands.

  His already wrinkly face wrinkled even more at the sight of the platinum coin in his hands. “I cannot accept this, Agatha!”

  She instantly knew how serious he was as he used her name, but that mattered not to her. Instead, Agatha pressed the coin harder into his hand.

  “You definitely can!” She protested. “I have acquired some coin on my own,” which was another way of saying Christie gave it to her, “and I won’t be needing it for a while, while you are here becoming older by the day. Soon you won’t be able to work and feed yourself, and there’s no family to take care of you. If anything, this is just to pay the villagers who will need to take care of you in the near future. If you won’t take the platinum, I will then shove osmium in your hands.”

  Mister Krugger grunted in displeasure, but he ended up accepting the coin, perhaps mostly out of the threat of greater riches. Perhaps not a danger to his coin purse, but definitely to his manly and elderly ego.

  “Get outta here before I decide to chuck the coin at you!” He shouted, which made Agatha giggle.

  “Love you too!” The petite girl took her girlfriend by the hand and left the house with a sprint as the old man thrashed his fist around as he growled.

  “That was… something,” Christie giggled under her breath.

  “I knew you would like him,” Agatha smiled at her with the greatest of satisfactions.

  She knew that she wouldn’t see Mister Krugger for a while, and it was also likely the old man would croak before she had another chance, so this type of goodbye was the best she could wish for. An energetic one.

  “Should we get back?” The dirty-blond girl offered to her gorgeous redhead princess as she guided her down the stairs of the porch with an extended hand. They both knew that the proposal had another meaning. Their stay at the state was coming to a close as holidays ended, and it was time for their third year at the Skyscraper Academy.

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