The first thing I noticed was my Material statistics. They had all gone up by another four, but that was the same as going from zero to o looked like Exposition-san was right about that being the biggest jump. Still, four pert of the maximum possible was still quite an increase for the average person, as my physical testing had proved. As expected, the Intangible statistics had not improved either.

  The sed was that ‘First Node’ had ged to ‘Base Chakra’. I trated on this and a description followed.

  Base Chakra- The first Aether tre of the body, ected to the Silver Cord. This has only retly been opened and the efficy is bad. be traio gee Aether from the surroundiher. As the foundation of the Chakra work, if this Chakra node is underdeveloped the rest of the system will be unstable and suffer poor, irregur performance.

  This was iing. I wasn’t sure whether it really followed the Chakra system I had researched online, or whether it had ged as that was the way I was thinking about it, but the extra information made me believe that there was definitely something deeper to be uood.

  There was also the new skill Crude Aether Manipution, which was as below.

  Crude Aether Manipution- A very basic grasp on usiher to affect the higher realms, with terrible effid otency. Easily suppressed by other Territories or stroher, and would not be effective in affeg the Material pne.

  That was harsh! Of course my skills weren’t very good, I had only learned a day ago… still, I wondered if that applied both ways, and perhaps my Territory might be able to supress others? In any case, I couldn’t help but be excited as it was time to examihe information on my Territory, I had lost sciousness as it was being updated in the Boundary, so I didn’t mao catch it.

  Territory Rank - 1.

  Territory Defence - Very Low. Your Territory will absorb Aether slowly from any hostile entities who e, increasing in potency as they he Territory Anchor. A low level Aether barrier is geed around your Territory to defend it.

  Your Territory will draw Ether from the surrounding Astral, stockpiling it, though without suitable ste facilities this Ether may be lost over time. Your Territory also gees a small amount of Aether for you, which is transferred automatically through your Silver Cord/Chakra work.

  Due to your cim on this Territory ierial world you suffer a low penalty to your Territory's abilities, and as you do not have total ownership you ot synise it freater bonuses. You are uo affect the Material world with your current levels of ownership.

  You struct various Buildings to improve your Territory’s performance. You currently have zero facilities structed.

  That was a lot of useful information. It looked as if it would now be harder for ao take my Territory from me due to the barrier, and the gain iher aher would be wele. The most iing thing was the ability to affect the Material world. I guess that was another reason to have full ownership of the Territory in both worlds. Damn, why wasn’t I born a billionaire?

  No point g over the impossible, this is still good. Still, despite the bes I couldn’t what I had to doing to the fridge I pulled out my st bottle of tea and took a swig. I would o restock my food and drink supplies and then see if I had any more work ing in. If I did I could do that quickly and then trate on training my Chakra work.

  It was then my ph, which was unusual, as most people just emailed or messaged me. Pig it up I saw the caller ID. Surprised, I opened up my phone. “So, to what do I owe the pleasure of this call?”

  “Now don’t be like that, Aki.” A melodic voi the other end sounded, calling me by an annoying niame that reminded me of being bae. “You should be super happy a beautiful girl like me is calling you. Most of the guys here would sell a kido get to talk to me, not that they could afford me.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” I agreed half-heartedly. I’d known her long enough to know it was best to just ignore her jokes. Ever since she’d joined our Uy several years after us, she’d been famous on campus for a few reasons, the first being her beauty, the sed her etricity. “So, why are you calling, Shiro…?”

  “That’s Shirohime to you, buster!” she groused adorably. “I hate it when you fet it.” Yep, etrid beautiful. With her long dazzling silver hair and fwless pale skin, she certainly does look white. But as for being a princess… no one on campus knew her real name, not even the lecturers it seemed, and she always insisted on being the ‘White Princess’. “Anyway, I just had to call you to see if you are all right? You want more work on my game? You know I ’t pay you? Is your woing so badly you are that free? I mean, of course I have more if you want it, but…”

  I let her rattle on for a bit. The third reason she was famous was her intellect. She was a genius at maths, sd also g, though her physical abilities were pathetic, making mine look good. She’d get tired typing out a couple of lines of code, which was the fourth reason for her fame. Still, her ideas were always awesome, and me and my friends had bee close with her and helped her get set up with a game design she was w on. Hell, I still helped her, even now.

  “Don’t worry about me. I just fancied helping you out, is that s?” I replied when I could get a word in edgewise.

  There was a long pause, and then she spoke. “I’m not going on a date with you or anything in exge, you know.”

  “Do you think I’m that shallow?” I had to ugh. “Seriously, if you don’t have anything for me to do…”

  “No, no, I do, I do!” she interrupted me rapidly. “I need some assets for the Vilge portion of the game, as well as plenty of code setting up for the various buildings and upgrades…”

  After spending a good fifteen minutes listening to her she agreed to send over some work via email in a day or two. Ending the call, I put on my suook up my wallet aed into the bright m sun.

  My apartment building wasn’t huge, just a three story set of single rooms for mostly single men, although there were a couple of women livioo. It did have a few trees and such around, and there was a cheap vending mae just around the er. Several other simir blocks were dotted around the area. It wasn’t too far to the shop either, about a kilometre. There was also a park just under a kilometre away, as well as the graveyard, and up in the small hills overlooking the suburbs there was a small shrine by a river where local festivals were held. All told, it retty nice area, and the rent wasn’t too bad. It was a shame it was right oskirts of Tokyo so any ute was a bit of a pain, but if it was closer and actually in Tokyo I wouldn’t be able to afford it anyway.

  I purchased some more bottles of iced tea, as well as my usual supply of cup ramen, noodles and other easy to cook foods, before strolling back towards my apartment. Hmm, perhaps I should call it my Territory now? The day leasant, and luckily my wounds had rgely faded away, only a few scabbed cuts left, so I ehe walk. It didn’t take me long to reach my apartment, as I was walking faster than I normally would, yet I felt no fatigue.

  As I reached the stairs on the er of my building I saw that out on the baly was one of my neighbours, a dishevelled older man in a faded broad-brimmed hat, smoking a ratty cigarrete, Hashimoto-san. It was unusual to see him at this time in the m, as he was usually at work. When he saw me he waved briefly, taking another long drag on his cigarette, puffing smoke out into space.

  “Well good m Oshiro-san, up and about already I see?”

  I nodded politely. “And a good m to you too, Hashimoto-san. Indeed, no point in hanging around, I’m hoping to have a productive day. Speaking of, aren’t you w today?”

  Hashimoto-san sighed, letting loose aream of smoke. “Not today, I have the day off. I’m going to see my daughter. Not that my ex-wife wants me to. I don’t think my daughter really wants to see me either, but I did promise I’d try to be a good father to her.”

  “I’m sure it isn’t as bad as all that, Hashimoto-san.” I tried to sole him. “Girls of that age be difficult. I know my sister be. I am sure she is actually pretty happy to see you.”

  “Oh I don’t know about that.” he sighed again, finishing off his cigarette and pulling another out of a case that was in his inside pocket. Lighting it with shaking hands he took another deep drag, before blowing smoke dissotely. “I don’t really uand her. She’s in high school, yet she dresses up all fshy-like, and she’s always bleag her hair aing fake tans. She looks like a deli. There weren’t girls like that in my day, I assure you that! Why she ’t be a proper dy like her mother was I don’t know…”

  “It’s just one of the fashions these days.” I ventured. “They ge over time. In a few years she’ll be into a different look I’m sure.”

  “You may be right.” Hashimoto-san said absently. “Sometimes I wish I had a son instead, maybe I’d uand him better. Oh, look at me rambling on, I’m keeping you from your work. I have to go get ged soon anyway. Thanks for your time.”

  “No problem. A good day to you Hashimoto-san. Make the most of the visit with your daughter, family is important.” I o him and walked up the stairs to my room, shutting the door behihe temperature was beginning to build already, so I flipped on the air ditioning unit. It was an old model and a bit loud, but I had no iions of sving away in the heat today.

  The first thing I had to do was check my emails, so I switched on my puter. I had received a reply regarding the paid work I had doerday, a glowing bit of praise thanking me fetting the work done so speedily, and promising to bear me in mind when further work was hey also promised me swift payment, which would be here were a couple of useless spam emails as well, but apart from that, nothing pressing.

  “Oh well…” I said, stretg. “I guess I spend a bit of time trying a few more methods to improve my Chakras. A couple of hours won’t hurt.” I gathered the printouts I had made yesterday and studied them, before deg on a couple of the most promising to try. Settling down into my chair I closed my eyes and began to run through the exercises.

  For a few hours I tio imagine various means of drawing iher, with limited success. I could definitely feel the presence of aether, especially in the warmth within my lower body, but actually drawing iher to vert was too hard. Still, I had only been trying for a st few hours, so I refused to get dowed. I had stopped when my email started pinging, so I decided to take a break to clear my head and see what I had received.

  There ly from my sister, pining that I never visit home anymore, which I promptly ignored for now, as we had already had this discussion a couple of days ago. I would reply ter. The other was much more iing, it was from an old colleague and good friend of mine, one who I had worked with ba that softroject along with some other freencers, and had a good time at uy hanging out with. It read…

  Word up my man, long time no speak. How‘ve you been doing? It’s me, Hayato! Just hitting you all up regarding a tasty opportunity I’ve been able to grab hold of. I’ve been employed is department for an up-and-ing new game developer, and shortly there will be a ton of g, graphic design, 3D modelling and bug finding work avaible, enough to st us all for a few months. If any of you guys are ied, hit me back as I’d rather give it to old friends I know do the work than look for some newbies. That sweet yen could all be yours!

  I had to smile. Hayato-san was the real mood-maker of our little group of freencers, and the ohat suggested most of our social events. He was on first erms with everyohin a week at uy, even the more standoffish Hina-. In any case, this was a good, well timed offer. I should be able to blitz through work with my new abilities, helping Hayato-san out and making myself mo the same time. I fired off a quick acceptance, asking for as much work as he had going. Ohat was done I retty much finished until some more work came in, so I decided to get back to training. It’ll annoy Shiro a bit since I asked for it, but obviously her work is st priority…

  “Sometimes I envy those with a steady job…” At least they had a regur wage. Still, it would be hard to train if I had to work all the time. Got to look on the bright side, right?

  Rexing in my chair, I began to carry out the exercises that felt the most promising before, trying to raise my aether levels by dragging in the surroundiher...

  ********

  The few days carried on much the same, with me simply meditating to raise my aether levels. I wasn’t having much success, but at least every day I felt more and more aether inside me, probably geed by my Territory. I also received a couple of bits of work while waiting for the tasks from Hayato-san to e through, and fihem in record time. My bank bance was looking a bit healthier at least. I had also made a start on the work for Shiro, modelling several items and writing the supp code.

  On the fifth day the warmth within me had spread to most of my body, and this time when I tried my aether-building exercises I felt my sciousness start to e loose from my body. trating on that feeling I focused my aether, and with a surge of heat everythi dark, my thoughts reg. Opening my eyes a moment ter I found myself once again in the Boundary…