Walking through the streets, ignoring the volcano in the background like he did every time he had to go there, Ben made his way to his current target, the research center set up to study the various new magic materials that had been created, hoping that some more progress had been made.

He knew that they were trying to be careful in their study, and he even understood why. An item that was just inherently magical with an unknown effect had to be treated with all of the caution of an unexploded bomb, lest some casual action reveal that they’d been studying something that would make deathstone look like a joke, and yet, Ben still hoped he’d see some meaningful progress. The fact that every affinity had a crystal or a mythril-equivalent of its own was exciting, and there’d been a few undeniably interesting finds among everything so far, with the voidstone and stopstone he was enjoying, the faithstone the gods desperately wanted him to forget about, as well as the temperate mercury which, while interesting, he hadn’t put to work yet, but despite that, he found himself still wanting more and he let himself inside the building in the hopes of getting it, seeing a familiar face when he did, but not the one he expected.

When he’d been there in the past, he’d found Nare’s oracle Rench, but that time, instead, walking through the halls with a variety of projected grey who were contributing to the research, was Nati, Xilly, and Zallith, with Nare’s granddaughter and the summoned from Yuzu’s group having their heads buried in paperwork while they walked, leaving only the high priest attending to them to notice him, growing pale as he did.

It looked like he was going to say something too, but before he could, Ben already had a finger over his lips, signalling the man to be quiet and got as much, even if Zallith slowed to a crawl while the two women carried on, not noticing their companion had fallen behind until they were too late, left standing in front of Ben by the time they noticed him and jumping as they did.

Xilly let out a small shriek seeing him, while Nati contained herself the best she could, no matter how her face tried to give her away as she greeted.

“Ben, it’s been a while,” she said as politely as she could. “Um, my grandfather didn’t tell us that we should be expecting you.”

“Oh, that’s because seeing you like this is a complete coincidence,” Ben smiled with nothing but warmth, making all three flinch back, with Xilly only then noticing the way Zallith had slipped behind them to drag him forward. “I only came here to see what results on the new magic materials have been collected.”

“Ah, in that case, please, don’t let us keep you,” Nati told him, again trying to sound as polite as she could so that she and the other two could safely escape, with Ben being nowhere near that merciful.

“Sorry, but what’s fate if not a lucky coincidence? Since I’ve found you both, this is a great chance to try and squeeze another level or two out of both of your advanced connections, plus I can help raise your mind skills while we’re at it too, and Zallith… well, I’ll figure out something useful to teach you while I’ve got you. Now, come on.”

He could feel the deep desire to run in all three of their minds but they’d lost that chance when he first noticed them, Ben already having the connection up and pulled the three into his mindscape, training them as he wanted and teaching them all how to use material user as well, given their status as both worshipers of, and in Nati’s case, a relative of a crafting god. That bit of extra strength would only help them in the long run, and as a friend of Nare’s, he couldn’t help but want those both close to and under him to grow.

Leaving the three looking in a daze as he puppeted their bodies, the surrounding grey recognized him at least, even if they left him to his own devices as he made his way to the record room, pulling books and documents from the shelves before reading them in a flash and sighing the next second when he finished.

Considering that it’s barely been over a year, there’s been decent progress, but not anything that immediately jumps out to me as world-changing.

Really, there was little that even stood out to him as useful. While they knew for a fact that those new materials had to have some sort of magical effect, some of them simply continued to go undiscovered no matter how much more extreme the experimentation became, with the ones that were found being results that would surely be useful in the correct circumstances, but just wasn’t what he was looking for in that time. A material that, when exposed to the cold, would take days to come back to room temperature; one that seemed to turn into the opposite of a magnet, pushing any metals away from it; one that caused hallucinations, one that soothed pain, and more from there.

He could think about applications for all of them, some quite good ones too, if he was being honest, but nothing he could immediately see as a means to attempt his next push to the third tier, and even from there, little that he couldn’t largely replicate just as well, if not better, using an enchantment.

It left him pinching the bridge of his nose, lost in his thoughts with it.

Too many of my goals in life have become about getting more power. I really need this next attempt to work.

But, that was an attempt that would be a few days away. With a new round of soul modification and awakenings starting the following one, they were going to be taking up a fair bit of time before he could make that attempt.

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“Alright,” he told himself. “First things first, while I’m here I might as well do something productive. Nare Nare Nare, are you around?”

<Hmm, Ben? What… are you doing with my granddaughter?>

“Found her and the other two while I was coming to check out the new magic material research, figured I’d help get them some levels since I ran into them. It’s not important. I’m noticing that there’s been a few walls hit in some of the research, and part of that is going to be from what small amounts we made. If it’s fine with you, I was thinking I could make a little bit more of all of the non-affinitied options at least, to let these guys do a bit more study on the ones they aren’t sure about and to see how the effects scale on the ones they have figured out, if that sounds good to you?”

<... Yes, that’s fine. If you can wait a bit, I’ll have Rench run over to arrange things quickly for you, but to be clear, is my granddaughter going to be alright in your head?>

“Yeah, of course, obviously. Unlike one particular group of three I won’t name, who were more than happy to watch while I was dying, all I’m doing is leaving them aggressively educated."

<What you call aggressive education is traumatizing them.>

“They are being taught in a marginally more extreme way than my apprentice and the demis get; they’ll be fine. Hell, have you seen Myriad’s high priestess? I train her like this, and I have to keep her from talking me into making it worse. I’ll even apply some calming to their minds to reduce the strain if you’re so worried about it.”

<That would be appreciated. For now then, feel free to head to the storerooms, and while we wait, you and I can determine how much more of everything it would be best to make.>

Once Rench came, Ben did what materializing for them he could, letting the oracle fill the rest of the research center in on the development, even if he left in disappointment. One day, every magic material would be both fully studied as well as understood, but they’d reached a point where such a result was far too unlikely to happen before the next wave. Maybe there’d be a few more that would have their effects discovered, but that was it, and by then, he’d be out of time to put them to any serious use.

A truth that left him wanting to clutch his skull, even if he put on a far more cheerful face when he went to pick Mora up, confirming that Fontesh would still be able to look after him for the next couple of days, as well as Dewdrop, now that the scrungle was a part of their family and needed to be fed, with that same individual taking up the end of Ben’s night after they all finished dinner and started going to bed.

Left alone, Ben looked at it, the black cat-like creature that very clearly wanted to be asleep now that their meal was done, who wasn’t going to get to enjoy it so soon as instead, Ben began asking it questions.

“Alright, Dewdrop. You’ve been living with all of us for a little bit now. Are you comfortable? Enjoying yourself?”

The outsider nodded without needing much thought. It wasn’t in pain like it had been for so long, and now that it understood the concept of having company, it was enjoying it, and that wasn’t even mentioning the abilities that came with its new body, sleeping being the greatest of them all. Overall, of all the choices Ben had given it, Dewdrop didn’t regret picking that one for a second.

“Alright, good. I’m glad to hear it. And since you’re getting used to being a part of this universe, I was thinking it was time you start engaging in another facet of it. What do you say we start teaching you a bit of magic, huh?”

At the question, Dewdrop looked at him, tilting its head before pawing gently at the couch for a moment, getting comfortable, and trying to fall asleep, leaving Ben ignored.

“God, scrungle or not, you really are a lazy cat,” Ben sighed. “Look, just consider it a safety thing for yourself. Something you can use to escape a situation without having to resort to breaking reality. There’s four affinitied magics you’re capable of learning, and all of them have aspects to them that you’d want. Space and time, your most compatible ones, could help you escape from a problem if you need to, and light and dark could be used to distract anyone causing you those problems. Plus, light can be used to heal yourself if you need it.”

Dewdrop opened one eye, showing it was at least listening, even if not wholly interested.

“And learning it will be basically no time for you,” Ben went on. “I shove the knowledge in your head, help you learn how to feel your mana, we spend an hour practicing from there until you get the zeroth level of everything, and then you can go to sleep.”

Ben almost had him, right until he said ‘spend an hour practicing’; the scrungle not taking such a delay in its rest so kindly and left Ben to sigh once more.

“And, I’ll let you decide what we’re having for breakfast tomorrow,” he offered as a bribe, watching the smaller creature think for a moment before giving in. Even if it placed rest above food, it still needed to eat, and while the meals it had gotten to try on the planet so far had been limited, they’d been enjoyable and varied enough that Dewdrop could already pick its favourites, much to Ben’s satisfaction. He had a bit of an ulterior motive for wanting the outsider to increase in its power after all. Since it was going to be watched by Fontesh as well as Mora, it would make a good line of defense in case Vividus ever decided to come around to cause trouble.

Not that Ben really expected she would by that point, she’d shown no inclination at least, even after the boy had helped create so many new spirit varieties, but as things were, the little spirits were all aware that if she did show up while they were away that someone needed to tell Abrus or Lux immediately, but even with that, it could take time. Much better to have someone around who not only would be more powerful than her, but also someone who cared enough about Mora as well that maybe they could be trusted to not just sleep through any hypothetical confrontation that might come.

And all of those options are just good for letting it take care of itself, Ben admitted, Dewdrop’s own comfort and safety just as much on his mind. It should be a natural at using at least a couple of them too, if it can bother to practice at all beyond this; the levels should come easy.

And given its nature as a soul stored in a crystal interacting with the world through a homunculus, it seemed it was going to have plenty of time to improve, no matter how scant whatever bits of practice it would do may have ended, so with that, Ben began his lessons, devoting just a bit of the night to helping the newest member of his family grow after already helping so many others.