ZhuQiu walked around the yurt. Seeing no shadow of the albino toyger, she continued to stroll towards the green valley nearby.

It was deserted. Everyone definitely went to the party somehow. ZhuQiu felt calm and tranquil. She slowed her steps, and imagined the breeze and pretend to smell dirt and musky flowers.

She later gave up because she don't remember what the wind felt like anymore. That was okay, there wasn't a hint of stirring leaves anyways. She stood and stared off into the distance. She wasn't lost in her mind, there wasn't much thought going on for that to happen. It was just blank serenity as she watch the clouds slowly chased the other clouds.

The leaves indeed rustled but it was so gentle, so enticing. ZhuQiu decide to lay down for a while and warm her metallic limbs and plastic bodies under the sinking sun. Of course, she had to check the area was clear of any, ahem, excrement. It was a behavior that started when she sat on a stray poop in a garden when she was younger. Like they said, once bitten, twice shy.

The world seemed to be in a slow motion when ZhuQiu couldn't see anything but the moving clouds.

"Meow."

ZhuQiu smiled, but didn't move.

Meoow. The toyger's approaching figure was in her sight as it began to rubbed itself on her face.

"Where have you been, hmm?" ZhuQiu lightly scratched the kitty's head.

Meorrw. It seemed to answer her.

"Was it fun?"

Meow. The mewl was alike a sound of affirmation.

"Good. Good."ZhuQiu didn't say anymore as the kitty settled on her chest. She was too lazy to move her fingers and hover her arms so she just laid her hands over the kitty with an occasional pats.

This moment is too wonderful to describe. If readers could imagine having the grass under your back —of course, without poops, hehe— the clouds above you, the slow moving time, and a purring little kitty on you that seemed very content. Most importantly, the skies changed color with every descend of the sun.

When the sun is about to be swallowed up by the distant hills, the kitty got up abruptly and meowed urgently. Look, even the toyger knows that it's time to go back to the yurt, ah!

ZhuQiu sighed and then got up, carrying the kitty in her arms, and dusted off the grass off her clothes. She was reluctant to go, though, staring at the distance, hoping to imprint the moment in her mind.

The toyger had previously sensed something coming and wanted ZhuQiu to hurry up, so it mewled repeatedly, reminding her.

"Okay, okay, going. Ah, you're a little kitty but you act like my nanny, haiz." ZhuQiu huffed and turned back.

But before she could take one complete step, she picked up some sounds. Stomping feet, something dense swishing in the air, and grunts with curses. It sound like a violent confrontation. Sound light a fight even. After all, not every aspect of reality is accurately depicted in big screens on earth. Books doesn't make a sound, despite the creative onomatopoeia¹the formation of a word, such as cuckoo, meow, honk, or boom, by imitation of a sound made by or associated with its referent..

ZhuQiu did have common sense of self-preservation: to run and deny knowing anything of it until it's over.

But, to be fair, firstly; ZhuQiu's had never encountered such thing.

Secondly, she forgot that not every scuffle are just two people are focused on hurting one another in one single place.

Therefore she wasn't wise in picking the direction of where she should run. She simply dashed in the opposite direction. Wise choice if someone was fighting in a fair duel. Bad choice if the people in conflict actually knew QingGong and one of them needed distraction. And so, our silly dummy not only attracted attention to herself, she also gotten herself targeted.

A figure landed in front of her so abruptly and close that she did crashed onto them. In the last second, she automatically hunched her back so that the toyger was not going to be affected. The figure before her is covered by bulky clothes and their head is simply wrapped by scarves. Even the eyes are covered. How does this person even see?!

ZhuQiu let herself bounce off the entirely covered person, with one sole goal of getting away from them, tightly sheltering the toyger and remembered to roll away when she hit the grass. She had learn this trick when Shi DaMao had been a crazy attacker, and now she is grateful for that turn of events. Besides, being used as a shield by Paeonica once is enough for a life's time experience, ah! Like one can say again, once bitten, twice shy.

Before the person could grab her as shield, ZhuQiu managed to roll herself into a kneel further away and she, very obviously, begins to dash away in the other direction, her eyes kept on the entirely covered person, to briefly gauze her distance.

Another big mistake, ah! she crashed into another cloaked figure, who pushed her away with a hoarse deadpanned voice, "Not again."

Wait, wasn't he at the party? How come he's here fighting someone?

ZhuQiu recognized the voice and knew that she should definitely not be caught in the fight. So, she used the momentum of the push and, with a little grace that she could muster, twirled away. She was glad that her former hobby consisted of dancing, giving her a practiced sense of her own footing and she manged to get quite far without stumbling.

Bi'An suddenly landed out of nowhere, scaring the mannequin silly. Bi'An took one look at ZhuQiu and the fighting and frowned. ZhuQiu had never seen such a none smiling expression on Bi'An's face before, feeling a little worry rising within. Is the entirely covered person, that H'Jeel is currently after, a member of Space Pirates?

ZhuQiu found her answer soon enough. H'Jeel roared at Bi'An, "Out! The Nightmare manipulates currents. Out. Now."

ZhuQiu couldn't help but look twice at the heavily covered person. They do have a large frame —though, not as big as BaXia— furthure exaggerated by the heavy clothes that wrapped themselves around the figure. A bit of black hair peaked out, but it wasn't uncommon to find dark-haired person. There was nothing distinguishable except for the sparks of electricity he hurled at H'Jeel who met head on without being affected.

Bi'An gritted her teeth and grabbed ZhuQiu, who was caging the wriggling kitty in her arms, and send a powerful kick off the ground. The kitty did not struggle after that.

ZhuQiu felt what it was like to fly for the first time. Of course, it wasn't as good as she imagined, because she couldn't feel the wind but the pressure was akin to diving under a substantial heights. If she was made of flesh, she would have wind blowing out her cheeks, making her look and feel ridiculous. Maybe the wind might even cut her tender skin, ah! ZhuQiu now understood why body refining wasn't just an option for the individuals with organic vessels. She begrudgingly thanked the random gods that allowed her to reborn into such a vessel.

Somewhere in the celestial realm, a certain godly immortal paused writing into a thick red book and sneezed.

Being dragged into safety, Bi'An quickly pushed everyone, who was watching, inside. She gave a series of quickly commands. GongFu and BaXia sprang into action. They were to quickly rush out to help H'Jeel and Bi'An did not allow anyone else to help.

ZhuQiu soon understood that the Nightmare was able to paralyze others due to his advanced knowledge in manipulating electrical currents with his Spiritual Roots of Fire. It was so purely fantastical to ZhuQiu, whose mind began to imagine all kinds of elemental power combinations.  Does that mean if one has got water and fire affinity, they can produce boiled water anytime? Also, are ice manipulation included in the water category? Wait, does water affinity user can manipulate blood too? There are so many unattainable logic, ah!

ZhuQiu have such questions, because Bi'An explained that BaXia had advanced affinity for earth and fire, thus, making him a great counter for the Nightmare, since he is able to protect himself from being affected neurally. And as for GongFu, he also has got affinity for both earth and fire in addition to the water affinity he acquired not so long ago. He was a great choice to help H'Jeel.

Also, getting one affinity to show up is already hard enough. Where in the world did GongFu suddenly managed to attain a Water Attainment Manual Drystal that he could forcibly open the his Spiritual water path?! Such thing is too OP, ah!

ZhuQiu then wondered if the Nightmare problem would be solved forever after this. Three vs one is unfair, but that one person have been terrorizing the whole town at night, so it's not bad, ba. Thus, her overactive mind of how the natives would rejoice at the fact that they could finally have a nightlife.

Not long after, Bi'An received a message on her communication device that BaXia have been admitted into the Lotus Lab. ZhuQiu was shocked. BaXia is twice the size of the Nightmare, ah!

Bi'An thought it was wiser to wait until morning to visit them. Just in case the nightmare is still prowling the streets, awaiting their opportunity. ZhuQiu had a lot of question.

If the Nightmare actually had fire ability, it doesn't make sense that he would be avoiding victims in vicinity of light sources. If there were fire lamps, he could simply control it. If there were electric bulbs, he could simply control that too, given his advanced ability.

Bi'An didn't have an answer. She was as clueless. She was almost convinced by ZhuQiu's points and planned to visit BaXia now instead of later, but disregarded the idea when YaZi pointed out that there must be something else everyone miss and it's better to utilized the already established facts to stay safe rather than take chance and be sorry. YaZi also firmly reminded ZhuQiu to calm down and rethink. Perhaps, the person who was attacked by H'Jeel wasn't the actual Nightmare after all. Since no one could confirm who is the Nightmare and who is not.

ZhuQiu realized that and was guilty that she almost put them all into trouble, thus beginning to calm down from her excitement and meditate. She won't be absorbing another drystal for now. She is going to face and refine her mental blockage. It seemed that she had to lean how to be calm and analytical.

Bi'An burned the midnight oil, writing up a report and then submitting it to the system while paging all the senior members in order to exchange data. YaZi was in an even higher alert but he seemed to just be lazily polishing a metal piece that BaXia had been working on.

The kitty laid silently. It seemed to be zoning out. There weren't much reaction when ZhuQiu tickled it earlier. It was lost in its own thoughts.

The five centaurs returned quite late, almost when it was dark outside. They sensed a different tension inside the yurt but couldn't tell much apart from the fact that there were two person missing, and everyone seemed to be too calm and awake.

The night come when ZhuQiu's erratic thoughts finally calmed down after playing themselves out and exhausting all excitement. She began to notice that something was very strange within her.

For one, she seemed to sense a warmness in her abdomen, something that wasn't suppose to happen to plastic synthmanoid for no reason especially if they weren't running on electricity like robots or computers.

Another strange sensation is that, she could vaguely feel a presence imposing itself in her mind. She turned towards the presence and let it settled in the middle of her sight. Opening her eyes, ZhuQiu saw no one, but a cut little kitty dozing off.

Odd.

Not thinking anymore about it, ZhuQiu returned to her mindful state and scrutinize the other sensation.

The warmness gave a feeling of ease and confidence somehow, as if it was a part of her that was something innate. Like some sort of inner power.

Upon thinking about it, ZhuQiu thought back on one of her groundless suspicion. She began to investigate the source of warmness within her. She wasn't very skillful with inner meridians explorations and spirit core inspections, thus it took some effort to merely focus her Qi Circulation and she finally found a meridian pathway. She followed it, grazing past the various acupoints, as the flow of Qi naturally circulate to and from the core. Anatomically similar to a heart and its blood circulation.

Upon reaching the inner core, ZhuQiu almost lost her concentration. It was really pretty, it's like a amber colored crystal ball, except it wasn't transparent. It was like it's made of frosted glass with some hint of otherworldly glow. ZhuQiu once learned that this is the battery of the soul, where Qi— that are gathered from the air —are stored and then spun into flowing threads of mysterious power that could lead to immortality.

The reason a synthmanoid are Qi dependent was because within their non-organic body, that does not have actual working spinal cords or nerves, the network meridians pathways act as the nervous system. Simply put, souls manipulates their non-organic vessels with Qi that the consciousness pulls from the surroundings. Its an automatic process, very much like breathing or keeping the heart beating.

ZhuQiu tried her best to tap into her spirit core, to see the overview of her spiritual being and why is there a extra warm presence. ZhuQiu slowly allowed her perspective to diffuse itself into the core, not daring to accidentally hurt her own core. She could see brightness everywhere in the sphere. Every corner was bright, there was no shadowed area.

There, in the middle, floats one orange object that emitted light that is utterly different from the core's brightness. ZhuQiu looked without comprehension at first. This wasn't there the last time she peered inside her own core. Curious, she approached it, the sensation was like swimming in the air. Upon closer inspection, it seemed to be an orb of glowing embers. It is the thing that have been producing the warmth and amber glow. And then it dawned on her.

So, it seemed somehow her Spiritual Roots has unlocked its own affinity for the Fire element.

ZhuQiu was baffled. Why and when? Was it because of that time?!

ZhuQiu lost her concentration with the bewilderment and her focus fell rapidly back into the external perspective. The center of the yurt's ceiling clarified in her eyes as she blinked without moving.

The fact slowly sank in. And when it does, ZhuQiu quickly lifted her palm into her sight. She's got fire affinity!

ZhuQiu concentrate with all her might, for a small flames to materialize itself on her finger. Hehe, little fire! Show yourself!

Nothing happened.

ZhuQiu tried again, with different methods. Come on!

No result.

Disappointment washed over her as her hand fell and the steel wrist accidentally hit on the little kitty.

The little kitty jerked away and stared at her with shocked eyes and flattened ears; WTF.

ZhuQiu was apologetic and hurried to coax the kitty in hushed whispers. "Sorry, sorry, sorry, ah! Don't run away, ah, QiuQiu is sorry, ah!"

She hugged the kitty and fiercely rubbed the place she hit and tickled its neck. The kitty was lax and did not complain.

***

"You can't produce fire?" Bi'An was puzzled over ZhuQiu's question. They were on their way to the Lotus Lab.

ZhuQiu gestured wildly to show her image, "You see, I did the inner core inspection last night and I swear I saw the fire ball thing in my core. It's the spiritual root affinity, right?"

"Right."

"So I should be able to do the fire tricks already, right?"

"Usually, after the trigger, one should be able to recall their summoning." Bi'An tapped her chin. YaZi, who trailed behind them, had a thoughtful look.

"But, you see, I don't know how to. Plus, I think I triggered it that day, when I thought I was imagining the Nightmare attack. But I didn't even see it."

"Nightmare attack?!" Bi'An's inhaled sharply.

"Yes, if you ask GongFu and BaXia, they can tell you I had some sort of breakdown. But they didn't see the nightmare when it entered. I did, and it saw me too, it did jump towards me. I thought it'd attack me so I just panicked and like,"— ZhuQiu reenact her reaction as best as she could— "this."

Bi'An tilted her head, looking at ZhuQiu wildly waving her hands with closed eyes. The gesture attracted attention from passerby.

YaZi asked, "and then?"

"And then it's gone! Both, the Nightmare—I swear it's the nightmare— and the fire. Everyone woke up, and they even looked around to find nothing. I really did thought I had some sort of hallucination! Even teacher Shi DaMao was there. He even said he met no one while he was on the way."

"Celes— Lost Tiger(Shi DaMao) was there?" Bi'An suddenly suspected something else entirely. So did YaZi.

"Yeah, he was." ZhuQiu nodded vigorously. Wasn't this a clue? Maybe the Nightmare was afraid of fire! Maybe he was afraid of his own power. Or he has an entirely different power and was using some wonky paralysis talisman or device that don't work under light sources? ...wait, that doesn't sound right.

"I'll ask him too." Bi'An tapped her chin as she glanced at the little kitty on ZhuQiu's arms. It looked at her with innocent eyes.

Upon entering the Lotus Lab, it was bustling with more activities than usual.

The GuardBots scurried themselves in a line towards somewhere as if being deployed. Some NurseBots followed along the GuardBots. The remaining NurseBots seemed to be in their usual working self. A group of people in white uniform with the Lotus Lab logo on their back and chest where quickly moving. Some seemed to be collecting bottles of substances, some collecting portable equipment. Some quickly dismantling other heavier equipment.

H'Jeel was looking around fanatically, barely avoiding the moving NurseBots. BaXia was already up and awake, he stood by the waiting area beside GongFu, who sat cross-legged on a bench with closed eyes.

"What's going on?" Bi'An grabbed a casual NurseBot and asked. YaZi joined BaXia and GongFu, patting each of them a greeting.

"Good Morning, Gate Guard. The Protocol of Emergency Deployment have been taken effect. Gate Guard is requested to contact Leader Ruby and Leader Engelina as soon as possible. There is a new rising situation in Alpveom that requires the assistance of Space Pirates."

"Okay, thanks, dismissed." Bi'An's face was grim.

The NurseBots wheeled away.

Without going to find Ruby, Bi'An sat at the bench beside GongFu and accessed her holographic device. ZhuQiu didn't know what else to do.

"How are you, BaXia?"

"I'm fine, Autumn Chaser." BaXia gave a gentle smile.

"What happened?"

"Viper (GongFu) and H'Jeel managed to suppress the Nightmare, but he escaped. I tried to block them and it attacked me. But there was just enough of a distraction for the Nightmare that H'Jeel managed to cut off its power in time and catch it."

"Can powers be cut off?" ZhuQiu heard of TingLing Talisman, which can deactivate the soul's activity and render it unconscious.

"Yes, using the HeXinLan²核心(HeXin)-spirit core; 拦(Lan)-block Talisman"

"Oh. Then the Nightmare is no longer a danger?" ZhuQiu thought in her heart that there is surely a Talisman to paralyze as well.

"Actually... the Nightmare disappeared. We just found that out, H'Jeel is looking around in case the Nightmare is just hiding."

"Oh." 囧 How can this be, ah?!

"If he's still looking, that means the Nightmare has already gone elsewhere." YaZi shook his head pityingly.

They were silent, staring at the hurried movement of NurseBots and GuardBots, and how H'Jeel was furiously storming around and then storming out of the Lotus Lab in search of his nocturnal nemesis. The group of uniformed people had  already finish their packing. A leader seemed to be taking stock and marking it down on a glass tablet.

Bi'An suddenly snapped out of her holographic device. BaXia and ZhuQiu stood to attention. YaZi glanced over. GongFu was still.

"We need to go back to our space vehicle."