"We need to go back to our space vehicle. I've informed everyone. I'll announce once all of the Space Pirates members have gathered together." Bi'An's voice was solemn.

ZhuQiu was surprised at the abrupt turn of event.

Sure enough, there was a lot of them hurrying back to Space Pirates' space vehicle that it caused a bit of a jam.

ZhuQiu quietly stroked the toyger while walking slowly behind the crowd along with BaXia and GongFu. Bi'An and YaZi has already hurried ahead, as they were required to be inside to widen the entryway, allowing for more Space Pirates member to enter in a quick manner.

Everything was a little unorganized but it seemed that the quick retreat was well practiced and all older members were much calmer than the others. They walked around to offer any help to calm the rushing newbies.

As everyone is busy with trying their best to accommodate, let it be revealed to the reader that no one suspected two uninvited strangers infiltrating the space vehicles among the crowd.

One petite figure with fern-like hair and peony crowns suppressing her excitement as she nonchalantly walk everywhere to admire at the sight. People who were blocked by her could only helplessly think she was a new recruited member who have been longing for an adventure. She is indeed the very Paeonica of Thiria. Sure, she is a little pretty thief, but she wasn't a hardened criminal in the records so she was allowed to move freely after serving appropriate punishments. Although uninvited, she wasn't much of an cause of alarm.

Another tall brooding figure in navy blue robes walked in between the crowds. He would lend a hand occasionally, not out of kindness but to better fit into the crowd as the experienced Space Pirates member's eyes swept around. Under the observing look, his relaxed confidence posed no threats. He was just a little pale —from years of wrapping himself in layers of clothes and hiding in the dark — and there was no way to make any connection with the demeanor he had now compared to his previous usual appearance.

When everyone accounted for —there were also a handful of extra new members joining for the very first time— have entered the space vehicle, Bi'An quickly stepped onto a raised platform and transmitted her Qi onto it. The platform rose far above the crowd, allowing a full view for her and the people below.

"Disciples, teachers, and members!" Bi'An began, using her Qi to heighten her vocal volume to such that it echoed back loudly.

Everyone was silent.

"We seemed to receive a call for assistance from the assembly of The Origins in Alpveom. There had been a coordinated attacked by the Nihilition sect. The attack was uncalled for. As we all know, Nihilition sect have had a change in leadership in recent years and their actions, although some can say it is justified, has been getting more violent. There are some speculation that the justifying is simply a cover, and that the new leader does not entirely care for actual justice. We do not know the full extend of this situation, therefore I request everyone to start training seriously. Everyone will have an assignment, please appraoch your overseer to receive it."

Bi'an paused to take a breath. 

"Remember, Space Pirates! Be unfettered and be unbiased!"

Everyone cheered loudly. ZhuQiu looked around and see whistles, hootings, and excited individuals.

Suddenly, the little kitty jumped out of her arms and disappeared. ZhuQiu panicked and tried to chase after it but the toyger disappeared among the crowds. She kept looking for it, hoping that it did not get trampled on.

"——–I'm so going to use my electron laser!"

"——–Hey, look, a chance to use that mecha of yours!"

"——–Dude, will you help me fix my crossbow? It's not shooting straight, there's a little crack here..."

ZhuQiu remembered about the bow she wanted and felt grievous. She hadn't gotten to say goodbye to Zufior. Will he be disappointed at her for not keeping her words? Plus, that bow in his store... ah! No chance to attain it anymore.

Indeed, there is no way to get a bow except to make one herself. So, ZhuQiu has now found herself a project. She hesitated on whether to continue to look for the little kitty or go back to her dorm and start building a prototype.

Looking at the surrounding, it's almost impossible to find the kitty. It's natural that its own cat-like reflexes should keep it safe and uninjured, ba. With a little less reluctance, ZhuQiu make her way to her dorm.

ZhuQiu's schedule has changed. This time around, she is to split her days into three parts. One part is for rest. One part, activity of her choice. And lastly, one part to train under Shi DaMao on her Martial Art's skill.

It almost seemed as if monotony had been regained, where ZhuQiu chose to go to the smithy on her free time. Except ZhuQiu was allocated more time to refine her Martial Arts skills to make up for the terrible times she have had and was forced to take a timely break on her rest time. Shi DaMao was her assigned overseer for now, therefore he was immovable as mount Tai when ZhuQiu tried to reason that she would be more productive when she spends her break time in the smithy. Shi DaMao would simply drag her into her dorm, push her in, and shut the door, successfully locking her inside.

ZhuQiu, as normal person with normal teen-hood, decide to sneak out when he's not around. However, just like the wise saying of 'man proposed, god disposed', a counterattack of her brilliant plan was already in place. ZhuQiu made sure she stayed absolutely still to pacify Shi DaMao so that he would then proceed to attend to his assignment —obviously he couldn't be guarding her door the whole time right? ...right?— she then quietly opened the door to face a creepily smiling face of Shi DaMao.

Silly Dummy: "Aah!"

Lost Tiger: "Where are you going?"

Silly Dummy: "N-nowhere. Ah ...ha ha. I j-just want to... know what ... what the time is..."

Lost Tiger: "You can rest assured. I will call you up on time."

Silly Dummy: "O-okay. T-thanks"

Silly Dummy: (door closes)

Silly Dummy: (muffled) Wu wu...

Despite the forceful break time, Shi DaMao was kind enough to simply hand over a bag of random Drystals to ZhuQiu when she complained about having no more Drystals to chase away the boredom. ZhuQiu's eyes almost took on a humanly appearance, sparkling with such lively passion of greed. ZhuQiu was not going to be polite and reject such precious present, so she clutched it tightly, hurriedly saying a word of thanks in case he might change his mind, and retreated. ZhuQiu did not get to see the hint of smile in his face.

Shi DaMao also did not torture her during the Martial Art class. He did not demand an impossible duel, but —of course, still adhering to 'seeing is not doing'— began to teach her how to properly execute a move and soon, ZhuQiu managed to perform a whole choreography of disciplinary core technique withing a week. 

ZhuQiu began to take immense liking to her new schedule, despite being told what to do most of the time and being cut off in the middle of working to take her break or to go to the next class.

That is because ZhuQiu also learnt something after a while. Total freedom is a farce. Sure, it felt good to do whatever one wants and whenever one wants, but it does not mean one know what one truly needs in order to keep a balance in not only mentally, but also in a holistic sense of being. Somewhat similar to the process of homeostasis.

ZhuQiu kept going with vigor each day without ceasing in motivation or lacking goals to complete— that she hadn't had the chance to before being interrupted.

Finally, one and a half month later, ZhuQiu finally complete her own project! This time, she had built herself her own version of archery bow that could double as twin sabre. She made it entirely out of metal, the bow was detachable from the middle into two separate pieces. The two pieces becomes four pieces, since they're both a sleek short saber with sheathes of their own— two sabres and two sheathes. The taut wire, which could stretch while keeping the original tension, can double as a whip, not that she knows how to use a whip yet. As for the arrows, it was simply a long thin stick with a pointy end. It was a terrible bow, in all honesty. BaXia could have corrected ZhuQiu's all-in-one bow with kind constructive criticism but unfortunately he wasn't there most of the time as he was often busy with other disciples' request to oversee and adjust their weaponry.

Of course, to learn how to wield her own handmade all-in-one bow monster weapon, she had to practice with it. There was a target field quite within the vicinity of Shi DaMao's private arena. So, she spent some time there during her free activity.

Shi DaMao, who was curious at the strange looking bow that ZhuQiu brought with her into the target field, trailed behind like an overbearing manager. When he have seen the weapon in action, he could only stared with disbelief. He had truly overestimated her!

When ZhuQiu tested out her all-in-one bow, Shi DaMao had to fled into somewhere secluded to burst out in laughter. He nearly spat blood and died on spot.

Unbeknownst to our silly dummy, who kept wondering why her arrows would not struck the target, often getting reflected dangerously in all directions as it bounced off the targets. She tried to shorten the wire, thinking the tension was too loose. It had a little improvement but the arrows wouldn't stick deep enough. It fell off after a few seconds of trying to hang onto the target.

Shi DaMao, who came back to see such a sight, almost lost his mind again. "That simply won't do! Are you an idiot? You clearly have never even used a real bow before making one!"

ZhuQiu was dejected. She stared at her bow, face full of disappointment. She had spent so much time making it, ah!

"This kind of bow, even if you gave it to a retard, they would be forced to politely decline to save face!" Shi DaMao was short of howling in guffaws.

Our silly dummy almost lost hope when she remembered to refute that it's not just a bow. "It's not just a bow, you see, I can detach it into other weapons."

ZhuQiu retract the wire and then tried to whip at the target,  "see, it's a whi—" the whip struck ZhuQiu on her own leg. She truly had no idea how to control such dangerous thing, ah! Catwoman had looks so cool and sexy on screen when brandishing such a weapon!

Shi DaMao almost hurt his internal organs, struggling to keep his face straight.

With a sheepish look, ZhuQiu slowly puts down the makeshift whip and tried to get back her dignity and the crumbling pride, "hehe... I don't know how to use a whip, so let's move on to this, ba." She disconnected the bow and then unsheathed the curves blades. "See! Twin sabre!" She showed off her blades proudly.

Shi DaMao raised his eyebrow, with actual impressed looks. "Not bad, but if you want to make a bow, the string is not supposed to stretch. It is the bow body that has to bend. That is where the arrow gathers the energy to shoot. Flying arrows is not the same as shooting arrows."

ZhuQiu was finally enlightened and hurried to take note of it. "Oh, oh, tell me more." Shi DaMao smiled and did not say anything else except to hand her a wooden bow that they had on board. ZhuQiu finally had a chance to use an actual bow.

With mind oriented towards researching on building a decent bow, ZhuQiu began to spend her free activity time looking for any manuals on weaponry. BaXia, being busy, directed her to FuXi, who was well known for keeping various manuals and record as Drystals that he come across, whether relevant to him or not.

ZhuQiu, with the watchful Shi DaMao outside,—she actually rather the company of the little kitty, but it seemed like it have decided not to bother with her... ai, misfortune!— entered FuXi's study and greeted her meditation master.

After being warmly welcome by the serpentine scholar, ZhuQiu asked if she could make request in relation to his collection of Drystals and FuXi was glad to have another fellow Drystal obsessive acquaintance that he brought out all of his labeled collection. ZhuQiu was in the third nirvana at the sight of so much data-filled crystalline objects. ZhuQiu finally shook herself out of her daze and asked about weaponry related subjects to which FuXi responded by helped her navigate his collections.

There were so many Drystals, but ZhuQiu could only choose a handful for FuZi to copy the content onto another Drystal and then give it to her.

"That's right, Master Fuxi, disciple ZhuQiu has a question relating meditative studies."

FuXi asked her to continue and she did, "When I was in Centalos II, I heard from a fellow cultivator who mentioned a subject that master once mention in class. It was regarding telepathy and that sort of thing. Master haven't taught me that and some other topics—" ZhuQiu proceed to list down some topics she could remember "—will I have to learn those by myself, too?"

FuXi blinked and then sighed, "I may have forgotten to mention that these things are only possible through consented dual cultivation. It is due to the intimate nature of such cultivation that these things can occur, therefore I was unable to teach. Why does Autumn Chaser ask of it?"

"D-dual cultivation?" ZhuQiu blinked. Could it be just like the novels described?

"Naturally."

"Are those...? Does that mean... cultivation involving two persons?"

Outside, a certain Lost Tiger choked on his own saliva.

"That is indeed the nature of dual cultivation." FuXi nodded solemnly. There was no trace of embarrassment.

ZhuQiu, on the other hand, wanted the ground to swallow her up, ah! She have just embarrassed herself.

"Does Autumn Chaser want Drystals regarding this matter?" FuXi guessed.

"N-no... but disciple have one more question, is d-dual cultivation only limited to humanoids or are synthmano—" ZhuQiu wasn't able to complete her question when Shi DaMao strutted in and greeted FuXi with a nod.

"It's almost time. Are you going or do you want me to drag you?" The chilly cold voice almost froze ZhuQiu's brain.

"Ah, wai— ah!"

ZhuQiu is then dragged away by her overseer who is too punctual and obsessed with duels.