After a long day, Quinn and Layla were more than relieved to have returned back to the dorm building. All they wanted to do was lie down in their own beds, stretch out their legs and stare at the ceiling passing out before they knew it, but they had a feeling that things weren’t going to be that easy, they just never were.

Upon opening the door to their dorm room, they spotted Fex. He was chewing on what looked like some gum, since he had been blowing bullets and popping them, while laying down on one of the couches. He was attempting to knit his string together using his fingers.

Glancing around, Layla noticed it was quite empty in the room. That there was no one else inside.

"Erin isn’t here?"

Fex glanced up from his hands, and then looked carefully before going back to what he had been doing. "Huh? I thought she was with you."

Layla grumbled, frustration building inside.

"I thought she would’ve gone inside by now, but I guess she can just go off wherever she wants to," Layla bitterly mumbled between her teeth, an undertone of hurt in her words.

Rather than just doing nothing there was one thing that Quinn could at least do. Sensing for Erin with their shared system connection, Quinn was able to feel that her presence wasn’t very particularly far. He felt it weakly, which meant she was close enough for him to feel it at all.

There had been times where he was unable to track her so he had a good gauge to how far she was based on this feeling.

"You know how Erin is," Quinn said. "Or at least I can get near to the area where she’s in."

"Yeah, I know," Layla huffed, "She never backs down from a challenge."

She headed to her bedroom with her own feelings all over the place, sometimes the best thing to do was just rest it all off, but before leaving, she turned around.

"I’m going to take a nap, wake me up when Erin returns."

With that, Layla shut the door, leaving Quinn and Fex in the living room together.

"Is Peter still here?" Quinn then asked Fex, whose face had tensed, and his mouth curled into a frown.

"Unlike Erin, yeah, he IS here," Fex grumbled, turning away from him on the couch, "He’s in his bedroom."

Quinn hummed, acknowledging what Fex said.

If he was being honest, things were getting worrisome. Everyone was in a bad mood after today’s events, which was affecting the whole team. Not only that, but the events of the red portal incident still lingered on. Quinn was potentially going to make things worse by talking to Peter about it, so for a moment he thought it wasn’t the best thing to do.

He wondered, maybe there was a better time, maybe they could wait, but that was possibly just a dream in his situation because he knew...he had to do it.

Walking over to Peter’s door, Quinn waited for a moment. He then let out a big sigh and gave a knock before pushing it, allowing himself in. Now inside he saw the teenager sitting cross legged on the bed.

Upon hearing that someone had entered, Peter’s head perked up, and wiped his face, like as if he was caught doing something he wasn’t supposed to.

"Q—Quinn!" Peter said, a little startled, "I just... I didn’t expect you to come in so suddenly."

"Can we talk?" Quinn said, which caused Peter to tense up.

"Uh... Sure," Peter gulped.

"Look, I’ve been trying to be there for you. I’ve defended your actions to the others, and helped save you from some beast attacks, but I can’t keep protecting you forever," Quinn explained.

Peter’s throat clenched up. One of his worst fears was coming into fruition. With what he had done, everyone was abandoning him, and he couldn’t even blame them.

His head dropped low, "I know..."

"You have to learn to pick up your slack, because at this rate, you’ll drag us down."

"I’m trying," Peter whispered, barely audible, "... But I can’t figure it out."

It was then that Quinn noticed Peter had a plastic tub of earth next to him, as well as his level 2 earth ability book. Despite him having the second book, Peter was still struggling to improve his ability, even after trying so hard. How long had he been here? The current state of the world would drive anyone mad and with everything going on.

He felt guilty, so he decided to sit next to him on the bed. Maybe all Peter needed instead were a few words of encouragement. At times in his old school, when tough situations happened he wished that there would be someone that could reach out to him.

Maybe, this time Quinn could be that person to Peter. Rather than just standing and watching, he should do something.

"Here, this is a little trick I learned about the earth ability..." Quinn said before grabbing a handful of earth.

"When learning the first level of controlling earth, the book tells you to treat it as an extension of yourself, but that’s just the first step, and using mud is like using training wheels. To control something stronger than mud, you have to command it..."

—

Back at military base 2, a tall boy with his brown hair in a ponytail had just come out of class, and headed into the library. As he passed through the hallways to the place there was a slight emptiness about the air. They weren’t quite as crowded as they usually were.

The library was one of the last few places where the second years and the first years could interact, however, it was only because of the second floor. Mono himself hadn’t been here since he had his gang beat up that one troublesome low level. He was a little worried that maybe there would be more trouble if he was to come in here too many times, a sense of bad luck almost.

Entering the library, Mono headed upstairs to the second floor. He only needed to grab a few books for one of his general study classes. The same emptiness in the air lingered.

As he sat down with a small stack of books, he let out a big sigh. He hated studying as many did but he needed to get ahead, he needed to continue being in the position he was in, and that’s when he could hear something to his side. Mono overheard a pair of second year students talking to one another at a nearby table.

"Why is this place so empty?" A second year girl had said to her friend.

"Oh yeah, you’re right. Isn’t it because of the whole green portal expedition?" Her friend had said in return.

"That was today? No wonder it’s so empty in here!" The first girl replied.

"No, not today, but it was recent, like I think 2 days ago? Or was it yesterday?" The second girl wondered.

"Well I’m glad they’re not here. Not to be mean, but they’re kinda annoying. Because of them, I can’t leave the second year buildings without the guards constantly eyeing me. It’s sooooo creepy," The first girl said.

"Wasn’t it a second year that did it?" The second girl questioned, "Or were you right and it was a first year?"

The first girl waved her hand, "Ugh, does it matter? Let’s just focus on studying. This biology homework is really hard."

Mono sighed. They didn’t know it was him, and a part of him felt like revealing it to them to see how exactly they would react but it didn’t matter. He would have his comeuppance some day.

The talk about first years did make Mono think back to his previous year. He remembered watching the same display of how the world worked in the assembly hall, him learning and improving his ability, the first portal expedition trip, and the time when he had to prove his loyalty to duke.

’Man... it’s been a while since then,’ Mono thought to himself, recalling the fight that ensued, ’That level 3 user was quite strong.’

Remembering that he had things to attend to, Mono quickly grabbed his books, and headed out of the library

—

"I... I did it," Peter said to himself almost surprised.

After receiving his lesson from Quinn, Peter took it to heart, and put all of his energy into commanding the earth. After a few hours, it had paid off. He had managed to shape a handful of earth into a knife, and not just any knife, but a knife made from a material that wasn’t mud.

Looking at his watch, Peter could see the fruits of his labor come into fruition. The number had ticked from 1.3 to a 2, and finally, his first ever smile since arriving here formed on his face at long last.