"Thanks for introducing me to your grandpa. I think I might get a job." Compass Carburettor helped Millie get up before waving her goodbye, "We'll meet again in a few days."
"Wait," Millie shouted upon staring at his receding back, exiting the house to turn around futilely, unable to see his figure anymore, "Where did he go?"
Unbeknownst to her though, Compass Carburettor was just there, stuck under the flight of stairs like a lizard, staying in an awkward posture, waiting for her to leave.
'You just had to play it cool, right?' He mentally berated himself, turning his head to the side as he observed a lizard stuck to the wall beside him. It tilted its head and stared at him before deciding to hunt a nearby mosquito.
He was a bit embarrassed, sighing as he waited until Millie returned home before gently landing on the ground as he began to walk away. After walking to a nearby street, he hailed a cab and returned home.
He stood within the lift, noticing a youth board it and stare at the button, noticing that the button for the topmost floor had been pressed, eyeing him once before clicking the button for his respective floor.
He remained silent after that.
Though, upon staring at his head, Compass Carburettor felt the urge to hit him, staring at himself to smirk, 'It seems Gehera had some fun being invisible.'
He then entered home, noticing Gehera reading a book while seated in the living room, "What are you doing?"
"A book review. It's just one of the things I do these days." Gehera removed her spectacles, placing the book on the side as she stared at him, "How did your meeting go? You didn't terrify them too much, right?"
"Well, I did a little," Compass Carburettor smiled wryly, "But, they'll give me this job. I mean, I did give them a lot of money. It's a bribe big enough to forget about everything else."
"Yeah, I know. It's from my savings." Gehera rolled her eyes subtly before asking, "But, why do you need that job? No, leave that."
She stared at him, "Why are you suddenly playing by the book? Don't you have enough power to do whatever you want now?"
"You're mistaken about one part." Compass Carburettor smiled as he pointed at the ground, "This isn't someone else's world."
"It's my daughter's."
"So," He smiled, "As her father, I should support her in any way I can, right? I'll help her strengthen it without needlessly interfering with whatever she has planned."
"Are you that confident in solving her issue?" Gehera asked, sighing as she said truthfully, "Over these years, I've used all the power I've stolen to look into Stencil's problem. Every time she surfaced, we've been in contact. But despite that, I've yet to find a solution."
"Are you telling me that despite being asleep all this long, you've found a solution?"
"I haven't been asleep, you see." Compass Carburettor picked up the book and flipped to its first page, beginning to read it while he spoke, "I've been experiencing all my memories. Every single Mental Fragment and Mental Energy I had, I've gone through their memories and experienced them like they were my own. I repeated it tens of hundreds of times until,"
"I made them my own." He grinned, observing Gehera's surprise as he said, "At present, every part of my body is entirely my own. Everything foreign had been converted into part of mine. And, I've long since evolved my powers accordingly."
"With me experiencing every aspect of the Mental Fragments that formed those powers, I gained a complete understanding of them. Following that, it was just a matter of treating them as pieces of a puzzle as I swapped in new pieces accordingly to what I desired." He flipped a page in the book, "It was why I turned my body into a Mental Fragment body."
"Now my entire growth is a game of puzzle."
"You've yet to tell me about your powers," Gehera said, expressing her curiosity. She leaned her chin on her wrist, using her hands as a stand for her head while arching her face to the side a little.
"It's a…secret." Compass Carburettor averted eye contact as he picked up her spectacles, wore them, and began to read the book, "I'll tell you at a later date. There are still a couple of changes I wish to make to that. And the experience I need for them is available in the Academy."
"Fine," Gehera let out a sigh of exhaustion, expressing mild disappointment as she got up and entered her bedroom, "I'll sleep now. I have an important meeting tomorrow."
"Sure, good night." Compass Carburettor said casually, asking after a moment of thought, "Where should I sleep?"
"There's free space on my bed," Gehera said, "Hazen made a mess in every other room."
"Alright," Compass Carburettor nodded, causing Gehera to pause in shock.
She turned around and stared at his figure seated in the living room, 'Did I hear that right?'
Thump! Thump!
"G-Good night," She stammered, her face red as she entered the bed, closing her eyes as a moment later, she sniffed herself, rushed into the bathroom to take a shower and changed into a different set of clothes, getting under the sheets as she thought, 'What the heck am I doing?'
'I'm almost hitting a century in age and I can't believe I behaved like a young girl just now.' She closed her eyes, letting out a mild sigh. 'Yeah, Compass probably said that while distracted. Don't read into it much.'
Seated in the living room, Compass Carburettor read the book, intending to get a better understanding of this world through their literary works, 'Hmm, there isn't a large difference when compared to Earth. If I have to be specific, things are a tad better here.'
'And, Stencil's ideology has become deeply rooted in the minds of the people, whether they are Heroes, Villains, or even commoners.' He thought.
"There's no freebie in this world. Everything has a price. Without an equivalent effort, if the rewards are too lucrative to be true, you're definitely paying an exponential price in the future." There were multiple variations of the same line being quoted from fairy tales told by grandmothers to even businessmen in their board meetings.
Stencil didn't just make the world reject the notion of Systems, but has also been preparing the minds of the people to instinctively reject their entire identity.
