After a long past couple of hours, Quinn and Layla returned back to the dorm building. Upon opening the door to their dorm room, they spotted Fex chewing on some gum 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. There wasn't anyone else around.
"Erin isn't here?"
Fex looked up from his hands, "Huh? I thought she was with you."
Layla grumbled.
"I thought she would've gone inside by now, but I guess she can go off wherever she wants to."
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.
"You know how Erin is," Quinn said.
"Yeah, I know," Layla huffed, "She never backs down from a challenge."
She walked over to her bedroom, but right before she did, 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, who's face had tensed, and his mouth curled into a frown.
"Unlike Erin, yeah, he IS here," Fex grumbled, turning away from everyone on the couch, "He's in his bedroom."
Quinn hummed, acknowledging what Fex said.
If he was being honest, things were getting a little worrying. Everyone wasn't in a good 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, and Quinn was potentially going to make things worse by talking to Peter about it.
But he had to do it.
Walking over to Peter's door, Quinn opened it and saw him 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 closed up. This was his worst fears 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.
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.
"Here, this is a little trick I learned about the earth ability…" Quinn said before grabbing a handful of earth.
"The first step of controlling earth is to treat it as an extension of yourself. 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. Momo himself hadn't been here since he had his gang beat up that one low level.
Entering the library, Momo 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, Momo overheard a pair of second year students talking to one another in 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 its so empty here!" The first girl replied.
"No, not today, but it was recent, like I think 2 days ago? Or was it yesterday?" The other 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. Its 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."
Momo sighed. They didn't know it was him, but it didn't matter. He would have his comeuppance some day.
The talk about first years did make Momo think back to his previous. 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,' Momo thought to himself, recalling the fight that ensued, 'That level 3 user was quite strong.'
Remembering that he had things to do, Momo 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 to 2, and finally, a smile formed on his face at long last.