“I don’t know what I’m doing.” This time, Bear Hug was speaking to nobody but themself. “I might be really bad at cultivation.”

    Of course, they wouldn’t believe that forever. After all, Anton and others had said how unique splitting into upper and lower realms was, and that it took a lot of talent. Bear Hug might not be sure about that, but they had to trust people who knew better.

    Bear Hug stood around in groups staring at themself. They had precisely one idea. It might not have been a good one.

    “Dying wasn’t fun,” Bear Hugmented.

    “We really don’t want to do that,” another one said.

    Speaking was pointless. They weren’t different beings with different thoughts. It was all Bear Hug. Not a hivemind or anything. Just a multividual that was usually in many different ces.

    Many of Bear Hug were on Xankeshan because that was a convenient ce to meet up. Others were on various populous worlds in the general neighborhood of where they had been staying. There were also arge sample of Bear Hugs that were on Second Gift, because work there still needed to be done. “We might not have enough after this,” Bear Hug pondered.

    Another part said, “We should be more efficient. It will be fine.”

    “What if we die? That will make people sad! That would make emme/em sad.”

    Bear Hug copsed limply into a bunch of puddles. “I’ve already thought about all this and I’m not going to stop. Maybe I shouldn’t talk to myself.”

    Nobody they had asked had answers for them. Anton was the one Bear Hug most emwanted/em to have answers, but most clearly did not. Anton couldn’t even go to the upper realms, but Bear Hug emlived/em there.

    And also in r. And many ces in the lower realms. Usually, one of them was with Anton, if that was possible. Anton was Bear Hug’s first friend, after all.

    Bear Hug wondered if they should tell people. Would warning them make them worry unnecessarily, or would it prepare them for disaster? What would Bear Hug want from emother/em people?

    Sess, of course. Alternatively, failure that wasn’t awful and bad. As if Bear Hug could just emchoose/em not to catastrophically mess up. How did humans do it?

    Oh right. Sometimes they failed. Or they gave up before trying. Bear Hug didn’t like either of those options. Relying on others for protection was fine, until Bear Hug needed to protect someone in turn. Briar was strong, but not emthat/em strong. Not as strong as the not-angel. Bear Hug really didn’t know what angels were but he knew they weren’t supposed to be awful so clearly that man was a emliar/em. And worse, a jerk.

    Anton said the man was named Aniello. He hadn’t even emspoken/em to Bear Hug despite Bear Hug very clearly making sounds at him. The worst kind of person- the sort that didn’t think everyone else was a person. They might not even think emmeerkats/em or emfishies/em were people. Terrible.

    Actually, Bear Hug barely knew any fishies that were people. Akrys did have some of everything though. r’s fish were just fish.

    Bear Hug might be stalling. Danger was scary, which was emalso/em the reason that Bear Hug had to do something now. Because not getting stronger wasn’t going to continue to work.

    Ultimately, Bear Hug decided that telling Anton was important, because it would make them more determined to be sessful. One part of them on r went to find Anton, though of course they could talk at anyary distance. Up close was more emreal/em though. And not broadcasting things to everyone visiting. Others went to find Bear Hug’s local friends, and anyone else they could in other ces.

    “I’m going to try to advance now,” Bear Hug said.

    “Okay,” Anton nodded, radiating confidence. He was so good at that, so Bear Hug hoped a little bit of it stuck. “Do you need anything from me?”

    “Umm… devotion? Do I need devotion at my level?”

    “It never hurts,” Anton said. “We will of course hold strong to your image in our hearts.”

    “Thanks. Oh! One more thing. I need you to think about whether Augmenrichment or Enrichmentation is better.”

    Anton also took the second task seriously. It was important. Bear Hug didn’t want to have to be improvising a name for their cultivation level every time someone asked.

    “Okay I’m going to go do something that makes sense to me and might not be a good idea,” Bear Hug said. “I really want to be back soon!”

    With that, they scrambled off, to meet up with numerous copies of themself. Here was the hard part- which numbers to make use of. Bear Hug had sent a lot of themself here, chasing after the guardian party, after resolving to try to advance to the next stage.

    Maybe it didn’t make sense. Bear Hug pushed that thought to the side. It didn’t have to make emlogical/em sense. That wasn’t how cultivation worked, necessarily. It just had to make sense to Bear Hug. Of course, that was emafter/em serious contemtion. Casual feelings could easily lead someone astray.

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    Oh boy. Dying wasn’t going to make things better. Bear Hug began to race every bit of themselves towards another bunch of bits. What made sense? Ten. Ten sounded good.

    Bear Hug didn’t get stronger by having more of them around. Fusing pieces of them together should therefore not matter. But also… it made sense. Each Bear Hug shared energy, so with less Bear Hugs there was less that each had to share, right?

    They would, of course, subsequently form more bodies to rece what had been condensed. It might be more difficult. Bear Hug thought that was probably going to be the case. Still, Bear Hug couldn’t afford to continue to be weak. No matter how many strong friends they had, sometimes they were the only one in a ce.

    Bear Hug squashed together a bunch of themselves and it was weird. Way too big. So, clearly they were going to have to be smaller. How did one trigger a new advancement? Bear Hug had been copying steps before, but splitting into Assimtion and Ascension at the same time had been following two sets of instructions. Neither the normal steps to Augmentation or Enrichment made sense here, and that wasn’t counting them being made for people with animal cells.

    Eh, whatever. Bear Hug just had to do it. Squash parts together. They should be smaller. That took energy, but that was good. There was supposed to be a lot of effort to this. Upper and lower realms bodies fused together.

    Bear Hug thought of something cool when they were halfway done and decided it was a terrible idea anyway. Way too risky. But smashing together upper and lower energy might have been fun.

    All human senses faded away. Those took extra work to try to pretend to have. The only thing that Bear Hug could feel was the moistness of the water and the temperature of the sun beating down from the sky. External energy wasn’t even on the list at the moment, because Bear Hug felt so much of emthemself/em.

    What did Bear Hug want? To be big enough to be listened to by jerks, but not emactually/em big. To be strong, so that they could protect themself and their friends. But also to still be able to emeventually/em return to being able to visit many at once instead of a small portion of them.

    Bear Hug wasn’t sure when things were supposed to be done. Were they supposed to feel very different? Because they didn’t. Had they just… killed a bunch of bodies for no reason? It didn’t hurt though, so that probably wasn’t it.

    Bear Hug took stock of their body. Each strand was… smaller. Thinner, maybe. But more of them. Physicalposition hardly mattered, though. Nobody was going to care or even notice if a strand of algae was ten or twenty times stronger, except maybe if a void ant tried to chew on Bear Hug. For anyone else, it was just the tiniest fraction of energy, even with Bear Hug’s previous cultivation.

    Oh, no wonder they didn’t feel stronger. Because whenparing their own energy, half was half wasn’t it? Bear Hug returned to paying attention to anything else. It all felt… weaker. Except for Nthanda, really. And Bear Hug was probably still the weakest cultivator at a simr stage of those present, having advanced for all of a few minutes.

    After a bit of poking and prodding, Bear Hug decided they felt stronger.

    “Hey everyone I did it!” Lots of people said congrattions. It was great, seeing people happy and not being dead. “When that one guyes back I want to fight him.”

    People didn’t respond as nicely to that one. Erin still emtried/em, but it wasn’t as nice as she wanted it to be. “Anton wasn’t able to kill him, you know? Even if it was from a very inconvenient position, he seems to be more experienced in the same stage. You won’t be… tempered enough.”

    “Your offense is insufficient,” Nthandamented.

    “You don’t need to fight alone,” Anishka added.

    Anton took time to think things over. “It will be difficult, even if you have made a necessary step.”

    Bear Hug wooshed closer to Anton. It didn’t take as long as it would have, but it still wasn’t as close to as fast as him. Anton was another stage ahead, after all, and not a beginner at it. “I still want to,” Bear Hug said.

    “Hmm. I won’t stop you,” Anton said. “I was rather thinking I would take him out myself, though. I’d very much enjoy the look on his face when he realizes I was restricted before. Then again, I’m sure he’ll be even more delightfully shamed if you take him down. But to get my full approval, you’ll have to spar with us. You don’t usually fight. Strength alone isn’t enough.”

    -----

    Nthanda was actually a pretty good recement for Aniello. Not because she could cover a wide area defensively- she couldn’t- but because the individual punishment she could take was quite high. It gave Bear Hug more opportunities to truly go all out with their attacks, despite not having protective formations to make sparring safer.

    “No, that won’t do,” Nthanda said as Bear Hug tugged on her arm. “You need a different angle. Remember, humans are made of muscle and bone.”

    “I emknow/em,” Bear Hug said. “That’s why I’m pulling so hard! You’re way tougher than algae.”

    Nthanda shook her head. “Not what I meant. Look.” Nthanda moved her own arm. “With the same level of effort, if you pull across here… I now can’t get out.”

    “That doesn’t make any sense! Did you get weaker?”

    “Muscles only work in one direction. Now, I imagine that Aniello will be using his energy as his primary source of power- but energy is most effective at augmenting the underlying ability. Forcing him to move against his own body’s natural tendencies will be to your advantage.”

    They had decided on grappling because of Bear Hug’s natural form, as well as because Aniello had very durable armor. Bypassing that would be optimal. If possible, Bear Hug would maneuver their strands into cracks, possibly even choking him. However, anything that wasn’t a strike would be more efficient. Bear Hug didn’t really have solidity behind striking attacks anyway.

    Next was Anishka. Aniello himself hadn’t disyed any elemental abilities, but Bear Hug could still gain something from training with her. A better assessment of how they had developed, if nothing else. Bear Hug had empreviously/em worked against Anishka’s ice and me powers, but not at anything close to a level where they matched.

    Now… it was still not true. She could turn Bear Hug into a giant popsicle- watery protection included, of course- orpletely evaporate Bear Hug’s portable pond in an instant. Both of those had to go through Bear Hug’s defensive energy to have such an effect.

    Bear Hug really wasn’t great at fighting. Many of their emserious/em battles had been with Briar trying not to get eaten while at the same time talking about friendship. That was a very lopsided circumstance. Some more battles hade with Second Gift, but Bear Hug still mostly was keeping the stable and not fighting off invaders.

    Fortunately, they had some time. Nobody knew quite when the ‘Holy Stars’ would return, but since they had sent groups to both r and Maheg, there would doubtless be more- either making a return attack or attempting to pass by. If they were ‘close’, Anton would handle them. He had no reason to be polite before he started shooting, so even if it wasn’t ‘fair’ to attack them over a system away, that was their fault for being too weak.

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