Takumi woke to the sound of dozens of tiny mechanical feet padding across the vault floor—Mame and several SEEDs excitedly transporting lesson crates to the training hall. Outside, in the Great Library-Tree's canopy, the plaza lights blinked awake like an expectant audience. His chat window was already full of explosions of emoji.
He rubbed his eyes, and the Cocoon pulsed in a corner of his awareness like the slow beat of a giant heart. A good kind of panic hummed under his skin: the serums were out, and the world had just become a little more complicated.
Group Chat — The Morning After the Red Packet
Fujiwara Chika: OMG OMG OMG I DID IT I DID IT I HAVE POWER WAHHHH
Sagiri: I can manifest things from my head!! My hands are shaking!! I made a tiny sandwich!!!
Himeko: Careful. Manifestation without training risks structural instability—both physical and psychological.
Zhongli: Gratitude, Takumi. The gift is generous and dangerous. Establish pedagogy.
Akeno: Fufu~ power parties~ I will come observe and possibly add glitter.
Eu: Report: serum received. Observing.
Takumi: Good morning. Training today. Meet in the Time-Dilated Arena. Bring snacks. Also: consent forms.
Takumi felt both warmth and a strange tremor—someone else had touched the Cocoon's edge. He'd sent those syringes because he wanted community, not to be a gatekeeper. Still, giving away power was like letting someone borrow your skeleton: useful, intimate, possibly irreversible.
He stood and dressed in clothes that were half-utility, half-librarian. The training hall he'd created that morning was a perfect rectangle of engineered space beneath the Library-Tree, ringed with translucent screens and tactical light. He used Reason Authority to lay down a dozen layers: a Restraint field to prevent runaway powers; a Consciousness net to monitor cognitive overload; a molecular buffer to prevent imagined constructs from collapsing reality at the seams. Teaching massive classes was going to be a strange blend of urban planning and parenting.
When Chika arrived, she looked like a child who'd found a new toy. Water orbited her palm in hesitant pulses—small spheres at first, then ribbons, then clumsy wavelets that licked the air like curious snakes.
Sagiri trailed behind, grinning, with a small kitchen she'd manifested—complete with a cartoonish mascot plate she insisted was a practice model for more complicated works. "I can print doujins now," she squealed. "I'll draw a million pages!"
Eu moved like gravity, precise and careful. Himeko arrived in practical armor—already scanning for environmental holes where a power could be dangerous—and Zhongli came with ancient, measured steps, hovering somewhere between scholar and sentinel. Akeno drifted in late with a theatrical bow.
Takumi cleared his throat and activated the arena.
"Welcome," he said, attempting to sound like an instructor rather than a god. "Lesson one: Safety, consent, and limits. We will do staged drills. If anyone feels dizzy or overwhelmed—raise a hand. Mame and the SEEDs will monitor vitals."
He set up the first simulation: a collapsed lane with a power-glitched micro-beast (simulated) thrashing. Chika's water power could douse conflagrations; Sagiri's manifestations could make tools. But raw, unpracticed power could also drown or crush. His Restraint field hummed quietly at the field's perimeter—Authority of Restraint in action, a suppression net that allowed powers to be used but prevented extreme escalation.
He instructed Chika first.
"Control. Don't push the orb—lend it meaning. Use less—then more."
Chika inhaled. The water above her palm steadied into a perfect shimmering bowl. It reflected her face—excited, sweaty, ridiculous. She made the water do a small task: fill a bowl and spin it like a dancer. The SEEDs logged her vitals and performance metrics, translating them into a little progress bar that popped up on the arena screen.
Sagiri's turn came. She imagined a pen and a stack of paper, and a tiny, beautifully rendered sandwich popped into existence on the table—detailed to the last sesame seed. Her eyes brightened as she realized she had the capacity to materialize complex textures. "If I draw a sword will it hurt?" she asked in a whisper.
"It will if you let it," Takumi said. "So we train control first."
He activated the Consciousness net and ran a soft holographic tutorial—how to imagine boundaries for mental constructs, how to assign persistence (temporary vs. stable), and how to code intent. The net fed small cognitive exercises into their minds—puzzles, imagery tasks, guided meditations—so powers could be conditioned to follow mental markers rather than panic-driven impulses.
Zhongli watched carefully. He'd been troubled by power-distribution since Takumi first materialized the serums. But seeing Chika and Sagiri actually learning—measured, cautious, curious—breathed something like approval into his old gravitas.
Himeko took the combat module for a spin. With careful steps, she practiced creating an explosive vector that was more flash than force; the Restraint field kept it theatrical, but she laughed like the bounty hunter she once was. Akeno practiced ceremonial flares—harmless but showy—and Eu sat still, eyes half-closed, absorbing the training like someone cataloguing vocabulary.
Takumi watched them all and felt a complicated fold inside his chest. Pride, definitely. But also the prickling fear of a man who had made a decision that could not be fully undone. The Cocoon hummed, like a patient animal tasting how civilization would feed it now.
After the drills, they split into smaller workshops. Chika and Sagiri worked on how to add culture to power—Chika designing synchronized water dances for festivals; Sagiri manifesting stage props to accompany music. Zhongli began structuring a curriculum module on memory-anchoring—using story to make power meaningful and accountable. Himeko and Akeno argued over pyrotechnic ethics with unfortunate glee.
Takumi used the time to run a background test: he manifested a tiny mirror and peered at the edges where the Cocoon communicated. He used a sliver of the Authority of Consciousness—not to control, but to observe: a gentle scan of the new minds.
He caught an anomaly. A faint resonance in Sagiri's manifests—an echo frequency that matched a leftover pattern in the planet's Honkai residue, a microscopic interference. It was subtle, almost nothing. But in the Cocoon's language, even whispers matter. He noted it.
Later that night, as the group wound down, Takumi opened a moderation thread in the chat.
Takumi: Quick note. Training looks good. Two things: 1) We need mentorship programs for awakened users. 2) I picked up a tiny resonance in Sagiri's manifests that matches Honkai residue patterns. Nothing immediate, but I'll monitor. Keep using the Restraint field.
Chika: Honkai?? I thought you cleared everything!
Sagiri: WHAT? MY SANDWICH?? IT'S OKAY IT'S CUTE!!
Himeko: Good catch. Residual fields sometimes imprint on creative patterns.
Zhongli: Whatever appears as an echo must be studied. I will contribute annotated history on Honkai signatures.
Eu typed after a measured pause.
Eu: Observation: residual patterns will adapt to user imagination. Suggest quarantine protocols for novel manifestations until vetted.
Takumi nodded and assigned a new mission.
Takumi (Mission #27): "Manifestation Vetting — Help design quarantine and mental boundary tests for new materializers." Reward: 20 points. Mandatory for serum candidates.
Chika immediately volunteered. She wanted to help make sure her newfound power didn't hurt anyone. Sagiri volunteered too, indignantly: "I will protect my sandwich!"
As the evening folded into engineered night, Takumi walked out onto the library-tree balcony with a cup of tea and watched the tiny plaza glow. The town had the small nervous energy of a place with a new marketplace: stickers, missions, arguments about snack recipes, lectures on ethics.
He realized he had designed schools and laws and sentries, but the messy, human part—making people care for rules—was being built by a dozen messy, earnest chats and the SEEDs playing teacher.
His phone pinged: Immigration Request: Fujiwara Chika — Points complete. Chika had done missions; she'd earned her passage.
Takumi felt his chest jitter, like a live wire. The theoretical had turned into the actual: real people, homes packed, teary goodbyes, flight coordinates. The Cocoon hummed louder, expectant, as if savouring the idea of a world that would soon have laughter in its streets.
Before sleep, Takumi ran one small test of Authority. He crafted a tiny pocket of Void-space under the plaza and placed within it a simulated city-ruiner—a ritual object that would normally destabilize constructs. He wanted to be certain his Restraint and Concentration nets could handle true anomalies. Then he breathed and watched as the nets soaked up the raw pattern and translated it into a harmless geometric bloom.
It worked.
He exhaled and, for once, let himself be small. Not an omnipotent architect, but a man with a cup of tea and a town to mind. He opened the chat one last time.
Takumi: Congratulations, Chika. Your passage is scheduled. Sagiri—keep manifesting. Eu—take your time. Zhongli—we'll lean on your lectures. Himeko—don't test fire the snack stall.
Chika: THANK YOU!! I promise to be a Good Founding Elder!!
Sagiri: I'll draw a welcome banner!!
Eu: I will arrive when safe.
The Cocoon hummed, patient and hungry and, perhaps, satisfied. Takumi turned off the lights and lay back, thinking of the small, ridiculous, dangerous future forming under his hands. He felt exhausted and very awake. The weight of responsibility was a living thing now, and for the first time, it felt like a partnership: power, people, and rules, arranged in a fragile architecture that might—if they were careful—grow into something human.
Outside, somewhere beyond the plaza, the residue of old wars slept like a scar. Inside, the seed of a new civilization blinked and stirred, waking to greet new arrivals.