August walked down the cobblestone streets, holding a small stack of papers.
He read through the papers fervently, flipping through and mouthing along with the words, making sure to get each one right.
He wiped some sweat from his face, the sun was threatening to turn him into a puddle. The city of Adamas– named after the ancient greek word for unbreakable, was entering summer.
Far out in the distance, he saw the rising ramparts of the limestone walls. Smiling as he walked, he recalled three months ago, when he first carried Alia through the city gates. Both he and the redhead were equally new to the city environment and struggled to grow accustomed to doing things.
Sasha had been a great help with adapting to the ways of the city, taking both of them under her wing to teach them how to get by. She taught them how currency in this world worked, the basics of aura, working, and education, among other things.
The currency of the free territories– places that were not influenced by any greater organizations - was sol. Sol was made from a mix of a few different kinds of new world paper, ironically produced by a few mints in the king of progress' territory.
Sol came in a variety of bills, ranging from one to five hundred sol. Each sol was somewhat equal to what used to be a Swiss franc. It took much longer than August was willing to admit to figure out why.
The rules of the free cities found a rather ingenious way to use a placebo effect, making people feel much more comfortable using the currency and, as such, had stabilized the economy by building trust. It also had the secondary effect of uniting the free cities in trade, allowing them to create a much more binding link than just money.
'People really are resourceful, using others like that.'
He wandered along the cobbled road until he eventually reached a part of the city that seemed to be under construction. People of all ages were helping to move, place, and build using physical ability, skills, and other applications of aura.
August himself had managed to achieve a few of the basics of aura, though he had no complex understanding or experience with it. He could create basic two-dimensional objects with his aura, though he was nowhere close to most users of the extradimensional energy, as his constructs tended to collapse in mere moments.
Alia and August had found out rather soon after moving in with Sasha that aura had a significant few applications. Sasha herself was capable of creating complex plantlike constructs of blue aura that she could move around freely. Most likely, through the use of a skill she refused to disclose.
She had taught them how to move and manipulate their aura and showed them how to maximize aura efficiency.
Aura efficiency referred to one's ability to produce a desired result using the least possible amount of aura. Efficiency had three main components, saturation, potency, and division.
Saturation was very simple to understand and easily comprehended. It simply referred to how much aura was in the body. Different people could contain different amounts of aura – typically, saturation rose with the size of the body, but some skills could circumvent that.
Potency referred to the amount of a person's aura that would be needed to produce energy. Different people's aura had a different concentration of energy for the same amount. This was the only thing August did not struggle with, as he learned early on that both him and Alia had an incredible potency, so much so that Sasha theorized it had something to do with their long sleep.
Division of aura was the most important part of the process. A person could separate their aura in such a way that they maximize the effects of that aura. This process forces skills and other applications to maximize the effect they produce for the amount of aura they use. August struggled the most with this, since he possessed such a large potency of aura, he lacked the necessary level of control to properly divide his aura into parts and the fundamental understanding of exactly how potent his aura was.
While thinking, he walked through the construction zone, making his way down to a large dug out foundation where an old man sat patiently atop some concrete slabs.
He walked up the balding Italian man, who suddenly seemed to liven up, getting up to hug and kiss him.
"August! My boy! You finally made it here, we been waiting for you, eh?" The old man spoke up.
'We? There isn't a single soul here other than you old man…' He thought.
"I know, I know, nice to see you too Rocco" August smiled, pulling himself away from the old man's outrageously strong grip and placing his hands on Rocco's shoulders.
"Now that you are here, we can finally start the construction! Did you bring the materials?" Rocco asked him.
Rocco was the superintendent of the city's southern construction projects, and Alia's boss. The redhead had decided to put her immense physical ability to a good use, and since Adamas was in the early stages of a mass expansion, she did not have to look for too long to find someone who needed workers.
The crossing had done some good, at least. Normally, it would be difficult for women to get into such professions, but the advent of skills made people much less biased. It also had the dual purpose of making August feel much weaker than he really was.
"I did, I did, don't worry, what was your order?"
The old man let go of August, fumbling around for a few seconds before pulling out a stained brown paper and magnifying glass, then began to read it.
"Eh… Steel, clay bricks, concrete… ahh whatever, you know my order." Rocco gave up at the start of the list.
Glasses were few and far between in the city of Adamas, the process required to produce and transport a single pair took weeks at least, sometimes almost a full year. Rocco was in his elder years, and his eyesight had already deteriorated, so he was unable to read very well. So August took pity on he man and simply provided what his record said of the order.
He walked away from rocco and towards an area marked by tied off rope.August then closed his eyes, attempting to divide his aura– a process which took him almost half a minute. If it was not for the fact that doing this allowed him to use significantly less aura, August would not have even bothered.
After a few dozen seconds of standing around, there was a bright chain of yellow flashes. When the light subsided, a large haul of materials, tools, and equipment were laid out on the previously barren ground.
He smiled and turned to Rocco, giving the old man a thumbs up.
"There you are! All set to start soon!" He almost shouted.
Rocco nodded, putting his hands behind his back and smiling softly.
"Ah, how many deliveries do you have left for the day, my boy? Care to have a chat?" Rocco offered.
"Sorry, this is my last one, but I need to drop off Alia's lunch. Do you have any idea where i can find her?"
Rocco nodded, then raised an eyebrow at him.
"She's probably by the grounds, Eh? Where she always hangs out?"
August thanked the old man, giving way to another quick yet stifling hug before being sent off to go find his friend.
'Touchy old man…' He said internally as he walked away.
He heard a large booming sound as he moved out of the crater, and turned around to see Rocco telekinetically moving and sorting some tools whilst moving through them.
'Never gets any less amazing.' He thought.
Then he pulled himself up and out of the dugout ground and back onto the road, jogging off to go find Alia.