“Did Coulter answer a lot of your more mundane questions?” Ripley asked while sitting in front of a table which housed a wide variety of wacky items. Enoch walked up to them, looking the menagerie over.

  A humongous gemstone sat at the fore, and Enoch gawked at it, “It's huge!” Enoch grabbed it and picked it up, looking it all over. It was sky blue, with white mist swirling about in the top of the gem. Enoch tipped it this way and that, the white mist always finding the top. It was mesmerizing.

  Ripley nodded, amused by Enoch’s reaction, “That, Mr. Aadland, is a facet. One of the more rare sky facets. Collecting them is something of a hobby of mine.”

  Enoch reluctantly tore his eyes from the gem, “How much do these things cost? A fist sized gem like this… I don’t even know how expensive it would be where I come from.”

  Ripley held his hands like a scale, bobbing them up and down off-beat. “Facets have recently become a commodity for sale, but up until about ten years ago, they were really without a price. The culture is that you should go out and gather your own facets. You know, earn them and know more about the environment that birthed them.”

  “Wait, so these things, what, just spontaneously burst into existence? That sounds far-fetched, even with all I’ve seen so far. I mean, would a sky facet like this just spawn in mid-air, conking whoever is unlucky enough to be underneath it?”

  Ripley laughed, “Yes, actually. There have been a few cases of injuries due to fallen facets that take higher-elevated concepts.”

  Enoch shook his head disbelievingly, “I actually want to see one form, now. Have you?”

  Ripley nodded, “I have. There's a flash, blinding even to a Topaz like me. The light dims, some swirly bits coalesce into a glowing orb, then a period of time passes where the phenomena inside is gaining form and concept. Sometimes it's a facet, though it's mostly either an aspect or a monster.”

  “An aspect is what you use to gain powers, right? Outside of the one you gain from taking a facet.”

  “Aye, and they are like Crown Facets in that they always embody ethereal concepts.”

  Enoch eyed Ripley suspiciously, “Wouldn’t the sky count as ethereal? I mean, you can’t really touch it.”

  “You might consider taking a job as a gemologist. Those are the questions they spend all day answering. For a layman like myself, I say it's pretty simple to determine if something is ethereal or material: can you go to it, wield it, or touch it. If yes, then its material, if no, ethereal. You can go to the sky, and you can look at it. Even if you can’t touch it, so to speak, it is something that exists with definition and location. Happiness is ethereal, which should explain itself.”

  “Fair enough,” Enoch muttered while looking over the rest of the items. “Is this an aspect?” He asked as he pointed at a disk with an emblem inside. It shifted between looking like a flexed arm, then a metal ingot, then an elephant.

  Ripley grabbed it and stared as he spoke, “Yes. A strength aspect. What do you see inside it?” He held it up perpendicular to Enoch’s eyes, and the emblems were on display again.

  “I see a flexed arm, metal bar, and an elephant.” Enoch said. “Don’t you see the same?”

  Ripley grinned, “Nope. That’s one of the cooler parts of aspects, in my opinion. Everyone interprets them differently. When I look at this, I see a sword and shield, a dragon, and a diamond. I don’t even know what an elephant is, but you associate it with strength.”

  Enoch smiled, the feeling refreshing. “That is pretty neat. Do you have any more?”

  Ripley nodded, pulling a bag from his feet. “Yeah, I do. I also collect aspects, and they make a great conversation piece in my opinion.” He pulled two more of the glossy disks from the bag. To Enoch they had emblems that looked like the symbol for wavelength and another for a foot in stride. “They’re vibe and stride aspects. They’re pretty rare, and I think they offer some of the more interesting results for emblems.”

  Enoch nodded, “Yeah, those are pretty weird… Say, where would an aspect like those even form? Nothing really comes to mind.”

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  Ripley held up the vibe aspect, “This one I found in a drughouse I raided with my band some years ago,” he held up the stride aspect next, “This one I found in Velocity, during the city’s annual race. I was pretty close to having it snatched, but got it first, if barely. We had a bit of a wrestle, me and the guy who also tried to snag it, but I came out on top.”

  “Huh, so the stride aspect just formed in front of you, from the concept of the event where everyone was running?” Enoch asked, intrigued.

  Ripley nodded, “Yes. Brilliance manifestations aren’t that rare in public. They are reduced, though, because most cities heavily control the ambient brilliance to not spawn monsters in the city.” He put the aspects back in the bag. “Now, what do you want to know next?”

  …

  Enoch had dragged a chair over not long after that started. He and Ripley sat there, talking about the world, which Enoch learned was called Praeda. He recalled from distant past lessons that was a latin word for quarry, which raised another question for him.

  As they sat there, the suns already having fallen over the edge of the world, replaced by a familiar-looking singular moon, Enoch breathed in the air already beginning to form dew. “One last question before I’m done bugging you for the night. Why is everything so focused on gems here? Facets, gems, roughs, brilliance, the ranks, tones, and all that. Is it a choice?”

  Ripley took a moment, breathing deep through his nose then letting it out slowly. “Never thought about it. I suppose that’s a perspective only an outsider can take. I mean, everything magical is related to gems, so they must be magical in concept, right?”

  Enoch was surprised. For the first time, Ripley was ignorant of something. Enoch shook his head, “That can’t be it. We have gems all over my world, and not one speck of magic. Is there anything that’s particularly source-y sounding?”

  “I suppose. There is the world-gem.” Ripley said off-handedly. Enoch gestured for him to go on. “Ah, the world-gem. How could I forget? It is the core of our planet. All magic comes from it. Brilliance being the most recognized force, but there are others.”

  Enoch nodded, “Yep, that sounds like a source-of-all-magic type of thing. So how do you know it exists? There’s no way people have dug that deep into the ground.”

  “Actually, they have. Facets and powers made it pretty easy for a gracious Diamond to dig a shaft to the core. That happened long, long ago though. No records of it aside from the fact that that was how the Shaft got dug up.” Ripley shifted in his chair. “It must be so strange for you here. The more I talk to you, the more I realize how little you know about this place. It probably seems obvious from an outside perspective, but I’ve never thought to question a lot of the stuff you’re asking about. Everyone has just grown up around it, not questioning it.”

  Enoch sighed, “Well, I expect it would be the common reaction from people originating in another world. It’d be pretty hard to have an odd perspective, really.”

  Ripley nodded, “I’ll bet. Anyways, that’s enough for tonight. Tomorrow we’ll go over local geography and a crash-course on making a living in this world. Coulter will show you to your room. You’re free to roam the halls, but if a door is locked, do try and check if the door is stuck or stubborn. The defense enchantments on some of them are likely to blow your hand off.”

  Enoch laughed despite the hefty warning, “I’m not nosy, so no worries. Do you think I could just stay in the courtyard for a while? Light pollution has made nights like these nearly impossible where I’m from, and the added view of the island’s waterfalls glimmering in the moonlight… It brings me some peace.”

  Ripley stood and walked by Enoch, clapping a hand on his shoulder, “No problem. Just have Coulter show you to your room so you don’t need to keep him up so he can guide you there.”

  Enoch stood up, “Fair enough. Where are we headed, Coulter?” He looked to the otter-man who seemed to appear out of the shadows.

  “This way. We’ll go slow so that you don’t forget.” Coulter guided Enoch back to the guest room. When Coulter left, Enoch went back to the courtyard, where the only man-made object remaining was a chair. Somehow all the other stuff had disappeared. Enoch guessed it was the other servants.

  As he sat in the moonlight, Enoch reflected. His time on Praeda had been short so far, and not too action-packed, but it seemed so full of possibility. He considered if maybe this place wasn’t so bad. The people he’d met so far were friendly, and everything just seemed within grasp, with how Coulter and Ripley described the reaches personal power could make.

  As he stared up at the moon, Enoch felt moved. He placed a hand over his heart, feeling a hard lump press against his palm. Confused, he looked down and into his hand, where he had a small, uncut gem in his hand. If anything, it looked like glass, with a very slight green tint to it.

  But he was attached to it. Enoch curiously tumbled it around, looking at it from all angles. But there was no need in the end. Enoch could the stone. It was like how you could sense your limbs, only a lot stronger. There was nothing about the small gem he didn’t understand, except for its origin. A little thought however dragged him back to the beginning of his talk with Ripley.

  “A gem or rough, depending on if you have facets or not, is something all people possess. Well, maybe. I don’t know if you have one. We’ve never had a non-gem user appear from outside our world, so I don’t even know if you have one. Regardless, a rough is what all people start with, and you add facets to it. Once you’ve added three, a Crowning Facet will appear. Once you are fully faceted, you’re rough is then called a gem. And don’t be hasty when you choose facets; they aren’t temporary.”

  Enoch smiled at the gem, a new line of thought birthed from the object which was an extension of his soul: Could he make this place his home?