Turns out Jeff wants to stay at the banquet for as long as possible to gorge himself, so after I'm done eating Poo and I head out to the south of Dalaam. We approach the cave to Pink Cloud, but turn east instead of west and are confronted by a massive natural spire jutting up to the highest point in Dalaam.

And the way up? More ropes.

"Please don't tell me you want me to climb up there," I say.

Poo looks back at me, smirking. "Perhaps that should be your first challenge. But I can assist you here. I will climb up each rope, and then help pull you up as you walk up the wall."

I grumble some more, but I was the one who asked for this and Poo is going out of his way to make it easier for me. He doesn't even wait for my verbal agreement before heading up and holding his hands at the top of the first rope, ready to pull. It's a lot easier with his strength aiding me, and we make it to the top of the spire with no issue at all.

The wind is even stronger than Pink Cloud, so fierce that I worry it will make me stumble and trip off the edge. Poo sits down with legs crisscrossed, and I follow his example. Still, with the wind and high altitude chill, I can't help but rub my arms.

"Before we begin," Poo says. "I should preface the lesson by saying that the Mu spirituality has been used to commit genocide in the past."

I blink. This is not how I was expecting a lesson on meditation to go.

"But how?" I say. "Aren't monks supposed to be… I don't know, peaceful?"

"And you've felt the emptiness the Starmen carry within themselves. Does that keep them peaceful?"

I don't have an answer for that.

"It was not Dalaam itself that carried out the ethnic cleansing," Poo says, "But one of the lowland areas nearby that adopted our spirituality. Religious differences with neighbors were the political basis for an invasion and slaughter." He shakes his head. "An oversimplification of a tragedy too large to comprehend, of course, but my point is this. Any religion or spirituality can be used to uplift or oppress depending on how the ideas are implemented. Remember that as we move forward."

That's going to linger with me for a while. I saw the Starman violence within their emotionless state as an alien attribute of them, but it's different now that I know humans have behaved in similar ways towards each other.

"Now onto the lessonitself," Poo says. "I've talked a bit about Mu before, and the emptiness it represents. But today, we're taking a different angle. There is a concept within Mu that roughly translates as 'flow.' Did the thralls mention it?"

I frown. "I think they did."

Poo nods. "It is important to understand. Mu is about passivity, about nothingness, but it is also about motion. Freedom."

"Passivity and motion sound like opposites."

"That is a common opinion of Eaglelanders. We do not see it that way. In fact, the passivity of Mu often gets misapplied in foreign contexts. For example, you know quite well the social pressures facing young girls. And in Eagleland, a girl is considered passive if she follows those conventions and yields to those pressures."

Oh boy, do I know a thing or to about that.

"But that is not true passivity," Poo says. "It involves choosing to stay within a cage, such as feeling like you must go out of your way to apply a time-consuming makeup routine every day. The passive sage instead bends away from this pressure."

I frown. "Bends?"

"You accept the expectations, the judgement, but you do not act to follow them for their own sake. You do not struggle, you do not assimilate. You simply… flow."

"So you're saying I shouldn't put on makeup and try not to care when people call me ugly."

Poo smirks. "You can take it that way if you like. That is but one example, and of course it is not my place to control your daily routine. But the principle remains the same. Societal pressure is like a raging river. Struggling against it is like swimming upstream. It is the easiest way to drown."

Like dyeing my hair and wearing skull earrings and ripped jeans just to annoy people. Because this isn't actually the style I want, because I was trying to resist without thinking about how to live my life, it all feels so pointless now.

"Instead, you float with it. The water moves with you, and it does not claim you. In passive motion, you are free. Are you with me?"

"I think so."

"Analogies of motion are key to the idea of the flow. You are a breath of air. Passive, aimless, yet the air around us can cause storms that level cities. You are a leaf floating in the wind, swaying and fragile yet carrying the nutrients to raise new life from the ground. You are the sun, following the path gravity sets out for you by bending space, yet having the nuclear might of turning matter into energy. You are power, but you are not the hand that wields it to conquer or oppress. Instead, you observe the world. You bend and flow along the path it creates for you. That is where strength comes from."

Thinking over his words, I look back on the past five years consumed with bitterness. I was torn between being the sweet little angel Eagleland wanted to see and a devil who spat in the face of its values. But what if all along, there was a third option? An ability to live my live my life how I want within a broken system. The ability to resist not by fighting, but by surviving.

I really was swimming upstream. No wonder I felt so alone.

"Dalaamian Mu is a spirituality of contradictions," Poo says. "You remain passive by moving. And by relinquishing power and ambition, you gain control. That is what I held onto during our quest to fight Gigyas. The world forced me down a difficult path filled with traps and monsters. I was near helpless at the start, needing to rely on my companions to protect and nurture me. Thank you for your aid in teaching me elemental PSI, by the way."

"Oh. Yeah, any time." I frown. "I didn't think you struggled with self-esteem like I did at the start when I was holding Ness back."

"In Dalaam we are more… internal about that sort of thing. And I was able to come to terms with it. I cannot change the situation I am in. I cannot change where it is pushing me. What I can do is focus on following the flow."

He pauses, gathers his thoughts, and continues.

"What Mu spirituality asks of us is no more and no less than what we do with our bodies. We do not have to convince anyone that our way is right. We do not have to resist and fight them until only our view remains. We do not have to accept the ways of others as correct. We simply hold true to our path. That is something we can always do, and so we always have control."

"And what if that path ends in your death?" I ask. "What if fate had Giygas defeat us?"

"Then my task is the same. If we are fated to lose, then running away from my destination is useless. I must follow the road where it leads. So long as I do that, my life is meaningful. And it is not something anyone can ever take from me."

The more I listen to Poo, the clearer his words become. Bending and flowing with my path, being passive, it doesn't mean obeying the whims of my parents and societal pressures like I thought. It means accepting that I don't have the power to change their minds, that I shouldn't have the power to make them believe exactly what I want when I want. They are part of the world that's pushing me, and I need to let that take me along the road of life instead of staying still to be chewed up and spat out.

"That's… helpful," I say. "Really. Um, but does it help me resist Starman influence?"

"We're getting there. Sometimes the flow leads us in roundabout ways." Poo flashes an impish smile. "And I don't get many opportunities to wax philosophical about this. Thanks for bearing with me, Paula."

He clears his throat, and his face returns to neutral.

"Now," Poo says. "We'll achieve that meditative state for you. And once you can control it yourself, the thralls won't be able to push you around with it. I do have to warn you that this will be a little… intense. What I will do is a lighter version of what I went through, but I prepared for years instead of hearing some monk yap at me for fifteen minutes."

"You think I'm ready?"

Poo nods. "I do. Much more so than Ness or Jeff, in fact. After all, it was you who pierced through Giygas's darkness and connected us back to the flow of the world. I believe that feelings of spirituality and faith are connected across different philosophies and religions. Your skills should serve you well here."

"And what if I haven't been in touch with that spirituality at all in the last five years?"

"Your path may have taken you to a dark place, but that does not mean the road you walked before no longer exists. It is a part of you, Paula. I can help you bring it out."

I exhale. "Then I'm ready."

"Close your eyes."

I follow Poo's instructions.

"I will take away your legs," Poo says. "Do you accept this?"

"Yes."

It's strange how naturally the answer comes to me. After all, I fought so hard over these past five years not to let anyone control me. But if Poo's going to lead me through this, why struggle and make it harder for myself?

And after the thought finishes, I realize I can't feel my legs anymore. Like I'm a genie floating right above the ground.

"Now," Poo says. "I will take away your arms. Do you accept this?"

"Yes."

As before, I lose feeling in my arms. And instead of being alarming, it's… soothing. Like I can feel the rest of my body more now that my limbs no longer exist.

"Next I will take your ears. Do you accept this?"

"Yes."

The world goes silent. All the sounds I didn't even know I was processing are now gone, leaving me with only my pristine self. I've never known peace like this my entire life.

"Now I will take your eyes. Do you accept this?"

Telepathy, a sensation purer than any physical sound could be. It's like every noise I've ever heard before in my life is accompanied by an annoying buzz that I'm only now realizing there's an alternative to.

Yes, I accept it. I say the word aloud, though I do not hear it.

Then my vision fades. I wasn't expecting a difference since my eyes were already closed, but there's a big difference between looking at dark eyelids and nothing at all. Instead of black, there is the void. Colorless, but neither light nor dark.

"Finally, I will take your mind. Do you accept this?"

Yes, I do.

Then there is nothing. No thought, no processing. And within that nothing is everything. This is it. Serenity. I am the vacuum of space, bathing in galaxies. So much larger than this world, its gravity, its atmosphere. Empty, yet containing all there is.

I am the entire universe.

Within the nothingness, I open myself up and take the stars within me.

Starstorm α.

My senses return to me, and my eyes flash open to see Starstorm PSI energy meteors falling towards Poo. I hop to my feet and let out a shout of alarm, but the meteors dissipate harmlessly around him.

"Now that I was not expecting," Poo says. "Congratulations on learning PSI Starstorm, Paula. You've felt the emptiness within Starmen, and now you can harness their greatest power for yourself."

"I… I almost hurt you."

"Starstorm targets enemies only. I am not your enemy. I was never in any danger."

"It's really that simple for you?"

"No." Poo regards me. "It's that simple for you, Paula. You were in charge of where the stars went."

"But I…" I take a deep breath. "I wasn't directing it."

"Of course you weren't. When you enter the nothingness, you cannot choose your path. But it is yours, and you attuned to its flow. What you were thinking or trying matters not. It is only when you are not thinking, when you are not trying, that you are in control. That is the secret."

I sit back down. "This is making my head hurt."

Poo smiles. "It's a lot for one day. Hold onto the emptiness and the flow. They are yours. And when the Starmen thralls try to force their own serenity on your mind, you can bend away and let your passivity prevent them from grabbing hold."

"That's what you did?"

Poo nods. "Like I said, it's not perfect. And the further I go into nothingness, the harder it is to actually fight back. Which is why I was floating there when you found me, and why I did not assist until the pressure of six Starmen was reduced to one."

And given the timeframe of when he went missing, he held that meditation for days without letting them in. I can't even imagine doing that, but I also don't need to hold out for days. Like Poo mentioned, even an extra second could mean the difference between victory and defeat.

"Let us head back to the palace," Poo says. "How are you feeling?"

"Honestly?" I say. "I'm worried that I'm now that one white girl who tries to solve all of her problems with eastern mysticism."

"Mm." Warm amusement enters his eyes. "That does happen, but it's simply another expectation that you must flow around. Besides, you're not misappropriating my culture. You're learning from a friend. And while I am not one to lose myself in the throes of emotion…"

He takes a deep breath and rests a hand on me knee, grinning at me.

"It makes me happy to share this part of my life with you, Paula. Even in Dalaam, not many can follow exactly what it is that I do. Think of it as my equivalent of Jeff showing off his new inventions or Ness talking about his favorite baseball teams. I appreciate your attention more than you can know."

Poo's earnest smile is the final piece of the puzzle that fits into place. Even a monk following this path while rejecting earthly pleasures still has a soft spot in his heart for friends.

I can accept the emptiness and flow, use it to ease my pain. And I don't have to become detached to do it. I will save Ness, and then I'll break the last of the barriers between us.