The Eternal Sanctum (Holy Knight Headquarters)

The Nexus was an infinite white space, but as far as Charles and Sakura knew it contained the Animusphere man. According to the disembodied voice though nothing was amiss. The physical form had its energy expended for whatever reason. "Sou ka," Sakura said aloud. Within she wondered if it regenerated naturally or if it would be quite some time before she was able to reappear. Actually, she'd really enjoy the ability to talk to her grandfather or great-grandfather a few more times.

Moving on from this point it seemed that the Nexus had an explanation for how Anu was able to track down the Holy Grails and why the method was only mostly perfect. He looked for things that went against his established order because it was designed by him he could see the inconsistencies. It made sense that there were occasional mistakes with such a method given that there were quite a few things that could be considered against Anu's established order, Charles's elafia friend being one of them, potentially anyway. Even so, Charles only had this particular power for less than a day, but apparently the Nexus could give him a workaround for trying to find the thing he was looking for. "Ah, a sensory ability might be nice," Sakura confirmed. She could see its usefulness. There was also something she considered a bit more practical, though she wasn't really sure if it was or not. If they had a timeframe to work with it would also narrow down any inconsistencies and help them get where they needed to be in a timely manner.

Charlemagne had his answer, and it was even easier than he expected. He could be led essentially directly to the next Holy Grail, though he and the others would have to follow some trail to do so. That was fine by him. "Sounds like an adventure. We can use the time spent traveling to train and be ready for the battle. That is, as long as everyone is willing to go on a journey for uh..." Now that he thought about it, Charlemagne wasn't 100% sure about the time this would take.

Luckily, the Nexus had many answers. "Roughly two years, it will take. In two years, the child will be complete. The trail will be stronger to you as the moment encroaches. Once you leave this place, your senses will include its energies," the Nexus answered. Charlemagne hadn't expected such incredible ease, but there was another question on his mind as well. "Cool. One more thing I want to know is whether I can keep calling someone to this room or not," he said, which prompted an immediate response from the Nexus. "Of course. The summoning you witnessed before is something you are just as capable of, so long as there is a connection between you."

What a perfect answer that was. Even more than before, Charlemagne was sure he'd be returning the next day. For now though, he'd take solace in knowing the plan for this new group's adventure. So... he looked toward Sakura once more. "That's it then. I was thinking about taking a walk, or just relaxing until everyone's ready. Interested in either of those? Or... maybe you wanted to do something different?"

According to the Nexus the journey ahead of this group would be approximately 2 years. This wasn't a very long time in the grand scheme of things, to Sakura it was longer than her present life time, but she didn't care how long such a thing took. She was here for this and to fully meet the other goddess. After all the necessary information was given, Sakura could be happy knowing that all would be well. Moving on from this point and whatever other plans Charles was making to summon someone here again, she was pleased. Charles spoke of maybe taking a walk or relaxing and that was an interesting thought, "I'd enjoy a walk or just relaxing. I've never been to this level of the world before so I'd like having a look around while I think about the skill I'm working on," she said looking to Charles and extending her hand. "I'd also like to hear about your friends, I'm curious..." she mentioned knowing she didn't know so much about him but figuring he likely wouldn't just talk about himself. She decided it might be better to extrapolate from extra information. What kind of people did he trust? Who did he build his bonds with? What kinds of things did they all enjoy? These were interesting things to consider.

Sakura had an interest in both things mentioned. With her specification of being new to the upper part of this world, Charlemagne figured it would be beneficial to both of them if a little walk was taken. That extended hand was taken, and he looked out toward the empty space of the Nexus. "Then I'll show you around. This is one of the best places to be in Chaldea; I think you'll like the scenery," he said. Only a few more words would be spoken within the Nexus, and they were for the Nexus itself. "Thanks for the info. I'll be back later."

With that, the whiteness around them faded. They would be immediately returned to Charlemagne's room in the sanctum. They could go for a walk, though Charlemagne wondered why it was his friends Sakura was curious about. "My friends? Well... alright. I'll tell you whatever you want to know. Let's get going," he urged while taking steps toward the room's exit. If anywhere was to be first on the list, it had to be the sanctum's primary courtyard. As such, he led down that winding staircase they so recently ascended. "Why that, though?"

It seemed that Charles was pretty excited by the prospect of showing her around and Sakura found such excitement infectious. "It sounds fun," she said as calmly as she always spoke but she still seemed rather pleased. She kept up her movements as they found themselves leaving the Nexus with thanks issued. "See you later," she offered the Nexus not knowing how long it would be before she returned but still being a rather respectful person. Inside of Charles room the lad was already pulling her forward and she was eagerly joining him, passing out of the room descending the stairs and headed towards the outside.

As they moved he claimed he'd tell her what she wished to know but he did express some curiosity about why she was interested in his friends. She obviously had several reasons for this, and the first of them was rather simple. "I'm interested in your friends because they're your friends. I don't have any of my own," she mentioned this strange and slightly sad fact like it was empty but that was simply how she was. "Besides how other people interact is always interesting and you're interesting so, the people you are close to are interesting to me too.." she said as a strange bit of logic she shared with at least one of her fathers. She kept up her pace as she looked around and her eyes were studying the whole of this place. Whoever created it had done an amazing job, the architecture was truly gorgeous.

And so, the two were on their way while Sakura clarified why she wished to know about Charlemagne's friends. The young goddess claimed she had no friends of her own, so she wished to know about his. "Hm. That's a surprisingly dumb thing to hear from the child of a wisdom goddess," he said without much hesitation. In the first part of Sakura's explanation, he already discovered a blaring issue. "You have your own friends. If we don't count as friends now, I have a huge issue with pretty much everything we've done since meeting," he added. "Annie and Astolfo also consider you a friend, I'm sure. If they didn't... they'd have probably said something to me about you being with us."

Soon enough, the pair would be seeing the courtyard in more than just a passing glance. Charlemagne remembered many training sessions, impromptu or otherwise, happening in this very location. Thinking about it now, he realized how very similar Aincrad could have been. "I've trained harder here than I ever did inside Aincrad. A couple of my friends are real monsters in combat, though, so it feels really weird to admit that," he mused absently. Sakura did say she wished to hear about his friends; combat prowess covered at least three of them at a basic level.

A surprisingly dumb thing to hear? Charles and Sakura walked and he took issue with her understanding of friendship. This was strange to Sakura. She could look nothing but baffled as the lad asserted that she had her own friends. According to Charles if they weren't friends then he had a huge problem with everything they'd done since meeting. Sakura gave that some thought, looking truly perplexed why did it matter what they'd done so far? All those things were done simply as a matter of her own curiosity, there was no altruistic motivation she wasn't being kind the entire time she was just doing what she felt like doing. Even if he took her actions as kindness was that truly enough to count as friendship? Beyond this he claimed that Anais and Astolfo also counted as friends. He claimed they would have objected to her coming along if they didn't. "I really don't understand..." the girl mentioned. "Friendship doesn't seem to be such an easily accessible thing... nothing in anything I've done nor my motivations likely count as friendly so how have I made friends?" she asked truly not grasping this concept at all. Maybe it needed more study, or perhaps there was some nuance to her previous actions that she didn't understand? That was at least sensible. Social cues were often missed by her so she could be very much missing something.

As they walked Charles took a trip down his own memories. He recalled training in this place being much harder on him than it was even in Aincrad. He qualified this statement by claiming it was odd since a few of his friends were combative monsters. Strangely there was a fair explanation for why he might feel that way. "It actually makes a lot of sense that you might feel that way," she said carefully. "You were here when you were much younger and less experienced. The gap between those you trained with here and things you were doing was much greater than it could be after you were an established adventurer and Holy Knight. Experience builds upon itself and bodies can hold memories. So as your body gained experience it was less stressful on you, regardless of the monstrousness of your newer experiences," she said. She smiled then, "Wu-papa is good at explaining that kind of thing, combat difficulty is at least partly a thing of underdeveloped instincts, as those grow it becomes easier to fight and move, so it shouldn't be too weird that you found fighting here much more difficult than fighting in Aincrad," she finished.

It came as no surprise that Sakura lacked an understanding of friendship. Just the same, Charlemagne expected her to fall short of understanding how she had friends now. How had she managed? The answer was easy to Charlemagne, and probably easy to the others he figured saw Sakura as a friend. "I hate to tell you, but you're wrong. Friendship is that easy. Maybe you view a friend as someone you know for a long time, have a lot in common with, and build a lot of memories with. It's not that complicated. Sometimes, a friend can be someone who was just in the right place at the right time. Friends can be made in a single moment over one tiny little thing. It doesn't even matter why you did anything. You were there when we were all in a strange place, not knowing who to trust... and you made yourself trustworthy. That's all it takes," he chattered.

Moving on, there was a minor misunderstanding about something else Charlemagne said. Sakura claimed he was experiencing less difficulty after moving to Aincrad due to his own growth, but his intention wasn't at all to speak of difficult or stressful training. "I get what you're saying, but it's not like that. I don't mean it was tougher here; I mean I worked harder. Every day, I was getting up to make myself better. It just felt more... right. All the training felt like it was worth it, so I kept pushing myself more than I ever have since. If anything, the stress has actually gone up because of people like Ren, who is one of the more battle-thirsty friends I have at Aincrad. Fun to fight, terrible to be on the 'exciting to fight' list of. Liv is similar, but... different."

Charles being the kind of person he was, went on to explain friendship to Sakura and she spent the moments he spoke processing his words. She was wrong, that was fine she could learn and understand. Friendship is easy? That didn't make sense. He gave a few hypothetical and direct examples of how and why friends could be made. Even for the case he listed with potentially himself, Anais and Astolfo apparently she'd simply been in the right place and trustworthy. That truly didn't make sense in the mind of Sakura at all, there was no real logic applied to it the way that Charles explained it. Maybe she was thinking about it all too hard, maybe she was giving too much credit. That seemed likely, "That isn't logical at all. Is friendship illogical?" she questioned this as if it was outrageous. She began to quickly run though what she understood and it would come out as a rambling dissertation of understanding. "Friendship is part of people's every day lives and it doesn't even have to make sense to anyone involved in it," she started seeming to think about it a bit more only to continue. "The continued existence of humanity baffling," she stated in the most alien way she'd said anything. "Friendship doesn't make sense. People don't seem to understand natural biological functions, they let emotions get in the way of their normal thought processes, their ability to solve problems isn't based in logic or even completely on instinct. It is like they are randomly put together and told to do stuff and they may or may not be able to accomplish it," she murmured. She was curious about people and wanting things to make sense but it seemed that intellect and feelings didn't necessarily mix and that half of human life was spent randomly? Yes, that sounded right. "Yet, they are happy, confused, excited, strong-willed, and oddly aligned..." she finished. None of that was negative and would eventually culminate in a single idea. "Humans are weird."

Sakura's understanding of people was being expanded upon all the time. She was always willing to learn though she was admittedly confused by most of what she'd learned in the last few days. Watching Charles and his friends interact at varying degrees of animosity was strange, what was more she wasn't quite sure she understood the distinction between friends and enemies. Apparently though, Charles didn't think his life was tougher here, just that he had a different attitude and mindset while being here. Sakura could surprisingly understand that with relative ease. "Self-gratification and marked or noticeable improvements are easier to understand. I get that..." she said. "It sounds like it was fun," she summarized. He apparently had a friend he called Ren who was battle-thirsty and a friend called Liv who behaved similarly but different. "Those people sound interesting, how are they different?" she wondered. "And is the Ren one just looking for a challenge because that is pretty normal when people like fighting, it's motivational," she said seeming to understand the basics of such mindsets.

Charlemagne was incapable of understanding why Sakura thought friendship should be logical. At its base, it was an emotional thing, and there was little to no logic in emotions. Why did she think it had to make sense as a study? "I might have a way to help ease you into it," he said just after the girl's rambling. "I swore myself to Angie, but I still did what I did with you, even after it wasn't necessary to keep myself alive. What logical reason would I have to break a promise?" he wondered. Though it could be stated that the vow itself was illogical in this world, there was more to Charlemagne's point. "And even if the promise itself was illogical the way you see it, why would I make it? It's simple. There's no need to care about what makes sense and what doesn't. Why are you goddesses so happy when someone sees the things you've made? You already know what you're capable of, right? Why do you need validation to be satisfied? That sounds like an emotional response to me," he concluded.

Humans were weird. Goddesses, too, were weird. Matters of perspective aside, there was surely no one who could claim the likes of Renaud and Olivier were anything but bloodthirsty. Ah, but Sakura wanted to know how the two were different. That one wasn't so easy to explain. "Mostly... Renaud is a relaxed guy when he's not fighting, and occasionally a little crazy when he is in a fight. Olivier... sometimes seems more like it's her goal not to fight someone, but to keep them 'beneath' her, if that makes sense. They're two different types of dominant, and two different types of frightening. But... they're both incredible combatants," he explained as best he could. "And yes, Ren is looking for a challenge because he just wants to improve. He's a pretty stand-up guy if you can look past the maniac on the surface. Liv too, really."