Talking to Nephele

Nephele's home screen is a conversation. Unlike an ordinary chatbot, Nephele doesn't just reply with text—it actually operates your computer: opening a browser to search for images, organizing your Eagle library, batch-packaging your work, running Python scripts to process files.

This page isn't about how it works under the hood—it's about how you actually use it once the app is open.

Working with the interface

One input box, manual tier selection

The main input lets you manually pick a model tier (like choosing a model in ChatGPT). Just type what you want to do into the home input box:

1. Axioma Zephyr (fast tier, default) — Billed at half rate; runs the full Agent loop, calls tools, streams over SSE. Use it for everyday analysis, creation, and multi-step tasks.
2. Axioma Tempest (full-power tier) — Billed at full rate; runs the same full Agent loop. Switch to it for hard reasoning, reviews, and style analysis.
3. Rule engine (local · zero latency) — Explicit commands like "open Photoshop" or "open the Downloads folder" run directly, without going through AI, without a network call, and without spending any credits.

Both tiers are billed in Nepheline (drawing from stamina first, then Nepheline). Light "how do I use this" questions can go to the separate, free Guide channel (the "?" in the top-right of the toolbar, see below) — no billing, no stamina, fails open.

In the top-right of the toolbar there's also a "?" guide assistant you can ask "how does this feature work" at any moment—it's driven by a lightweight lite model, it's free, and when it can't answer or you want to go deeper it carries your exact words and "escalates" to the full Agent (Tempest tier). More on that below.

Dragging images onto the input box

Drag an image file straight onto the input box and a 60×60 thumbnail appears. Click the × in its top-right corner to remove it. PNG, JPG, JPEG, WEBP, BMP, and GIF are supported.

The dropped image is sent to the Agent as an attachment alongside your text. For example, drag in an image and ask "write me a caption suited for posting on Pixiv," and Nephele will generate the content based on that image.

Stopping generation

While Nephele is producing output, a stop button (a square icon) appears at the right of the input box. Click it and the current stream is interrupted, showing "[Stopped]".

The Skill system: why Nephele can "understand" your intent

You may have noticed that the same instruction sent to different AIs gives wildly different results. Nephele's secret isn't a smarter model—it's Skills.

What a Skill is

A Skill is a plain-text file (SKILL.md) that describes in natural language "when the user says X, here's what you should do." It isn't a plugin, it needs no installation, and it involves no code—it's essentially a "work manual" for the AI.

A Skill looks like this:

---
name: find-references
description: 找参考图
tools: [find_references, find_similar_by_image]
keywords: [参考图, 找图, 灵感, 搜图, 风格参考, Pixiv, 以图搜图]
---
 
## Decision tree
 
- 关键词 → 调用 find_references（Pixiv+Eagle 并行）
- 图片 → 调用 find_similar_by_image（Eagle 视觉相似度）
- Pixiv 标签必须用日文：初音未来 → "初音ミク"，赛博朋克 → "サイバーパンク"

When you say "find me some mecha references," Nephele will:

1. Load a Skill: a keyword hit on "reference" fast-loads find-references — and even when your phrasing matches no keyword, the AI can recognize the right skill from its catalog and pull it in on its own
2. Inject the prompt: drop that Skill's full strategy into the AI's system prompt
3. Execute: the AI not only knows which tools to call, it also knows to use Japanese for Pixiv tags and not to search with Chinese

Built-in Skills

There are six built-in Skills right now:

trace-artwork-origin has a thoughtful design: if you drop in an image and ask "who drew this," Nephele looks at the image first—if it recognizes the character or art style, it tells you for free; only when it really can't tell, or when you want a specific URL, does it call a paid reverse image search engine. Not to save money, but to avoid spending it for nothing.

Where Skills come from

Nephele loads Skills from three sources, in order of priority from high to low:

1. Cloud push (remote) — delivered through remote config, with no action needed from you. A same-named Skill overrides the two layers below. Good for emergency strategy fixes or pushing new capabilities.
2. User custom — C:\Users\<username>\.nephele_workshop\skills\ (or the corresponding user directory on your platform). A same-named Skill overrides the built-in one.
3. Built-in — the skills/ folder that ships with the app.

Want to write your own? No files needed — Toolbox → Custom Workflows lets you create and edit them in place; saving takes effect immediately, and you invoke yours with / in the chat box. See Custom Workflows.

Coming up: a UGC Skill marketplace

We're planning a Skill marketplace. You'll be able to share the SKILL.md files you write with other illustrators, and download ones others have written—like "Pixiv operations strategy," "Comiket exhibitor checklist," or "a guide to analyzing a specific art style."

The beauty of a Skill is that it doesn't depend on coding ability. Can't program? No problem—as long as you can describe your own workflow, you can write a useful Skill.

Cloud mode (the full Agent): what it can actually do

This is Nephele's full form. What's listed below is already implemented in the code and can actually be called.

Searching for references

You can just say:

• "Search Pixiv for some cyberpunk illustrations"
• "Find Japanese-style character design references on Pinterest"
• "Search Eagle for images tagged 'mecha'"

Nephele opens the built-in browser, runs the search, and returns the results as image cards in the conversation. You can check off the ones you want and save them to your computer or to Eagle with one click. If you're not happy with the results, just keep going: "show me a different batch" or "only vertical compositions."

Boundaries: Pixiv search goes through a cloud node; Pinterest, ArtStation, and Huaban go through your own Edge browser via the Nephele Wisp browser extension (the extension must be online—there's no Playwright fallback); Konachan, Eagle, and Wikimedia Commons are also available sources. By default it only searches your local Eagle library; network sources have to be specified explicitly. If the target site is unreachable or pops a CAPTCHA, the search may fail.

Find Similar (local Eagle)

Upload an image and say "find images in Eagle similar to this one," and Nephele uses the visual embeddings produced as a by-product of tagging to compute cosine similarity, layers in tag-overlap to rank, and returns the most similar assets in Eagle.

Prerequisites:

1. These images must first have been through library indexing (visual embeddings are written during tagging); the first indexing pass takes a few minutes
2. Only already-indexed images can be matched by Find Similar

Eagle asset management

• "Import every illustration-type image in the Downloads folder into Eagle"
• "Move the images tagged 'mechanical' in the 'references' folder to the 'mecha references' folder"
• "Batch-add the 'to evaluate' tag to this set of images"
• "Delete the duplicate images in Eagle"

Boundaries: imports are automatically tagged by the local tagging model (if the model is loaded). Batch operations involving large numbers of files can take a while, and Nephele will show progress.

Working on artwork

• "Review this image" — calls Creative Review, which gives a letter grade (S to E) by artwork type + three-part narrative feedback (what you nailed / what you could explore / what to try next time)
• "Check whether this image is AI-generated" — calls AI Credential Check, which scans EXIF/IPTC/generation-parameter fingerprints
• "Write me a caption suited for posting on Pixiv" — calls the multi-platform caption generation in Publisher
• "Add a watermark to this image and package it" — calls Watermark & Credit, which outputs a processed image
• "Issue a Digital Certification for this image" — calls Digital Certification

Boundaries: these tools need you to upload an image or specify a file path. Timestamping requires a network connection (a timestamp server). Packaging writes files to a specified directory.

Running Python scripts

• "Write a script that renames every PNG in the current folder by date"
• "Count how many images are in this folder"

Nephele generates the code and displays it on a dark code card. You must click Confirm before it runs. You can edit the code before it executes. This is a safety design—Nephele will never run any code without your knowledge.

Boundaries: the script is executed in a subprocess by a separate Python interpreter in isolated mode (-I, ignoring environment variables and user site-packages); it can access the file system and the Python libraries that ship with the app (PIL, numpy, onnxruntime, etc.). For irreversible operations like deletion, Nephele first lists everything and asks for a second confirmation before executing.

System shortcuts

• "Open Photoshop"
• "Open C:\Users\Artist\Downloads"
• "What's the weather today"

Simple commands like these don't go through AI; they run directly through the rule engine with near-zero latency.

Boundaries: opening an app relies on system path resolution—if the software is installed in an unusual location, it may not be found. A weather query opens the browser to a Bing search.

What it can't do (not even in the cloud)

• Can't directly upload work to platforms — Publisher only generates captions and tags; it doesn't actually upload
• Can't modify your artwork — Nephele has no drawing features and won't touch the contents of your PSD/CLIP files
• Can't bypass site logins — if a site like Pinterest requires login, Nephele can't handle it automatically
• Can't guarantee 100%-accurate AI detection — AI Credential Check relies on metadata, which can be tampered with

The guide channel: ask "how do I use this" for free

Not every question is worth invoking the full Agent. The guide channel is driven by a lightweight lite model, dedicated to handling light "how do I use the app" questions for free, without spending stamina (subject to a daily cap). It lives in the "?" at the top-right of the toolbar:

The toolbar "?" assistant

Click the "?" in the top-right of the toolbar to open a guide overlay. It has two ways to use it:

• Option-card flow (chips) — a set of preset guide cards, purely local, no AI call; whichever card you tap takes you down that path. Good for deterministic guidance like "I want to do X, where do I click first."
• Free input — just type your question and get a streamed answer. It knows which screen you're currently on, so the answer is "in context." When it can't answer, or you say "tell me more / do it for me," it carries your exact words and escalates to the full Agent (Tempest tier, asking you to confirm before escalating).

Consumption and limits

Stamina and Nepheline (cloud credits)

Nephele has two independent resource pools—don't mix them up:

Stamina

• A daily free allowance during the test period, refreshed automatically every day
• Used to try out cloud features, no payment required
• Stops when you've used it up for the day, recovers the next day

Nepheline (cloud credits)

• A paid resource pool, bundled with your license purchase (50,000 Nepheline) + top-up-able
• Purchased and bundled Nepheline share one pool and never expire; when the license lapses only cloud AI features are disabled (local features keep working) — your Nepheline isn't wiped and is restored on renewal
• The test period (including the current Beta) keeps the daily free allowance; the free policy will change after the full release, per the announcement at that time

What is and isn't consumed:

• Shortcut commands handled by the rule engine: zero consumption
• Light questions answered on the spot by the guide channel: free, no stamina deducted (subject to a daily cap)
• Requests that enter the full Agent (cloud tier): billed in cloud credits; multi-turn tool tasks cost more

Tool-call limit

The full Agent runs at most 20 tool calls per message. Beyond that it wraps up automatically. This is a hard limit, to prevent accidental consumption and infinite loops.

Context window

The full Agent (both the Zephyr and Tempest tiers) has a 1M-token context that usually won't overflow. Single-output is capped at 8192 tokens—a guardrail against runaway consumption, not a ceiling on the model's capability.

Large-result compression

If a tool returns a very large raw result (say, a reverse search or a batch of references), the server first uses a lightweight model to compress it into the factual summary the main model needs to make decisions, then feeds that to the full Agent. Compression keeps only the key information (failure reasons, source trustworthiness, the next blocking point, etc.) to prevent long text from blowing out the context window. If compression fails, the raw result is kept and the conversation isn't interrupted.

FAQ

Q: Why does Nephele sometimes run the same tool repeatedly?

If a tool returns an error, Nephele will try to correct it and run again. But if it runs the exact same tool call twice in a row, the loop terminates automatically to prevent it from getting stuck.

Q: Do simple questions deduct from my credits?

No. Explicit shortcut commands go through the local rule engine at zero consumption; light "how does this feature work" questions are answered for free by the guide channel, with no stamina deducted. Only requests that genuinely need the Agent to do work (the Zephyr / Tempest tiers) are billed in Nepheline.

Q: How much can I do without the cloud AI?

The vast majority of things. Nephele embeds several local AI models (auto-tagging, Find Similar, cross-lingual semantic search); tagging, indexing, image search, semantic retrieval, watermarking, timestamping, rights enforcement, and file processing all run on your own computer and work offline. AI Credential Check relies on locally parsing image metadata/credentials (not cloud inference), so it also works offline. What needs a network connection is mainly Agent capabilities like natural-language conversation with Nephele (having it plan tasks, call tools, search the web).

Q: Can I have multiple conversations open at once?

Yes. In the session-history panel that slides out on the left, click "New session" to start a new conversation. History isn't shared between sessions.

Q: Does Nephele save my chat history?

Conversation history is saved in a local database and isn't uploaded to a server. But cloud-mode AI inference does pass through Axioma's servers—that's a necessary condition for using cloud features.