I’ve gotten so used to passively messing around with my inventory that it’s probably not granting me progress in anything anymore, but I notice I’ve been doing it almost subconsciously. It strikes me that I should at least be riding around on my largest walking stick. I could be wrapping it in as much cushion and as many vines as possible, rather than just trying to maintain flotation with no aid. If I recall, it floated pretty well even when saddled with all the weight and mass I could muster. If I don’t place quite as much on it, I should be able to ride it for a while at least.

I try to use my inventory to tie the extra leathery leaves in such a way that there’s a bit of sideways room, and cushioning for my head, so that my head floats higher than the rest, and I can keep Lil above water. Laying back, I let my eyes droop while drifting downriver lazily, the occasional jostling becoming an expected mundane part of the experience. I’m barely even startled at all with each bump. Less and less do I react to smacking into the river’s edge, or protruding stones, and eventually I feel myself napping slightly.

This continues for over a week, as we lazily float down the river. When not in the river, during times where we occasionally wake to eat our fish meals, Lil and I mostly stay contemplatively silent as we ruminate on the events of our travels. Though we also make certain to gather as many useful materials as possible, mostly the leathery leaves, sticks, vines, and the like. We only spend ten or so hours a day in the water so that we don’t get sick, and to leave us enough time to gather supplies and dig our dugouts while still getting a long sleep. I’m not sure we can get sick, I just feel ill from all the time spent in the odd-tasting water. Leaving our latest dugout behind, we hop into the river once more, and soon I’m snoozing on my makeshift raft. A single stick raft. Who’da thunk?

I awaken when I start finding myself submerged more and more, sputtering for breath. For some reason I’m less buoyant, or my single stick raft is less buoyant. It almost feels like there’s something towing us under, drawing us downwards. I gasp and spin around to make sure Lil is still in my hood, though of course I can feel Lil’s tail grasping my shoulder. The swamp scenery has given way to sparse palm trees under a brightly lit sky. Still no sun of course, but an entirely different lighting than the swamp biome. The source of light is vague at best, though few clouds dot the skyline. I flail towards shore, dragging Lil and myself atop it to landfall. Summoning my makeshift flotation device to my inventory, I try to make sense of my surroundings.

I spin around, probably too quickly, as I reorient myself. The river flows in a direction that’s still probably mostly southward, at least, as close as I can call any direction, as there are no celestial bodies to orient myself against. I peer back upriver, and see darker splotches that are likely the denser swamp trees far in the distance. I suppose I could verify the direction with the magical compass orb, but that feels meaningless, since we’re oriented around the river itself anyway.

I rattle my brain as I ask my constant companion, “Where do you think we are Lil?”

Lil takes a whiff, then another, then several more before answering, “I smell something salty again, but a different saltiness.”

Scents, sometimes I forget they exist. Lil’s answer leaves me hopeful though as I surmise, “Oh? Maybe that means we’re close to an ocean. If we find a shore, well, traveling around it is our best chance of finding anyone else who set up a society or civilization, I think.”

Lil jubilantly asks, “Why’s that?”

“I think that, well, when creatures, people I guess, collectively start to survive together, they tend to orient near water, and maybe, um.” I try to think about what my preconceived notions about the history of civilizations are, finding it more difficult than I thought it would be. It feels like the mysterious knowledge I had is harder and harder to access on-demand, though the whole of it still exists, it’s hard to dig through the knowledge to find specific bits that I want to know or remember.

I simply hazard a guess, “I think that, um, when people have enough to sustain them, they start to have more free time to think, and create, and desire. So when they want things, they have to be able to offer things. So trade revolves around water, maybe because it’s easier to move things on water?”

Lil raises what could be considered an eyebrow on their scaled face, “Like with us just floating down the river?”

I shake my head, but think better of it, “Well, kind of, but rafts and ships can hold a lot of weight and move it with almost no effort.”

“Can’t your inventory magic do that already?” Lil makes an excellent point.

I’m flummoxed as I ramble, “Oh, oh yeah, I guess anyone who finds some bags can just haul things around. Well in that case, ships and boats can take a lot of people who each have a lot of things. Hopefully. otherwise people might not live anywhere that would make sense to me, and my assumptions could possibly never lead us to anyone else.” I pout as a result of my own rambling.

Lil’s textual tone drops at least a level of joy as they further question the situation, “What happens if we follow the shore forever? And what if there’s no one in all that time?”

My face adopts a grimace as I try not to imagine a vast empty world with nothing but hostile creatures, relying on Lil and my space skill for survival against terrifying beasts like Octorochi. Trying to distract myself, I answer more about math, possibly accidentally condescendingly, “Well, hopefully the land we’re on isn’t infinite in size, eventually we should come back around to the same location. Normally when someone walks along the edge of a land mass, well, it’s a shape, and the shore is, um, its perimeter. Like if you see a lone mountain, you can walk a circle around it, more or less, it might not be perfectly circular, but you get the idea.”

Lil nods along, perfectly aware of basic geometry and its terminology. They then press, “And if we don’t find anyone?”

I gnaw my bottom lip, almost not wanting to answer. I don’t want Lil to think I don’t value them enormously, “I don’t really know. I love our time together, and I guess we can just build whatever sort of life sounds fun to us, maybe?”

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Lil’s effervescence returns as they reply, “I like that idea. I liked it when we were in our baked mud holes, they felt cozy.”

Grateful for Lil’s exuberance, and the change of topics, I nod, happily agreeing, “We could do that again, but do it above ground maybe, in case of flooding. I think I understand the basics of how to do some sort of construction of buildings. I know triangles are important for some reason, and perpendicular surfaces offer support. There’s something about distribution of weight, but I don’t know if that all applies here, or if things just have some sort of energy or health value, and don’t need to worry about physics.”

Lil chews their tongue as they ask, “What’s the best way to find out?”

Huh. What is the best way to find out? Have I experienced enough to understand physics in our world? What sort of observations should I have been keeping track of? It’s probably best to tackle a specific subject in an isolated way to understand it. I hazard, “I guess if we go back to our pond some day, we can try a few building types, one where we’re intentionally bad at construction, like balancing a whole house on top of a single stick or something, maybe not quite that ridiculous, but it shouldn’t be too hard to test.”

Lil hops atop my head and bounces, seemingly trying to catch as much air as possible to view into the distance. “Reggie, I think I see something massive and sparkling.”

Furrowing a brow and raising the other, I try to parse Lil’s meaning, “Massive and sparkling?”

Lil’s jubilant as they bounce about during their response, “Like, the entire rest of the world just shines.”

Confused, I continue walking downstream in the direction Lil had been looking, eventually I spot what must be an ocean on the horizon line, then it clicks.

“Oh, oh that’s the ocean Lil, yeah the water is really reflective I suppose.” I swear I see massive loops breaking the surface of the water in some nearly endless distance, far, far away. The idea that there are sea serpents large enough to be viewed from miles away terrifies me. “Here there be dragons” indeed. Another mysterious memory, something to do with maps, mapping or cartography and exploration. Here though it could very well be literal. Actually I’m not certain it wasn’t literal in my memories.

Trying to distract myself from potential terror, and possibly infinite loneliness of an empty world, I admit to Lil, “Lil, buddy, the more I think about it, the more I just want to go back to the pond and build a home with you, what do you say after we get to the shore, we just take a look around for one day, then go back?”

While chewing their tongue, Lil nods, “I’d like that Reggie, if I’m being honest, I’m so far from anywhere I’ve ever been before, that if I weren’t grouped up with you, I think I’d be running day and night to get back home.”

My eyes flash wide with understanding and agreement, “Yeah, I have this weird fear type feeling in the pit of my stomach, I guess this is what they call homesickness.”

Lil jokingly asks, “Homes can make you sick?”

I take the question seriously anyway, “Hm? Oh, no, no nothing like that. I think it’s a, well, a mental thing, psycho somatic or something like that. Words that I think mean brain, and feeling or something like that. Basically your brain is used to something, and misses it, and that longing is somehow such a bad feeling emotionally, that you also feel bad physically.”

Lil playfully pouts as they insult the idea, “Well that’s dumb.”

“Uh, what?” I can’t say I’m not confused by the direction their tone is taking.

Lil goes on a silly tangent, I barely realize they’re joking, “My brain, it’s dumb, why would it do that to me?”

Finally starting to catch on to the humor, I respond, “Oh, I mean, well honestly I have absolutely no idea why we feel the things we do. It’s not like it’s a thing trying to hurt you.”

“I’m just being silly I guess, but you feel the same way right now? Like you want to go home?” Lil’s response begins to allow me to laugh, admitting their silliness, then sobers me up rather swiflty.

I frown and glance away, “Yeah, I know it’s probably silly, since anywhere is as good as any other place while we have supplies, and we have a ton of supplies, but I guess it’s, um, what’s the word. There’s a word that means, uh, illogical. Well I guess that would suffice. A brain doesn’t necessarily process feelings logically, or something, I guess. You might get somewhere and feel homesick just when you arrive, or you might feel jealous that someone else has something, even though you can have it too, things like that. Feelings are complicated. There are some that I have that I have to avoid.”

Lil seems confused, perhaps not understanding I’m hinting about my panic attacks, “Some feelings you have to avoid?”

I nod, trying to clue them in, “Yeah, well, memories, whenever I start to think of certain things I just freeze up, really badly.”

Lil’s eyes spark with recognition, “Oh, oh, I’ve seen you do that, you look like you’re so far away.” They suddenly appear saddened as they recall the times I’ve fallen into panic.

“Yeah, yeah, I probably am.” I feel my heart racing as our topic draws closer to a certain memory, but I rattle my brain pan by shaking my head quickly to bring my focus back to what is right in front of me.

I notice my toes sifting through warm, soft, smooth sand, and realize the last vestiges of the swamp are behind us. We’re essentially on a tropical beach, though a massive one. I just had a thought. This beach may be more massive than I’d ever seen, but it’s literally the first ocean beach I’ve ever seen, so yet again I have no frame of reference.

I imagine gravity rotating about ninety degrees, and Lil and I just falling forward towards the horizon, hurtling towards those terrifying shapes somewhere far in the distance along the surface of the ocean, thankfully it doesn’t happen. Catching my breath, I try to ground myself, literally sinking my feet into the sand and relishing the warmth. I flop backwards, reaching back to flip my hood up and launch Lil into the air as I land on my butt with one arm behind my head. I lay back into the sand as I catch Lil with my other arm.

“Wha, huh, woah!” Lil exclaims in surprise at being tossed.

I smile widely into Lil’s eyes, “Heh, sorry Lil buddy, I just feel like taking in the moment.”

They appear quizical about my turn of phrase, “Taking in the moment?” It’s almost as if they expect me to be talking about actually consuming time. Perhaps for some sort of time skill rather than a space skill.

I shake my head as I respond, “Just enjoying right now, how good we have it at this second, while we’re safe, and warm, in a beautiful location.” If they were actually confused by the possibility of me manipulating time, I can at least assure them that’s not what I meant.

“Oh, oh cool! Whew!” Lil bounces on my chest a moment before bunching down and cuddling against the leaf-leather armor. I can’t help but smile at how pure and jubilant Lil can be, with virtually nothing for inspiration.

I mumble quietly, “Love you Lil buddy.”

“Love you too Reggie.” Comes Lil’s reply, almost automatically, I close my eyes with a contented half smile, resting my head on one hand, while my other hand sits atop Lil’s head, stroking and patting gently.

Speaking about time, rather, thinking about it earlier, I wonder if time will pass, or if the light in the sky will dim at all. Keeping my eyes half lidded, relaxing with Lil for hours on end seems to make no difference to the light in the sky. Noticing no changes, and hearing our stomachs rumbling, I sit up, jostling Lil while I hold them up to place them on my head. I start summoning some of the usual food from my inventory as we continue walking, well, while I continue walking. Lil gets to be lazy by hanging out on my head, as I continue walking towards the shoreline. I swear I see objects dotting the shoreline, like giant seashells, as if they were set up to resemble huts or buildings. Continuing walking for several hours, getting hungry yet again, I pull more food out of my inventory for Lil and myself, and that’s when I notice them, moving figures from afar closing the distance almost in unison.