Silene was laying in a blanket inside the watermill, mumbling protests in her sleep.

In her dreams, those protests were a bit louder.

---

Silene was standing on a large ship, a larger version of the one they once made for class, and Hana was approaching her wearing an admiral’s outfit.

“Silene, Lilith and Malena have fallen overboard. I need you, Jatte, and Ethen to go looking for them.”

Silene frowned. “I was just with ops organizing supplies and going over distribution though. I’m not one of the fighters. Besides, there’s a play that’s going to happen in a few hours.”

Hana glared back with fire in her eyes. “They’re you’re friends Silene. I thought you of all people would want to help save them. You really think some play is more important? No, you’re getting on that rescue boat right now!” She pointed.

Silene shrank back and looked where hana was pointing. There was a smaller rowboat connected by some rope that Jatte and Ethen were already sitting in, and some guy was already holding a crank to lower it.

She frowned and thought for just a moment. While it was unfortunate that she would miss a moment with the community she loved, Hana was right: her friends’ lives were more important.

So, she sighed, walked over, and sat in the boat beside Jatte and Ethen. Once she was settled, the guy lowered them all into the water. And once the boat’s bottom touched the ocean, Ethen started rowing away.

And he kept rowing, and rowing, and rowing, until the sun rose and set a few times. Eventually, the main ship was so far away that it was a dot in the distance, until she lost sight of it. But in looking around for it, the flowers she always kept in her hair dropped out and landed in the water. She reached out to grab them, but they were already too far away, so she readied herself to dive in after them.

But Jatte caught her arm. “What are you doing?”

“They’re my flowers,” Silene said, pointing.

“Yeah, they’re just flowers,” Jatte said. “We don’t know what’s in the water and we don’t know if you’ll be pulled away from the boat. Just going in is a risk.”

“What about Ethen?” Silene asked.

Ethen paused rowing, set aside the oars, and flew over. But by then the flowers had already sank somewhere underwater. “Sorry, I can’t find them anywhere”

Silene frowned. However, Jatte had been right earlier: They were just flowers.

They meant something to her though, which was why she was still scanning the waves for them.

She vividly remembered the time she was standing in front of a man by his farm as he put them in her hair. His cart full of vegetables was filled to the brim besides him because of her magic, and this was his thanks: in his free time he’d already known how to whittle, and now he turned to cutting and staining textiles, until he had a perfect fake flower for her.

She remembered his words as he slid the flower into her hair, “This isn’t just from me. You helped my brother’s family too. I don’t think it’s right that you spend all this time helping us out with magic, and you have to go home to live with that grouch. He’s not doing anything, is he?”

She shook her head, but she now realized she misunderstood his meaning. He was asking her if her father had done anything wrong to her, but she answered that no, he’d done nothing at all. Her father wouldn’t even speak to her now, and barely put effort into feeding her.

She remembered the ceilings of different houses as she escaped her home to other places that gave her food and attention.

And just like then, she sighed and laid down in the boat. But she was here to help her friends, not rest, so turned back to the others in the boat to look around more. Unfortunately, this tore her ornate green dress on a jagged splinter that happened to be poking out.

She clenched her teeth. That dress was also a gift to her from the community, a gift that came to define her as a person, and now she’d gone and ruined it all.

She moved the torn part of the dress over the water to see her reflection and how bad it was, but she caught the face of a plain black haired girl in a normal green dress that she didn’t recognize. No, it was her, but it was from so long ago.

The image was momentarily broken as the dissected corpse of a large fish floated by, another thing she remembered from a long time ago.

Silene closed her eyes and took a calming breath, but when she opened them, she was no longer in the boat. She was a child, looking down at the dissected fish near her old back porch.

It had been easy to get. Her father wasn’t paying attention to her much since he’d started dragging his feet and getting distracted after her mother never came back from a short trading trip, and fish sometimes beached themselves. All she had to do was jog out to the beach and drag back the already dead fish. And even though her family didn’t farm animals, no one seemed to question it.

She did it because, In his neglect, she had to go to her mother’s bookshelf to find books to cure her boredom, and one of those books had been on biology, including many ideas on why animals were the way they were. One even included instructions on dissection and the reasoning behind many of the different organs it found. However, it was limited, and only detailed cattle. But the dissection itself was one of the few things she could try from the books that didn’t involve wandering into the dangerous wilds or waiting weeks for plants to grow. And besides, she was curious: Were fish the same? Were other animals the same?

With the organs, skin, and skeleton of the fish organized in front of her, she was able to answer that no, fish were not the same. This one had a much smaller digestive system, was missing some organs, and had organs the cattle didn’t have. However, it was mostly the same, which was interesting.

But then her dad walked over to check on her. “Hey, Silene, sorry I’ve been--” He stopped.

Young Silene turned back to look at him, the fish’s blood still all over her hands and body.

He shuddered, stepped back inside, then turned and ran into his bedroom.

Silene was back in the boat again as the fish drifted away. She frowned, because she hated that she could understand it all now. Her father was already traumatized when he lost his wife, and while it was bad that he neglected her, she could at least understand it. Then, looking down at someone that looked so similar to the one he lost pervert her image with such an act... It must’ve put him right back in his old state.

But he stayed in that state for too long, which was why the community had to help her, and that was why she was reaching to her hair for comfort, where the flower would’ve been, as she looked out of the boat.

She was confused now. She’d done the right thing, going to help Lilith and Malena, but it cost her everything that made her who and what she was. Who was she now?

---

Silene woke up, shook her head as her dream cleared, and got out of her blanket. Ethen and a few others had already woken up and started working, by the looks of their empty blankets, so she should too. They needed to stay safe from Solis and survive the winter, so a moment lost could mean the difference between life and death, and she couldn’t dwell on some dream.

She walked around the dragon egg and Hana resting beside it, avoided a pot of warm water, and looked through a line of books on a new bookshelf in the watermill, then picked out one from one of her agriculture classes. She remembered it had a few notes on weeds that could invade, and that the care instructions could be useful for ‘weeds’ or non farmed plants too.

She opened that up, flipped through, and started making a checklist. A few of the ‘weeds’ had notes saying you could cook them as spices, and those definitely went into the checklist since they wouldn’t be poisonous. There was nothing about ‘sap turning into a bouncy substance’ like Lilith wanted, but no one was really checking for that in the first place.

She closed the book and put it in her backpack, then walked over to a giant pile of glass vials Lilith made yesterday and scooped those all into her backpack. After that, she turned and opened the door, then walked out to the front of the cave, where Ethen was waiting.

“Ready?” He asked.

“Yep,” Silene said.

Ethen was about to grab her to start flying, but Silene avoided it and moved to the edge of the river instead, then crouched and jumped all the way over.

“Was that magic?” Ethen raised an eyebrow as he floated over.

“Yep.” Silene smiled. “I’d like to walk through the forest on my own today. I’ll tell you if I need a lift.”

Ethen nodded.

Silene walked up to the nearest tree, pulled out a thin knife, then stabbed into it. After that, she pushed a small spigot into the hole she made, and pulled out a vial to let the sap fall into. She stood there for a while as the sap slowly came out.

It took a few seconds for the first drop to come out, and even more for the second. It was a brownish fluid that trailed into the vial.

“This really takes a while,” Ethen commented as he laid against a nearby tree.

“Yeah, it tends to.” Silene sighed.

“Would it hurt anything if I tried pulling the sap out with my magic?” Ethen asked.

Silene paused, then shrugged. “Even if it does, this is a pretty common tree, so go ahead.”

Ethen stepped forward, then held his hand up to the tree and searched around with his magic. In a few more seconds, the sap was coming out a bit faster. Now instead of one drop every couple of seconds, it was a few drops every second.

Once the bottom of the vial had ten or so drops of sap, Silene filled the next one, and then the next.

She was a bit surprised Ethen was so patient about all of this, just like he had been in her dream. A lot of adventurers were notoriously impatient, including Lilith, and the others in their group didn’t seem to have Ethen’s level of patience, maybe barring Hana. Ethen hadn’t really complained about how slow her work was until recently, and even she was annoyed at how long it was taking since they might need some of these things to survive.

“So, why are we collecting this stuff?” Ethen asked.

Silene put the stopper in the third vial, then moved towards the next tree. This one had a layer of slime throughout the canopy, and a few slimes nestled in the branches below the leaves. In order to support all the weight from that, it had a massive trunk, and the branches and leaves seemed more like beams holding up green table tops. “A lot of different reasons actually: Lilith wants something called ‘rubber’, which is apparently from boiled or dried sap. I remember some sap can be burned without much smoke, or eaten. Lilith’s mom wants more dyes, and sometimes sap can help with that too. Oh, and they might be able to attract or repel pests too, like this one.”

This time, instead of just stabbing into the tree, Silene quickly scooped up three vials of the slime, and then stabbed into the tree to get its sap.

Ethen was a bit distracted as he looked up at the slimes that jiggled a bit at their presence, but after a moment of hesitation, he again stepped forward and helped the sap come out more quickly.

“Oh, another thing Lilith wanted,” Silene said. “‘Antifreeze’. Supposedly, it’s something that keeps plants and animals from turning into ice. If anything has it, I imagine they’d live here in the colder parts of the mountains.”

“That would be pretty useful for the winter,” Ethen said. “Do you know where Lilith gets her crazy ideas by the way? I’ve never heard of rubber or antifreeze, and it doesn’t seem like her parents have either.”

Silene bent down and picked a few nearby flowers of nearly every different color and put them into her backpack one by one, making her way to a calm part of the river, which had a large flower with blue green stripes in a spiral towards its center. “Hmm… If I remember right, I think there was something weird about her entrance, ‘ancestor spirit’ or something. Maybe it’s like this stuff.” The river flower had a stalk of tiny fruits, which she took, and some liquid in its center filled with dead bugs. She filled a vial with the liquid, then held it up to Ethen.

“That stuff that was killing the bugs?” He raised an eyebrow.

Silene nodded. “This is a hallucinogen. It makes the bugs spasm until they can’t move so they get digested, but for us, we just see things for a while.”

“Who looked at a fluid filled with dead bugs and thought it was a good idea to taste it?” Ethen asked.

“Someone really hungry maybe.” Silene shrugged. “But some villages use this stuff as part of their celebrations. Maybe we should try that. If we find a way to figure everything out here, I think that deserves a celebration.”

Ethen nodded. “That makes sense. Not the part about the bug killer celebration fluid, but a party to mark the occasion. I don’t think we need to celebrate because we deserve it though, just that we’re all here, and it’s a turning point.”

Silene turned back. “Why not celebrate when we got something done?”

“Because then you’re just working for the sake of celebration,” Ethen said. “If you’re going to work, you should do it for the sake of the work.”

“I think most adventurers work so they can get paid,” Silene said, raising an eyebrow.

“They get paid for their work, but good adventurers, really any good workers, I don’t think they care about money or what they get out of it.” He glanced over to a giant mushroom he spotted. “I mean, what’s motivating you right now?”

“I want to see Lilith and the others happy… yeah.” Silene paused. “But I’m also curious what’s going to come from this sap, what color it will be, and I like having all these parts of nature near me.”

Ethen smiled. “Sounds like you like the work.“

Silene nodded. “By the way, let’s stay away from that mushroom. Maybe we can come back with Lilith’s scuba stuff, but I think that could be the reason those adventurers went crazy and attacked each other.”

Ethen nodded and backed away from the mushroom.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

But he stepped on something as he moved, and there was some chittering, then a rising screeching sound. They both turned and saw a small, colorful monkey peeking out of a thick bush. It looked at both of them for a few seconds before it jumped up to a nearby tree, climbed away, and screeched down at them.

“Bedbush,” Silene said, kneeling down and taking a few samples of the leaves and fruits. “This is even better than the healheart back in the cave. It doesn’t cure every disease, but it cures a lot of them. No one knows why, but animals, especially monkeys, tend to rest here, and the plant does better when more animals rest in it, especially if they’re injured.”

“Does it take their energy when they sleep?” Ethen raised an eyebrow.

Silene shook her head. “No. If anything, it takes something from their injuries.”

“Oh actually, wait, I think we have some of that back home,” Ethen said, smiling. “Yeah, those little guys would come in and try to make life hell for whoever kept them, so some guy challenged himself by trying to farm them and fend off all the pests himself.”

Silene smiled and shook her head. “And that’s why we don’t grow them. They attract pests more than anything else.”

---

Meanwhile, back in the cave, Lilith and Lilac were arguing as Malena wrote some notes down, and a nearby slime that wandered into the cave hopped towards the bugs over the river that blinked with light.

“Lilith, you need to stop this underwater base idea. It’s too cold. You’re going to freeze.”

Lilith shook her head, her light-lamp bobbing with her. “No, it’s fine, see?” She knelt down and stuck her finger into the river water. It was ice cold, so she shuddered, but then used her heat magic to heat it up.

“You used your magic just now, didn’t you?” Lilac asked.

“Er, maybe,” Lilith looked away. “But I can do that for myself and anyone else that goes in. And even if I’m not there, it’s not that cold. It’d just be unpleasant.”

“I don’t think you should use the same magic you use to heat metal to keep yourself warm.” Lilac glared. “That sounds like a way to permanently burn yourself the moment you lose concentration.”

Lilith shook her head. “I don’t think it works like that… but still, using magic isn’t really necessary. It’s just cold. We can handle a little bit of cold.”

Malena looked up and watched them argue, curious.

Lilac shook her head. “I don’t think anything can survive that cold for long.”

“Nah, it’ll be fine.” She spotted the nearby slime hopping around. “Ah, let’s do a canary in the coalmine test. If the slime is fine, we’ll probably be fine too.”

Lilac shrugged and watched as her daughter picked up the slime in her electrical magic and flung it into the river.

The slime struggled and bounced around a bit once it hit the water, trying to exit the river, before it was dragged to the lake at the end, where it still struggled.

“See, it’s still fine.”

After a few more frantic but slowing splashes, the slime stopped struggling and smacked against the wall at the end where the water went under. It bobbed against the end a few times with the current, seemingly lifeless.

“Huh.” Lilith stared at it as it bobbed a few more times, and then was dragged under.

“More psychopathic tendencies,” Malena muttered and made a note, then looked up. “I think Lilac’s right. The water might be a bit too cold.”

Lilith frowned at where the slime disappeared, then turned to the metal box she made. “Well, if we put enough of these, they should protect us from that, right?”

Lilac shook her head. “No Lilith, they’re metal. Metal conducts heat.”

Lilith sighed.”So no underwater base then?”

Lilac shook her head. “No. The river’s probably going to freeze over anyway. That either means that it freezes here too, or it goes down to nothing, and your underwater base will just be a box on the floor.”

Lilith rolled her head back. “Ugh. I wanted an underwater base. I had all these plans for airlocks and everything.”

“Well, just write them down,” Lilac said. “Who knows. They might be useful for something else.”

Lilith nodded.

Malena took out a few papers and held them out to Lilith. “Here, you can use these.”

“Thanks.” Lilith smiled and walked over. “You know, it’s been a while since I wasn’t actively building something or boiling stuff.”

“Well yeah,” Malena said. “You’re the reason we can sleep without freezing, and your inventions are, well, the reason I’m alive at least.”

“I know, I know.” Lilith gave a weary smile. “And I’m happy to do it.” She looked away. “I don’t like that so many of my projects are failing though.”

Malena shrugged. “I think you’re doing better than most researchers.”

---

“Ooh, a Titan Iris!” Silene walked up to the massive purple flower that was bigger than both of them, then scooped a few seeds from the stalk in the center into the vial, stabbed the stem and took some fluid out, and took a few chunks from the end of the flower off. “Maybe Lilith can use this to repair her clothes.”

“Maybe.” Ethen shrugged. “Is this flower also used for celebration?”

Silene shook her head. “No. It’s just rare.” She stood up, then ran over to a nearby tree with wood like vines wrapped around a hollow center. A few colorful birds flew out of a void in its center as she approached.. “Oh, I love these ones! Birdvine trees!”

Ethen stared at the bird droppings on the rotted wood inside the base of the tree. “Wow, brutal.”

“It is, isn’t it?” Silene stabbed another spigot into the tree. “It grows in the cracks of other trees, then takes them over.” She reached over and plucked some small nuts from a nearby branch, then looked up the mountain as the sap poured out. “I don’t think it’s as brutal as some of the other things I plan on getting though.” She turned back. “Do you still have space in your backpack?”

Ethen nodded, so she handed him the nuts.

Once they were done with that, Silene ran up the mountain, and Ethen flew by her side to keep up. They stopped at the trunk of a very tall tree next.

“Alright, now I’m gonna need a lift,” Silene said.

Ethen concentrated his magic around her and started to lift her.

“Er--” Silene panicked a little. “Can you carry me actually? It feels safer when there’s something holding me.”

“Sure.” He floated forward, put an arm around her midsection, then carried her up until he saw something that looked like a giant resting brown bat. “Uh, is that going to attack us?”

“No,” Silene shook her head. “That’s a seed. I mean, if it was the right season, it would unwrap those leaves and fly until it found a good place to drop itself, and then it might explode and dig some spikes into us… but it’s not in season.”

Both of Ethen’s eyebrows raised. “This tree is deadly.”

“Yep.” Silene plucked one of the seeds, and immediately, the leaves around it started to unfurl. “Uh, put this in your backpack, now.”

Ethen hastily took off his backpack and unzipped it, holding Silene in his magic only now, and shoved the head sized seed inside it. Then, he grabbed Silene, held the bag away, and concentrated with his magic. He could see that something had pulled up inside the seed with his magic sense, and now two fluids were mixing. It could explode at any moment, so he braced himself and tightened his magic around the thing. Then it cracked apart, and the fissures quickly spread to lines made to isolate the spikes until they all shot out. Several spikes shot through his backpack out the back, but none of them managed to get all the way to them.

“That was dangerous!” He turned to Silene.

She stared at the now hole filled backpack, wide eyed. “I-- I didn’t know they would do that! I thought it’d be fine! I mean, we eat these at lunch all the time!”

“I guess no one tried to pick them before they fell.” Ethen frowned at his backpack, then moved a few of the captured spikes around and put it back on.

“Sorry.” Silene shrank.

“It’s fine,” Ethen said, floating back down. “Now we know.” He floated forward, near some different trees, and touched down nearby.

Once he reached the ground, he lifted his foot, confused. It squished like he was steppin on some animal, but it was still white. And then he saw a few beads of red budding up from the snow, like it was bleeding.

“Snowblood fungus!” Silene bent down and took out a few more vials, scooping up the red beads. “Y’know, I think this might have the ‘antifreeze’ Lilith wants! I mean, the red stuff is a liquid, yet there’s snow around.” She put the vials in her backpack. “Oh, can you tear off a chunk? Don’t touch it though. I heard it tastes good, but also that anyone who eats it bleeds out, so I wouldn’t risk it.”

Ethen stepped back and hesitantly tore off a piece, then levitated it into his backpack into a different compartment. “Is my backpack poisoned now?”

“Probably not?” Silene shrugged, then turned to the nearby trees Ethen floated down by. “Anyway, here’s something I know will be useful, but you should stand back.”

Ethen looked at the next ‘tree’. It was white and fuzzy, like some animal made for the snow rather than a tree, and there was buzzing and humming as different bugs crawled around in the fur. “Yeah I’m fine with that. Are you going to be fine though?”

“Mhmm.” Silene stepped forward, then pulled out her knife, shaved off the fur, put some into her bag as the bugs fled. Several bugs landed on her and readied their stingers, but they fell to the ground before they could do anything, due to her bio magic.

After that, she did the usual routine with this tree, and a nearby one that had a trunk like black and white shattered glass, before she sealed her backpack. “Alright, time to head back.”

---

Once they were back in the adit, Ethen gave her his backpack and floated back to Malena for more orders, and Silene ran to the watermill to unload her stuff and put some of the bug-free white fuzz around the dragon egg, right by Hana. She had a lot of materials to work with now, but Lilith recommended she use a ‘fume hood’ or do it outside. Actually, she remembered she saw Lilith at the mouth of the cave.

She opened the door and walked back out, then walked over to Lilith who was laying against the wall by the entrance, staring off at the nature around them.

“Nice view, huh?” Silene said.

Lilith turned, then smiled. “Yeah.” But her smile faded quickly.

Silene raised an eyebrow. “Something up?”

Lilith shrugged. “I guess I’m a little exhausted. I’ve been using my magic and working on stuff for the past couple days without a break.” She frowned. “And, y’know, maybe I shouldn’t be saying this, so don’t tell the others, but I might be a little worried that it won’t be enough.” She held her arm.

Suddenly, Silene realized Lilith was holding her arm right where an arrow had been through it earlier. She had seen the injury, but everyone was panicking and Malena was giving so many orders that she forgot.

“Is that still injured? Let me help.” Silene grabbed Lilith’s arm around the injury and poured her bio magic into it.

“Oh, thanks.” Lilith relaxed as the magic flowed in. “I forgot about that.”

“How did you forget?” Silene raised an eyebrow. “Didn’t it hurt?”

Lilith nodded. “It ached all the time. I just ignored it.” She moved her other leg towards Silene. “Oh, this one too please!” She smiled.

Silene moved her other hand to the other arrow injury. “I don’t know if there’s anything we can do about it ‘not being enough’ though, so maybe we shouldn’t worry about it.”

“Maybe.” Lilith sighed. “But maybe I’m not seeing things quite right, and there is something I can do if I try harder.”

“Maybe.” Silene agreed. “We’re all doing work, but I guess we don’t know what everyone else figured out, except maybe Malena.” She frowned. “I think she’s overworking us a bit.”

Lilith frowned. “She’s doing her best.” She paused. “But maybe we could use a break. I’m out here after all.”

“Yeah.” Silene smirked. “Hey, it’s your mad scientist lair after all. Shouldn’t you be running it?”

Lilith didn’t respond. Instead, she stared off at the trees, thinking. Malena wasn’t doing a bad job, but there was one thing she sometimes complained about not understanding as a leader: morale. She could plan and strategize all she wanted, but no one on her side could keep up with her, even though people could somehow do harder work when she wasn’t the leader.

None of the people here were leaders. Even the adults weren’t. Cyla was still probably circling overhead since she couldn’t stay still for long, and her parents just wanted to work on their own stuff even if they were really helpful. And now, despite Malena’s leadership, Jatte seemed stressed, Hana seemed depressed, and even Lilith herself was overworked.

“Maybe I should be,” Lilith finally said.

Silene smiled. “Ooh, what are you going to do to lead your lair then?”

Lilith turned to her. “You like plays, right? Or dances? I feel like we need that, especially Jatte and Hana. Although, I think we’ve been a bit harsh on Hana. She hasn’t left the adit for the last two days. She’s just been by her egg.”

Silene stared. Lilith was being more serious than she expected.

Lilith gently pulled Silene’s hands away from her injuries, then stood up. “Let’s get Jatte and Hana, take a walk, and plan something.”

They both walked back into the cave, then made their way into the watermill. Inside was Hana and the egg by the still warm pot of water Lilith boiled to keep them all through the night.

“Hey Hana,” Lilith said.

Hana opened her eyes and stared up. “What’s up?”

“Do you know where Jatte is?”

Hana looked around, then pointed. “Looks like she’s patrolling with Ethen again.”

Lilith frowned. “Well, hmm. I need her, but they still need to be in pairs.” She thought for a second. “My dad put a lot of work into that gun, so maybe they could hang out together and Ethen can show him how he uses it.”

“You’ll need Malena’s approval,” Hana said.

“I’ll tell her,” Lilith said, then reached down for Hana’s hand and pulled her up.

“Huh?” Hana blinked.

---

“Oh hey Lilith.” Malena looked up.

Lilith’s parents looked up too. William was drawing something out and writing down equations, while Lilac was patching up some clothes. They were all lit by a white gas discharge lamp and battery Lilith made earlier.

“Hey,” Lilith said. “I need Jatte for something, so I was thinking: Dad, why don’t you hang out with Ethen, since you helped make his gun, and mom, can you guard Hana’s egg? She needs to get out some.”

Lilac nodded, but William looked unsure.

“Isn’t Ethen guarding?” He asked. “I don’t have anything to guard with.”

Lilith nodded. “Ethen can protect you. And maybe he can show you how to use the gun.”

“You really want me to use that thing, don’t you.” William smiled and shook his head.

“I mean yeah, if you can defend yourself, then that’s good.”

“If we can find something that can explode and it doesn’t need magic like magicite,” William pointed out.

“Silene might find something.” Lilith glanced at Silene. “And there’s another cave that might have something for it, so it should be possible.” She paused. “If not, I could try making something like my electro ball thing.”

“All I’m hearing is might, should, and could,” William said.

Lilith frowned. “Even if we can’t find explosives, iron is magnetic, and even if we can’t get it here, we could get it from a trader. Then I could draw that forward instead of using an explosive. There’s no ‘maybe’ about that, but it would take a while to get right.”

William paused, then nodded. “Alright, since you want it so badly, I guess it wouldn’t help to learn more.”

“Hold on.” Malena raised her hand. “You’re working on the piping. We might need that to get through winter.”

“I think he can take a break,” Lilith said.

Malena frowned, then shrugged. “I guess, but come back here after then.”

Lilith paused. “Actually, do you wanna join us too?”

Malena raised an eyebrow. “Join you in what?”

“Silene and I wanted to plan something like a party now that we’re all here. We can’t just work all the time, you know,” Lilith said.

Malena paused, then put down her papers, sighed, and got up. “I guess. I don’t know how much help I’ll be at that though.”

“You won’t know until you try.” Lilith smiled.

They walked out of the cave as a group and eventually found Jatte.

---

“Hey!” Lilith called up.

Jatte looked down, frowned at Lilith, then saw Malena by her side and flew down with Ethen.

“We’re planning something and need you for it,” Lilith said. “Ethen, would you mind showing William how you used your gun while you’re patrolling?”

Ethen nodded. “I wouldn’t mind at all. Sounds fun.”

Jatte looked to Malena, who simply nodded. Then she looked back to Lilith and raised an eyebrow. “What are you planning that you need me for?”

Lilith paused to think about how to word things. ‘You seemed stressed’ might not have been the best way to say it, but it was good to be truthful. “Everyone’s a bit stressed since we’re out here, and Silene used to go to plays and dances all the time, so I was thinking we should do something like that so everyone doesn’t go stir crazy out here.”

“Stir crazy?” Jatte tilted her head at the foreign phrase.

Hana translated, “It may be similar to fishermen who’ve been out to sea for too long and went crazy in their boredom or stress.”

Jatte blinked at the explanation, then shrugged. “Oh. Well, I guess I can help.”

Only Hana really knew that Malena, Jatte, and Hana were probably the most stressed, and that was a main reason Lilith and Silene were asking them for help, but she didn’t mind. Instead, she had a small smile on her face, which was a rare sight in the adit.