A year passed. To commemorate Felix's achievements, the three of us held a celebration at Old Mo's bakery.

I was the first one to arrive. The moment I walked through the door and sat down, Old Mo passed me a bowl of soup and laughed.

"Glad to see you're the first one here, Miria," he said. "I made you a bowl of fish soup. Let me know how it tastes." He winked at me, and then gave me a loaf of cheesy bread to go with the soup.

"Thank you, Old Mo," I said, as I started to dig in. Old Mo sat beside me, and pulled out a bowl of his own soup. It smelled like onions and vegetables.

“So what’s the occasion?” asked Old Mo in between bites. “All you said was that we were celebrating. Is it about Felix’s railroads? I heard that they’re starting to take off recently.”

Before I could respond, Felix and Anise walked through the doors. Felix gave both of us a quick tip of his hat, while Anise smiled and waved at us. Recently, Felix had gotten into the upper-class clothing of this world. He now favored suits, top hats, and canes. I wasn't sure if it was a 'perfect' look for him, but he was having fun with it.

“It's the railroads," confirmed Felix. "I thought the initial payout was all I was going to get, and I was pretty happy with that already. But recently, I got some influence Achievement for contributing to the development of this world. It looks like the railroads really are going to keep paying dividends for a while. I'm definitely happy about that.” Felix winked at Old Mo. "Not only do I get a keyword ability out of it, but I can bankroll our advancements next time we return to the Market. Or I can get a massive pile of stat points. Either way, I’m excited."

Old Mo frowned as he listened to Felix’s words. “I’m sorry, my memory seems to be failing me. Keyword abilities were the important ones, right?” As he asked, he also got up and started making his way back towards the kitchen. He returned with two more bowls of soup and two loaves of bread, which he set down in front of the others.

Anise nodded as she eyed her own bowl of soup and her bread. “Yeah! Keyword Abilities are the core of what makes us strong in future worlds. Felix’s new ability, for example, will let him do Alchemy in all worlds. It's really important, because without a keyword ability we lose all of our training and progress after each death.”

Old Mo nodded thoughtfully, before he turned back towards me. “That’s how you do healing magic, right?”

“Yup, that's a keyword ability. It lets me use the shaping magic system from our last world,” I said, smiling as I spooned some fish soup into my mouth. “We’re celebrating everything we’ve accomplished in this world so far.”

Old Mo’s eyes widened, and he started looking at us with a hint of anxiety in his eyes. I frowned. Why was Old Mo feeling anxious? “If you’re celebrating everything you’ve accomplished… Does that mean you’re leaving soon?”

I finally realized why Old Mo looked worried, so I stood up and wrapped Old Mo in a hug.

“Of course not. I don’t want to lose any of the friends I’ve made in this world. Iselde, Vance, you, Dr. Trish, Markus… I want to stay with all of you as long as I can. Even if I haven’t gotten many rewards in the last year, I don’t want to lose my connections until I’m forced to. I won’t stop pursuing ways to grow and improve. We could die early, but I'm going to stick around until we die.” I said. “Besides, I’m actually an adult again for once! You have no idea how frustrating it is to be stuck as a kid all the time!”

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Old Mo chuckled, and ruffled my hair. “How often do you guys die before turning into adults?”

“Usually, we die right before or after turning into adults," said Felix. "So... hopefully this doesn't end up becoming a recurring pattern. I'd like to see what old age feels like someday."

Old Mo chuckled. "I imagine you'll get fed up with it rather quickly. Being old is... frustrating. Even if you have an amazing healer to cure most of your little chronic pains and aching joints, I don't recommend it." He ruffled my hair again, before he raised an eyebrow at Felix. "It sounds like you accomplished your major goals. What are your plans now?”

I saw Felix fall into thought, so I decided to answer instead. “Well, I still want to keep working with the prosthetics team,” I said, before searching for a loaf of bread. “The Worldstriders don’t seem to be letting up on their invasion, despite the scare tactics Anise and I used on them last year. It's important to develop more weapons to fight against them. I’m rubbish at alchemy, so it’s not like I'm crucial to the research, but I can make testing safer, at least.” I kneaded my forehead in frustration. "It's not like I matter much in direct combat here. Too many people on the battlefield for my limited essence reserves to mean much."

“On the other hand, I can more directly contribute,” said Felix. “I'm starting to get a lot of money from my hand in creating railroads. The government gives everyone in our research time a chunk of money whenever they use our design... and they have started using our design a lot recently. So I can fund the prosthetics research team, and do some research myself. I'm thinking that we'll try making prosthetics capable of hurting the worldstriders. That could lead to a change in the overall battlefield.” Then, Felix grinned. "Apart from that, I also intend to start a new research team. Almost a decade ago, Anise gave me a pretty neat idea that I had a hard time following up on. I wanted to see if it was possible to use an Affixation as a storage container for another affixation. Kind of like one of those nesting dolls. I'm not sure if it'll work, but if it does it would be amazing. I could make some amazing items in the future with that."

"The first goal sounds reasonable. I have to admit, I have no idea how to evaluate the second goal. It would definitely be a game changer if it works, but at the same time, I have a hard time wrapping my head around it," said Old Mo. "I guess I'll have to see what you manage. Still, are you sure that affixed prosthetics be enough to change the situation? Things are... bad right now."

Felix and I looked at each other and sighed. Old Mo's words weren't wrong. Right now, the human countries were losing ground. As Anise and I had hoped, countries were developing anti-worldstrider weaponry. Once Alchemists had nailed down which Zelyrian weapons worked, they had learned to create knockoffs. It appeared that affixing 'space' concepts to weapons let them hurt worldstriders.

However, production of these weapons was limited. Only skilled alchemists could make a weapon with spatial attributes. Thus, demand far outstripped supply. In armies of hundreds of thousands of men, less than one in ten had an effective weapon. The rest were there to pick up the weapons and keep fighting if their comrades died. The Worldstrider's advance was slower than before, and they lost troops as they advanced. However, the Worldstriders seemed to have a very high reproduction rate, and the human countries were losing ground. Right now, over half of Verne was occupied. The worldstriders were no longer talking about 'holding onto their mountains' at all. Most of the countries on the continent were waging total war.

“Well, I wish you the best of luck,” said Old Mo. “I have to admit, I think my days of conflict are long, long behind me… but I know the three of you. If anyone can do it, you can.” Then, he patted Anise and Felix’s heads as well. “I’m just glad you decided to visit me today. It’s not often I get to host a party. Most people thinking of throwing a party go find a dessert shop instead.” He cackled. "Here, you look like you're almost out. Let me go back and get you another bowl." He made his way towards the back of the shop.

The three of us kept chatting and laughing. Since it was a day to celebrate our accomplishments, we enjoyed our food and soup. At least, until I heard a loud crash from the back of the shop.

I shot to my feet, and a sudden bad feeling crept its way into my heart.

"Old Mo?" I asked.

Nobody responded.

My heart started thumping as I started running towards the back of the shop. There, I found Old Mo, slumped over a counter. A bowl of fish soup was spilled everywhere, but I barely saw it. Old Mo wasn’t moving.