Mellow morning light filtered through the cracked sky. The frosty glass of the towering skyscrapers reflected speckled light into the streets and avenues. Frozen ivy clung from the bleached walls and icicles hung from the overhangs. The snow that had accumulated into meter-deep carpets slowly soaked the sun's RADIANCE and trickled tiny streams of melted snow into the storm drains.

It had been the calmest it had ever been for a month. The air was relaxed and cool, flowing with lethargy.

It had been a productive week for Menthol. His goals had become remarkably easier with his curse significantly weakened. He reawakened the discipline and instincts that were locked to the back of his people's minds. He continually drilled them so that their instincts don't get locked back. Looking at all the plantfolk clearing streets of snow and chopping firewood, Menthol felt a sense of pride at his progress; his people were at the very least decent laborers at this point.

The blue dragon-- Metaphor and company were very helpful. Metaphor was skilled in the arcane arts of magic. Menthol had seen magic text before, but he had never seen the script used on her spellbook (her claims swung between Draconic and Ursegal). Metaphor was especially skilled in water-related magicks. She was adept in medicine and healing, and she used those skills whenever there's injuries. She's been helping teaching the plantfolk hygiene and reading and writing.

Stripe, the yellow sack of paint, was helpful in another way. His skills lay in the realms of the culinary although his cooking style resembles more like homecooking rather than restaurant material. He happily tended to the pots of soups and stews with his assemblage of green assistant cooks; he was rotating around a group of candidates to train them in the craft of cooking.

Menthol admired Hero's Prophecy. To think that he brought capable and kind individuals to his people, he wished to thank him for just attempting to help them. If it wasn't for him, the people of Gardenton would be without capable people trying to help them. Menthol would like to meet him one day.

Although they were part of Hero's gang, Menthol was rather wary of Tesla. They were an agent of Prometheus. While he would love to have Tesla help them, Tesla would be able to enact whatever plans and contingencies Prometheus stuffed into their brain. He'd been delaying any attempts of repairing them. At least he had a very valid excuse: they should not play amateur surgeon on the comatose robot. Menthol found it unfortunate that none of them had any skills in extracting information from Tesla's circuit boards; it would be useful against Prometheus.

Where was he...? Oh right, on a main road outside Gardenton. Menthol entered an office building. Snow and slush had flooded in from the open doors and broken windows.

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Menthol was tasked to scavenge some tools. Although offices weren't characterized as troves of implements, hardware stores were not exactly common in this part of Urbanland, and if there were, they were almost guaranteed to have been cleared.

Menthol chose this specific building for a reason. Although the name of its company had long been wiped in the calamity that bleached the city, it belonged to a respectable company with reasonable amounts of cash to spend on safety features. Each floor was almost guaranteed to have a fire axe, fire hose, and fire extinguisher near the stairs or elevator.

Menthol climbed the building one floor at a time. He grabbed fire axes that hid themselves within the fire cabinets. He searched each floor briefly. There wasn't much to see but empty cubicles and file cabinets full of blank papers. Uninteresting trinkets like bobbleheads, mugs, and miscellaneous desk toys littered each cubicle. The sun's RADIANCE filtered through the crystal glass, giving Menthol energy as he worked through the floors.

The floors were engineered in such a way that sunlight would filter through on sunny mornings and allow employees to photosynthesize while they worked. The height of the building compared to the surrounding buildings allowed the optimal amount of light to enter through the windows at the start of morning shifts; it worked just as well as coffee and reduced coffee expenses.

By late morning, Menthol had worked to the penultimate floor, the ninth floor. He gazed out the window and stared directly into the sun. He laid in the RADIANCE to recover some energy he'd expended in scavenging through the building. His pack was laden with axes and the occasional interesting trinket. He took off his jacket in order to soak in the RADIANT sunlight more effectively.

Menthol's malnourished body was getting better by the day. Some muscle had returned to his skeletal skeletal frame, and new green leaves had sprouted from his back. His pale bleached skin and fur were regaining their healthy green color. He laid on the floor and continued to soak in the light.

That's odd. The ceiling lights were on.

Menthol immediately sat up at the odd sight. There was no electricity in Urbanland; nobody operated the electrical substations and the Urbanlandian electrical grid had been frayed like spaghetti immediately after the calamity. A faint humming noise came from upstairs.

Menthol quickly put his jacket back on and took an axe from his bundle of axes. He slowly noiselessly climbed the flight of stairs and found the next floor be some sort of conference room.

A large wooden table was the center of the room. Blank frames hung from the walls and some green potted plants gave color to an otherwise bland room. The faint humming had turned into a grinding noise. Menthol turned to the source and found it to be some sort of generator. Steaming HEAT billowed from its heat sinks. It was an unfamiliar model; its style was distinctly not Urbanlandian. It was blocky and chrome, almost... Factorylandian in design.

Menthol cautiously paced into the room, the axe in his hand ready to swing at a moment's notice. The room was suspiciously empty and silent.

Ding!

Menthol quickly turned around to the source of the noise. The elevator that he had assumed inoperative had opened. A scowl had formed in his face at the sight.

A trio of robots emerged from the elevator. Their chrome chassis shone in the near-noon light. Their optical sensors focused at him.

"Winter Mint," The middle one began. "We've been expecting you."