The Way Ahead

Inion stumbled as she touched back down to the ground by the campfire, the spell… not exactly broken, but certainly ended. Its effects lingered, the moonlit clearing still luminous with the emerald glow of magic, emanating from every tree and blade of grass but also from the fairie lights, drifting through the air and occasionally extinguishing themselves.

Edwin was caught off-guard, but still was able to catch the otherworldly fey as she collapsed next to him, “You didn’t tell me you could sing.”

A tired grin flitted across her face, “Couldn’t. Hmmm. You’re holding me,” she tiredly teased Edwin, who rolled his eyes, “And aren’t tossing me away when I say that. Are you finally willing to admit your feelings for me?”

“Let me think.... I’ll admit you’re tired and I know I’d hate to be laying on the ground in your state,” she tried to shift to be more in his lap, “Don’t push it, though, or I will drop you.”

Inion stuck her tongue out at him, “You’re no fun.”

“Singing, though? Was that a Skill?”

“I can’t tell you.” So yes, then. Why would a Singing skill need to be a secret? Even if it had some special evolution that needed to be secret, why the base Skill?

“Well, it certainly was… something. What did you even do?”

“I helped you with your home. Like you asked.”

“I… don’t believe that’s all you did.”

Inion turned and tried to snuggle further into Edwin’s arms, “Mmmm… never said it was.”

“So then what else did… and you’re asleep,” he sighed, “I didn’t even know you did sleep”

“Mmdon’t. Mm… mmmmide amakmmmm….”

Edwin gingerly extricated himself from the exhausted naiad and picked up the sleeping figure, easily carrying her to the banks of her pond. His feet sunk into the bank as he deposited her on a bed of newly-grown moss.

For the next little while, Edwin sat by the mostly-dead campfire, poking its embers idly as he watched the emerald motes of light slowly fade away or drift into the dark treeline, vanishing from view.

As always, his thoughts eventually drifted towards, horror of all horrors, reliving every painful human interaction he’d had… pretty much ever, in reverse order. Tonight, he was stuck on his very recent conversation with Inion.

Why couldn’t he be normal there? Yeah, yeah. Everyone had those memories of an awkward social situation that kept them up at night. He knew. But just… a complete inability to do anything when he literally had an attractive girl who maybe liked him in his arms?

The rational side of his brain berated that line of thinking, though. She wasn’t human and he couldn’t forget that. She was nice to him, but that didn’t mean she really cared about his feelings. She was probably just acting nice because she was nice, and just enjoyed messing with him.

Edwin buried his head in his hands. Why did people have to be so complicated? Why couldn’t anyone actually be nice to him because they actually liked him instead of it just being their default? Everyone else always had such perfect little friend groups where they’d chat and usually let him somewhat join in… not that he was ever invited to, or really be allowed to join in the conversation.

Even though he told himself it wasn’t possible that everyone hated him, it could be so hard to actually feel that way. Not when he’d be laughed at as he was trying to get something off his chest, or when his supposed friends would spend time with him only so long as none of their actual friends were available. Not when people would turn away from him or choose to avoid him when possible.

Even if he was just the second choice for his ‘friends,’ being the second choice for everyone still just… hurt, after a while. He couldn’t help but shake the feeling that was what was happening here. Inion clearly was a fan of people in general, but she was also more or less trapped within the Verdant, or at least claimed to be. Did she only make their Bargain because it was either Edwin or nobody?

He sighed. Probably. At least he could pride himself in being ‘better than nobody’ for a sociable fey, at least for the time being. She’d already shown she could leave whenever, so she’d probably abandon him the moment someone more interesting came along. Just like everyone else.

With a sigh, Edwin took to his feet. There was no point in letting himself sit here in social misery for the entire night. He was alone, just the way he liked it. Who even needed friends? Just a bunch of exhausting individuals who demanded time and attention without offering pretty much anything in exchange.

He tossed a couple of logs on the fire before retiring to his bed, his last night in his little makeshift shelter. Upon seeing the tiny, bioluminescent mushrooms which had sprouted inside, he wasn’t sure if he should be disgusted or delighted.

He settled for ‘asleep.’

Morning brought with it daylight and even more birdsong than normal. A bleary-eyed Edwin stumbled out of his lean-to, wishing that he had gotten more sleep, nevermind that he was still objectively more rested than if he had spent the entire day laying around and sleeping.

“Gmorning, Inion.” The naiad was sitting on a rock at the edge of her pond, toe dipped into the water and absently humming an ancient tune.

She turned, broken out of her contemplation, “Ah! Good to see you up.” She gave a beaming smile, vivid green eyes sparkling in the early morning illumination, “Big day today.”

“Oh?” Edwin dropped himself by the edge of the pond, taking a seat on a decently- sized stone, “What’s happening?”

“Planning!” she cheered, “We’re gonna look over all your Paths and figure out what it is you wanna take first, and figure out what last skills you wanna take!”

Edwin groaned, at himself as much as at Inion. Yes, that was exactly what he wanted to do today, but why did she have to say it in that manner? Why was it so hard to want to do something cool just because someone else was pressuring you into it? “Can I at least see my new house first?”

She jumped up, landing deftly on the surface of the water and padding over to him, “Of course! I did a lot of work on it, I wanna see your reactions to it.” She marched right past him, grabbing his hand and pulling him along. He could have fought against it, but couldn’t marshal the willpower needed to do so.

He did reclaim his hand as they got to the cabin, though, to run his fingers across the walls. They were relatively featureless and fairly uniformly covered in an unfamiliar type of bark. Almanac was no help in determining the type of wood he was dealing with, and its rough surface was distinct from the nir he had used in its construction. It reminded him of something, though, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on it (heh).

“Could you have done this from the start?”

“Ehhh… Normally, I’d say yes. I coulda done something similar without your work, for sure, but it wouldn’t have been quite the same. When we go over your Paths, I’m sure you’ll see what I mean.”

“So… was all that time I spent working to dry out the wood wasted?”

“No?” Inion cocked her head, “No. Even putting aside your Skill growth, the cabin needed to be properly established and built to last in order to work. Otherwise, awakening it as your home wouldn’t have had the same effect.”

Edwin’s ears perked up at the hint as to what happened, and couldn’t resist a follow-up probing question, “So, with it being awakened as my home… what does that entail? How does that relate to putting a roof on it?”

She stopped and thought for a moment, “It’s… complicated. Maybe being able to complete it, and fit it into the Wild pattern, made the song especially potent for it, making it truly sheltered by the forest, rather than from it? I’m no magi, I’m not entirely certain.”

“Potent how? Wait, you aren’t a mage?”

“I am, I’m simply not a magi.”

“Those are… hang on, say ‘mage’ then ‘magi’ in just a moment…” he focused on turning his Polyglot off, to see if it was just translation, and signaled for Inion to speak.

“Miseh beag tha, c’hann idann e.” Edwin stared at her uncomprehendingly, and she sighed and spoke up again, “Beag, idann.”

Edwin turned Polyglot back on, “One last time. The full sentence.”

“I’m a mage/beag, not a magi/idann,” she sighed.

Edwin frowned. Was this the first time the way Polyglot translated words somewhat obscured their actual meanings? Or just the first time he’d noticed? He should probably try to make an effort to actually learn more languages at some point. He still mostly remembered Dwarven, and with Polyglot, a higher Research skill level, and Memory, it should be relatively trivial to pick up more.

“Can you teach me your language at some point? There’s definitely something being lost in translation.”

Inion beamed at him. No, that wasn’t beaming. It seemed too predatory for that, “Why but of course, Edwin. It will be my pleasure.”

What had he just gotten himself into?

The inside of Edwin’s house was… well, magical. There were faint motes of blue and green light floating through the space, illuminating the interior even in the absence of windows. Granted, the illumination was aided by the ceiling- the leafy boughs of some unfamiliar tree allowed golden sunlight to pierce in some places, though when Edwin looked for the corresponding holes in the foliage, he was unsuccessful.

Though the dirt floor was bare, it had been smoothed and compacted, providing a firm base for Edwin to later install actual flooring. The interior walls were much the same as the exterior, made of one mass of living wood.

Edwin’s alchemy corner had been split into two floors, interestingly, with wood in the approximate shape of stairs leading to an upper wooden platform, and the space below it having been slightly dug into the ground, with enough space that Edwin would be able to stand fully upright under the upper floor.

“Nice taste.” Inion nodded approvingly as she looked around the space.

“Wait, what do you mean?”

“Well, it’s your home. You’re the one that the song was trying to make comfortable. This is apparently what you wanted?”

“I designed this?”

“Well, subconsciously.”

“Can I… grow it, or change it somehow? How can I install a door?”

Inion shrugged, “It’s alive, so it should still grow.”

“That… doesn’t answer my question.”

“Pity,” she ran her hand along the walls, which Edwin realized were… huh.

“It’s properly sized?”

“Whaddya mean?”

“The inside…” Edwin pointed at the walls, and ducked his head outside to confirm, “it’s not bigger than the outside.”

Inion stared at him, uncomprehendingly, “And that’s a surprise? Didn’t you come from somewhere without magic?”

Edwin nodded, “Yeah, but… since I’ve been here, pretty much every building I’ve seen has been, well, enormous on the inside, regardless of how big they are on the outside.”

“That’s unusual.” She frowned, “Every building?”

“Well, so far as I’ve seen anyway,” he dismissed her next question with a shrug, “Not all by the same amount, but yeah.”

“Back in my day,” Edwin chuckled and she shot him a glare, “Not that I’m that old. Back in my day there were some shrines like that which I saw, but they were all made by this one guy with a Skill that made whatever he made bigger on the inside. I think he called it Efficient Interior or Efficient Space or something like that. But you said this was common?” Edwin nodded, which made her consider things, “Weird.”

Inion tapped her leg in thought, “You said the Lirasian Empire controls who gets skills, right?”

Had he mentioned that? “Uh, more or less? They like, have an approved list of what makes a good Class, Skills and Paths and stuff.”

She snapped her fingers, “That’s gotta be it. Whoever it is figured out how to reliably get Efficient Space, or whatever, and now it’s standard fare for anyone building stuff. That’s gotta be insanely complicated though. Efficient Space had to have been fourth tier at least, and keeping track of that many possibilities?” she shook her head, “I do not envy whoever is responsible for that. Still, good for them! Reliable reproduction of Skills can be so useful. It’s easy to get something going in a general direction, but replicating an exact effect across an entire civilization?”

She eagerly turned on Edwin, “Which brings us to you. Time to get to work!”