The next morning is surprisingly mild-weathered, in comparison with the quickly passed storm of the previous night. Fresh is deeply relieved that those unfortunately-timed, heavy clouds left just as quickly as they had come. Now, the cart is rolling again along the wet road, water and a bit of mud splashing around as they ride over the mixture of dirt, gravel and cobble-work. The sun shines into the cart very brightly from above, its heart-lightening rays breaking in through the sparse clouds and reflecting off of the puddles of water down below them. The air is damp. But thanks to the autumn-chill, mixed in with the bright sun, it is oddly comfortable. Especially compared to the sweltering summer heat that they had marched through the forest in, on their way towards the west.

Fresh sighs, leaning back, oddly nostalgic about that memory. Even if it was only a few months old. Life is moving very fast these days.

Then again, it has been doing so since she arrived here in this world. Half of a year, give or take, has come to pass and she feels like more has happened in it to and for her than in all of the years of her old life combined. Though, looking back on that oddly foggy memory, she doesn’t really remember how many years those were, at the time of her ‘passing’.

The fairies are flying around after the wagon again. Thankfully, they aren’t on a murder spree today and seem to be content with leaving the creatures of the forest alone for now. Though Basil does have to scold some of them, after they agitate the anqa by buzzing around its head, wanting to look at it from close-up. Tarja, being the leader, is busy today and so the others, uncoordinated, simply live the day.

“You need to pinch the edges,” explains Jubilee, grabbing the piece of fabric by the ends. “Otherwise your seam is going to sit wrong and it’ll look lumpy.”

Tarja nods, copying what she sees with the fabric in her hands. It’s the same cut as the material Jubilee is using, but just tiny. Jubilee is showing the classless fairy how to tailor and so the two of them are making something super simple to start with. A thin shawl, to help keep the desert sun and sands away from the face. Fresh thinks this is adorable, in fact, she thinks this is doubly-adorable, because Jubilee didn’t even need to be asked by herself or by Tarja to do so. They had simply waved the fairy out of the air and told her that they were going to practice tailoring now.

Shamrock meanwhile instructs Pentii, the mannerless fire-fairy on how to skin and prepare the body of a monster. Though, he’s demonstrating this with the body of the snake from the other day. Fresh does her best not to look. It’s gross. But the fairy, as well as some of the more adventurously-trimmed ones, watch in deep fascination. Some of them didn’t want to be crafters, having been inspired by the story of Veli to become adventurers themselves.

She wishes that they had just asked Veli to come with them from the start, or that he had waited a few hours at least, before running off. But she also blames herself for that. Fresh wonders where he is and hopes that he’s okay. None of the fairies seemed to hold a grudge about his leaving because of them, likely because all of them are leaving because of them as well.

Even Basil has a couple of fairies sitting on her lap, who she explains herbalism too while they ride along, pointing out various plants and trees on the way as they ride past.

Fresh sighs, nobody wants to learn anything from her. Feeling a bit dejected, she leans her head back and closes her eyes, falling into a nap.

A while later, she is jostled awake by a hand, reaching back to her shoulder. “Guys,” is all that Basil says.

A series of excited and awed ‘wow’s and ‘ooh’s escape the many fairies. Fresh opens her eyes slowly, yawning and stretching her arms and legs out. Her feet press against Jubilee as she stretches.

“Everyone stay in the cart,” instructs Jubilee.

“What’s that?!” asks Tarja. Fresh blinks, rubbing her eyes and turning her head to look forward, past Basil at the oddly green cloud in the distance. She blinks. Green? Fresh leans over, putting her head next to the priestess as she stares at the thing coming up in the distance, its massive, spireing body breaking the horizon.

A tree. A giant tree, as big as the mountain that they had left, if not even bigger, rises up like a leviathan from the depths and scrapes up into the sky. Its many boughed branches bend out in all directions and are covered in a swarm of green leaves.

“That’s the central city,” explains Jubilee. “They don’t like strangers,” they add on.

“Can we go there?” asks Tarja.

“Only if you want to die,” warns Jubilee. “They don’t know yet that you guys can leave the mountain and when they find out, there’s going to be trouble.”

“Huh? Don’t they like fairies?” asks Pentii.

“Something like that,” explains Jubilee. “None of us are welcome there. We’re going around it,” the say, looking at Basil. “And fast.” Basil nods, whipping the reins once. The anqa picks up its pace. “Keep going straight, there’s going to be a bend around to the right in a few minutes.”

“Got it,” says Basil.

“Jubilee!” exclaims Fresh. “There’s a giant tree!” she says, pointing at the thing.

“Sure is,” replies Jubilee. “There’s a dungeon in the roots of it, but that’s none of our business.”

“Is it a good dungeon?” asks Fresh.

“It’s the best dungeon,” says Jubilee, pushing her feet away with their legs. “But it’s for nobles only.”

“That’s so unfair!” exclaims Fresh. “If the dungeons have always been here, then why do they get to keep that one for themselves?”

“Because, dumb-ass, they built a wall around it and peed on it. That makes it theirs.”

“Eww, did they really?” asks Fresh, shaking out her hands. Jubilee rolls their eyes.

“It’s just an expression, goo-brain. Might makes right. They say it's their dungeon and they’ll kill you if you have a problem with it,” says Jubilee. “Way I see it, that means they have a point. That’s how ownership works.”

“But who made them the owner? It’s part of the world!” argues Fresh, crossing her arms.

“Take it up with them,” shrugs Jubilee. “But you won’t like the results of that conversation.”

“Don’t they like you guys either?” asks Tarja.

“They don’t like anyone, period,” says Jubilee. Fresh stares out ahead of the cart, sparing a glance at Basil’s tense form as they ride on ahead. The road ahead of them diverges into three paths. One goes left around the city, one goes straight towards it and one goes right around it. Basil tugs on the reins and the cart turns to the right, branching down the road as they make a bend towards the south.

“Wait.” Fresh blinks. “Are they going to get mad that the fairies can leave the mountain?” she asks, leaning in to whisper into Jubilee’s ear.

“Remember what we talked about in the basement?” asks Jubilee. “Yes.”

“Oh no..” Fresh leans back, not having thought about this possibility at all when she had made the rings. She just wanted to do something nice.

“Okay, so. You take the corners, like this -” starts Jubilee, returning to their lesson like nothing ever happened. Perhaps to ease the clearly fearful minds of the fairies. Basil and Shamrock both do the same. Fresh, meanwhile, sits there and contemplates the consequences of what she has done.

Razmatazz

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