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"No… you did good." I set aside the solid blue core and then grabbed all the cores into both my hands, sand slipping out like an hourglass. Then I purified them, and the sand broke into smaller pieces, spilling over my hands and under my fingers until there was nothing but glistening colorful gems. "If they’re givin’ us all a ride, they can have ’em all."

"Really?"

"Really."

"So? You gonna tell me the rest of the deal?"

"Oh, right. I told ’em we’d give them river water and cores to help ’em evolve. I offered it to one, but they said they’d only do it if I helped all of them."

"That deal sounds awful."

He smiled wryly. "We got a ride. Didn’t wanna risk it."

"That’s fair." I went and looked at the fire. "Anyway, we’re cool. Get things settled, and then come eat. And… bring ’em this." I grabbed some marinated meat and handed him the container. "Then we’ll have dinner."

He nodded, grabbed a large water jug from my gear, filled it up in the river, ostensibly to finish healing their wounds, and then took it to the barrier and looked back with a wry smile.

"You’ll needa let me out."

"Oh, right."

I helped him leave the barrier.

"Wait," I said.

Aiden looked back.

"You said Kline created an open contract. Is that… forever?"

He smiled and shook his head. "No. Temporary contracts like that last twelve hours. I think we’ll be alright." He turned and walked to the "lurvines," as Lithco called them, who were waiting for him.

I watched him heal the foxes, give them water to drink, and present the cores, which the beasts nudged around with their noses like pirates splitting loot. They looked up at me, and I looked away. Kline didn’t—he stared them down.

Two hours passed with Aiden healing and feeding the lurvines, and at some point, I thought he would curl up with them and sleep there, so I ate dinner with Kline and threaded my core. Kline offered me the third ev, but I shook my head, put it into his mouth, and grabbed a teal.

He was the bread-winner, and I was the healer—

—and I was A-okay with that.

Aiden knocked on the barrier a while later, and I let him in. He looked… tired. No, the better word was worn down, a type of emotion and state that no amount of sleep could fix.

I let him sit by the fire in silence for a half hour, giving him room to speak, but he didn’t. So I threaded my core for a bit until he asked me a strange question that broke me out of my trance.

"What happens to you when you change?"

"What happens to you?"

"Yeah… I mean. How do I put this? I don’t think that I can ever go back to who I was after this."

"You won’t."

"Yeah… I know. Um… So… is that a bad thing? Do you… regret all this? At night when you don’t need to survive anymore?"

I took a sharp breath, not wanting to admit the truth, but I answered honestly. "I don’t… I think… you become desensitized to it. You accept it. Everything out here’s trying to kill you, and the only thing you can do is kill back. It’s actually easier that way. Liberating even."

He laughed and looked up. "Liberating? Seriously?"

"Yeah, seriously," I said, shrugging. "It’s just… On Earth, everyone was always agonizing over their decisions. Should I live cheaply to spend time with my kids, or pursue a career to give them the best opportunities? Should I speak out for what I believe in and be hated, or be quiet and be loved? Everything was an ethical or financial dilemma. But here? You kill things and eat them, or you die. That’s it. Black and white. It fixes a lot of your anxiety problems."

"Oh… that’d be nice."

I laughed. "It is."

Aiden stared into the popping fire, dead eyes flickering with flames and hope. "Is that the reason why you decided to stay here?"

I pondered and nodded. "I think so."

"Makes sense now."

"Well, try it out." It was strange to offer, but it was nice to speak to another person. I didn’t realize how desperate I was for interaction until I offered Aiden to come with me on the journey to the alchemy station instead of demanding he stay here or simply locking him in.

Humans weren’t meant to be alone.

So while I had no emotional attachment to Aiden whatsoever, and he was a pain in the ass to keep around, part of me just hoped he’d stay with me forever. That’s why I offered.

But his answer was disheartening.

"I can’t…" Aiden picked up a twig and threw it into the fire. "Least not for now. I gotta get back and fulfill some obligations, or Halten will die. Plus, you know… I don’t particularly wanna die. Must’ve pleased our violent overlords ’cause I gotta a diamond milestone for threatening and axing all those beasts. It was damn cheap, but it gave me some diamonds. So I bought that book you recommended. The one on poisons? Yeah." He laughed breathlessly. "Took one look at this place… What the fuck?"

I returned the laugh, mine equally grim. "Yeah."

We shared a brief silence before laughing together. Then we fell still.

"Milestone… are you talking about the five-level bonus?"

During my first evolution, I got a bonus reward every five levels that applied a request for my books, recipes, spells, skills, and equipment. My diamond rewards for books were critical to me getting highlighting and tutorials, making it the highest windfall. If Aiden got a diamond across the board, it would increase our chances a lot.

"Well, kinda…" he said. "It’s not a five-level bonus. It’s a bonus you get every 20% of the levels. It increases every evolution ’cause there’s more levels. I think there’s a hundred for the first ev, so that’s… every 20? It’s more after that."

"That’s a bummer."

"Yeah."

"But you got a diamond across the board?"

"Yeah. It feels like a participation award, but… yeah. I did."

I laughed, remembering when I got an epic request simply by stabbing a wandering reaper in the first five minutes of being here. It was the same thing.

"Trust me, I got some participation rewards," I smiled grimly. "And you’ll need ’em."

He smiled wryly.

"So?" I said. "You gonna tell me about yourself?"

"Well, there’s not much to me. I’m just some loner who…" He tucked his knees to his chest, curling into a ball.

"What’s wrong?"

"Nothing’s wrong… No, that’s not it. It just feels off to talk about myself now. Like it’s a like... Like… Look. A few months ago, I was a shy, anti-social guy who released my rabbits and birds and lizards on Saturdays and let them roam around the house. I did it on Saturday so I had time on Sunday to steam-clean the poop off my couch."

I snorted with laughter.

"But…" He looked around the forest, panning his gaze on the corpses and fire and landing on the axe. "What am I now? I’ve been choppin’ up beasts for spare souls and cores and dealing with mobsters that’re extorting me. So what’s the point of even talking about myself?"

I lost my smile, thought about it, and shrugged. "I’ve killed a lot of shit. But I still love plants. I’m not studying them… yet. I’m just… trying to survive right now. But I still love plants."

"So… you just accept that you’re different now?"

"Yeah."

"Oh…"

"Don’t overthink it, Aiden. If you think you’ve lost who you are, just roll with it. Or… just be whoever you want."

"Oh, great advice. Wonder why no one takes it."

I smiled wryly.

"Then lie."

"Lie? Lie about what?"

"You know… that you’re cool, or that… everything’s good, and… positive."

Aiden flashed me a smile and then looked at the trees around us, illuminated by the fire. "Here?"

I shrugged. "Sink or swim."

He laughed.

"Look, Aiden. Try it out. If nothing else, it would be really entertaining."

"It’d amuse you?"

I raised my eyebrows and smiled. "Yeah."

He nodded a few times as he stared into the fire. "Okay."

"Okay?"

"Okay."

"Then I’ll be waitin’ for it."

"Alright. I’m getting to bed." He stood up and turned away.

"Goodnight." He entered his tent, and then I started my Mental Shielding training which was now far too easy and almost relaxing from the start, falling into the rhythm—but that night, there was something different that I couldn’t shield my mind from.

My entire body felt like it was molting like snake skin, and when I opened my eyes, I felt my skin developing a black ooze. I also thought I’d lose everything within me.

Illyndra elixir…

It was only then that I remembered that the Illyndra elixir required you to flush it out of your system after a certain time—and the way it happened was gruesome. It seeped out of my skin, and I had to disappear into the forest.

Then, I purified myself and took a bath to feel sane again. It was a bad time. If that happened during a battle, I would’ve been screwed. Learning experience: with great elixirs come great consequences.

I fell asleep after that and slept soundly.

Kline pawed me awake in the morning, filling my ears with the sound of symphony bugs and running water. It was a beautiful, naturey sound that I adored. If the area weren’t filled with corpses, it would be a dream.

I pulled out my foraging pan and chopped and sauteed mushrooms with meat for breakfast. Aiden tasted it and said, "Wow. These taste… really good."

I looked at his unenthused expression as he forced them down his throat. "You’re gonna have to try harder than that."

He smiled wryly and shrugged. "They taste like survival."

My lips curved into a smile, and I nodded. "Better. Let’s get to work."

Kline and I butchered meat from the bear, replacing all our other food within our containers. We wrapped the rest in tarps I got in Big Bag ’o Tools and put it into the Diktyo River, hoping it would prevent bacteria and keep it cool. Worst case scenario, it would ruin the meat—but at least we would try.

After loading up, Aiden convinced the lurvines to help us pile up the corpses of the dead beasts and build a funeral pyre. Most beasts had migrated north to Arithiel Pond in the last few months but the Migration had started today, so they would return. It was critical we took care of them.

To our surprise, the lurvines not only helped us pile up the corpses, but they used their blue flames, which didn’t seem to hurt plants or trees, to burn the corpses to a crisp. The fire was gruesomely hot, and the bones soon turned to ash.

I used Pervasive Breeze to blow the ashes across the river to the burnt forest. By the time we were done, there were no dead beasts near us.

It was time to leave.

"Which one am I riding?" I asked.

The lurvines all turned to me, studying me at eye level, a fact that felt increasingly terrorizing the more someone thought about it.

Aiden turned to the lurvines and spoke. There seemed to be a debate with snarling and growling and narrowed eyes until I sighed.

"Do I need to like… beat one of them in combat or something?" I asked. "If so, let’s get it over with."

Aiden turned to me with a skeptical expression. "Can you?"

"If there’s no killing. I’m not risking my life over bullshit, but it’s just a spar, yeah."

The lurvines snarled.

I watched in annoyance, pissed that I made things worse. "What’d I do?"

"Well, you’re unevolved and claiming—"

I turned to the lurvines. "Spar. One on one." I pulled out my machete and flipped it to the dull side. "No maiming or killing. You win, I’ll ride Kline. It’ll take longer but whatever. If I win, the loser needs to stop bitching and let me ride them because I don’t have time for this shit. Tell them."

Aiden’s face paled, and he complied. Once he spoke to the snorting beasts, he turned back. "They’re saying that your cat’ll kill them."

I expected Kline to hold his ground, but he huffed and rolled his eyes, and the lurvines dug their paws into the dirt, noses scrunched in as they glared at us.

I turned to Aiden. "What’d he say?"

Aiden turned to me with a strange expression. "I think it loosely translated to, ’Why would I need to?’ Like… you’re all weak. Can you guys stop pissing them off?"

I rolled my eyes. "Can you tell them to cooperate?"

Suddenly, the smallest lurvine stepped forward. I got the feeling it was a female due to its different body structure and blue eyes.

"Um…" Aiden turned to me. "Sina says she’ll fight… but… you sure? She’s the second—"

"Let’s do it."