Alex, Fufi and Ki discussed the missive lady Yvne sent in the guild master’s room that Ki had appropriated into her office to manage the barony.

 

“Should we just ignore her then?” Ki looked at the two others in the room.

 

Alex furrowed her brow. “I want to help somehow.  I’ve been here a full season but I’ve made almost no progress on my quest to defeat the demon queen.”

 

Ki agreed but conditionally. “I would love to cleanse the adjacent land of demonic taint but at the same time it is risky.  We don’t know much about what is going on there.  Also, this is a polite but very obvious trap.” The nymph paused. “Also, having a gemmed flamingo with you would be a dead give away.”

 

“Should we send a reply saying that we won’t be attending any meetings?  How would we go about that?” Alex pondered aloud. “Also why would Fufi be a giveaway?”

 

“We could send the shrubbery…er I mean man back with a reply.  It seems a bit cruel though.  Being landscaping is a better fate than being a thrall to whatever demonic entity is controlling that barony.” Ki ran a hand through her leafy hair. “As for Fufi, other flamingos have been flying around demon occupied places for years.  From some of the neried’s reports they can’t kill them but there is some kind of accord that was made before the demon queen was even born that they have to follow. Fufi might know more about that.”

 

“Yeah, the accords are supposed to protect familiars.  Several hundred years ago Terre saw a team of magical girls that were more effective than anything before.  They were tried by fire fighting the worst enemy ever, an astral sailing species that came down from the heavens to invade the planet.  Long story short, when the dust settled and the conflict was won, only one magical girl remained and she came away both powerful and sad from her losses.”  The pink bird inhaled. “The invaders killed their familiars.  But magical girl Cosmos emerged and really upset the balance of power.  Any evil empire, apocalyptic monster or scheming villain she dispatched in a rather unimpressive way.”

 

“How was that?  And how did it lead to the accords?” Alex asked.

 

“One of her team was a magical girl enchanter and she made scrying tools for Cosmos.  The two of them had good synergy.  Scrying magic was used to find targets and portals or meteors would be sent to eliminate them, often early on before they could become a real threat.  So the dark gods really wanted her gone. However, they couldn’t do it without escalating things to a point where it could easily result in the destruction of Terre.  So instead of mutually assured destruction, Luna talked Cosmos  into retirement in exchange for getting concessions out of the dark gods. They agree to not do a lot of things they used to do in regards to magical girls' familiars and that Magical girl who had their followers dead to rights wouldn’t set foot on Terre again.”  Fufi pointed her beak down. “But like team evil always does.  They found loopholes and with the advent of the demon queen we soon found almost no new magical girls being contracted on Terre.  Cosmos now works in the escalation department of the magical support center.”

 

“Wow Fufi, that is a lot.” Alex blinked.  “I felt a little inferior knowing that another magical girl could just go nuclear and wipe all the demons off the face of the planet.  But she works in a call center now.  I sorta feel sorry for her.”

 

“Hopefully she likes having time to relax.  She’s done a lot for Terre.” Fufi added.

 

“Wait, how long do magical girls live for?  If Cosmos is over 200 years old that is well past the lifespan of a typical human.  Is she a different race or something?” Alex squinted her eyes in contemplation.

 

“Oh that is an easy question to answer.  It is important to be a young girl.  It is in the class name after all.  You might not have noticed yet.  But after the incident in the hot springs you’ve been slowly doing the opposite of aging.”

 

Alex was a little taken aback by the fact that things were set in motion the moment one had a magical girl class.  But did that mean that magical girls were immortal?  No wonder demons hated them.  One of the goals of demonic cultivation was immortality.  The fact that magical girls could get it without the prerequisite of who-know-how-long meditating probably was offensive to them.  “I guess that would explain why the demons are so against having magical girls in this world.  I think maybe I could pass for a normal human but Fufi would be a dead giveaway.” 

 

Ki nodded. “Yes, I would think so.  If you and Fufi just walked into demon lands I don’t see things going well.”

 

“We could make a disguise?” Alex looked the pink bird up and down, considering options.

 

“What are you thinking?” Ki tilted her head.

 

“Well, maybe a doll she could hide inside?” Alex put a thoughtful hand on her chin.

 

“Um, wouldn’t that just be the worst bird cage ever?!” Fufi objected loudly.

 

Ki cringed a bit at this too. “Alex?  That is disturbingly similar to what Sakura did to Fumi.”

 

“No no, nothing like a big block of wood with a hatch.  I’m better than that you know. With some gears, bearings and springs I could make some simple bird-shaped power armor for her. People would think she’s just a wind up doll.” Alex waved her hands around, trying to dismiss the bad impressions.

 

Fufi gave Alex a look. “Well, I’ll consider trying out your contraption but I have one condition.”

 

“What’s that?” Alex asked.

 

“It has to be cute!” Fufi stomped her webbed foot.

 

“Okay, I’ll see if we can scrounge together enough materials to put something together.  There has to be some ruins somewhere with some brass around we could use or something similar.  I understand most of it will have to be wooden though.” Alex started considering possible solutions.

 

“Oh, that won’t be a problem.  There are lots of abandoned farmsteads and a few sites where battles were fought long ago in the past.  Most anything will be tarnished and nearly unusable but I think with a little magical girl power they would clean up nicely.”  Ki waved the concern away.

 

“I guess the next problem would be logistics.  How can we even get there? Isn’t the southern border all swampland?” Alex furrowed her brow.

 

“That is correct, there no longer are any roads.  It goes from forest to miles of bog.” The nymph added. “There still is the waterway.  Yvne’s capital for her barony is on the same river as ours.  But if you come down from the north it’ll be obvious where you came from.  You might need to ask the Nereids for some help sneaking in.”

 

“Sounds like we have the start of a plan.  When we get those two things crafted then we can head to the south.” Alex stated, showing some conviction.

 

The next week passed mostly in the workshop.  The weather remained mostly rainy.  Many of the trees had their leaves turn golden and later red.  

The blacksmiths were happy to take a break from trying to use bloomeries to get metal from rocks that had very little in them.  When the nymphs brought back brass, bronze, and rusted items they fished out of the forest.  It took some effort and several iterations but eventually they crafted a spring powered flamingo doll suit for Fufi.  

 

It had an exterior of wood and ball joints that matched where a flamingo would need them.  There were enough examples to get a good idea how to do things in the books that Alex fished out of the dungeon.  The power armor had a wooden key that stuck out of the back.  While it wasn’t magic like the spring for the carriage, the brass spring powered the suit for 15 minutes on a full wind. If Fufi remained still then it could last a lot longer.  Fufi required the suit to be painted lovely shades of pink and have feathers carved into it.  Minus the forehead gem, the suit looked mostly like the real thing but with slightly enhanced dimensions.  Like the carriage, the suit let out a ticking noise when it moved.

 

Alex’s phone rang out:

[Toymaking has reached level 2]

 

Everyone in the workshop cheered, congratulating Alex on the skill up.

 

The extra materials that Alex cleaned to like-new were added to the stocks in the main warehouse stores.

 

Alex drew up what a small sailboat should look like.  He’d seen some before and even had a picture of a small sailing skiff.  While not being a sailor, Alex had been out on the water before in small boats so she knew the basics.  Making a sail out of cloth was something they were quite set up to do with how much fabric Charlotte had been producing. They also had made quite a bit of rope that could be used to rig the vessel. 

 

“This long wooden part slots into a spot here.  It is called the mast.  It can come out but it needs to be tied with a rope along this part here to keep it in place.  The mast has a slot in it where the sail can be raised up by pulling a rope.  You pull down and the sail goes up.” Alex explained how that was supposed to work.

 

They grew another workshop down by the water.  Ki figured anything that might be part of a waterway travel system should be clustered around the river.  They even used plant magic to grow a dock that could be used in the future.

 

Burly men in frilly outfits listened and tried their best to understand.  No one was a shipwright and Alex hadn’t ever made a boat before.  But they made some drawings from the pictures on Alex’s phone and guessed at the dimensions.  

The nymphs proved to be a big help because they could use plant magic to just grow the parts from trees rather than having to cut or bend anything.  

 

“Okay, so the front part here is supposed to be watertight and just be hollow inside.” Alex tried to show this in the drawing but didn’t think she did a great job.

 

“Why should it be hollow?” A carpenter asked.

 

“Because that way it traps the air in it.” Alex patiently explained.

 

“What good does trapping air in there do?” Someone else asked.

 

Alex sighed. “Air is lighter than water so it floats.”

 

“But the whole thing is made of wood.  It should float anyway.” Another naysayer offered from the peanut gallery.

 

“Yes but if it has too much stuff loaded into it and it fills up with water it could still sink.  Also, having a watertight compartment means that even if something flips it upside down the boat will still float that much better.  Trust me on this.  In my world ships have whole sections that can be sealed off and huge chunks of them can be filled with water but as long as enough of the watertight compartments hold they won’t sink.”  Alex didn’t know how to explain it better.  

 

After several days of work they got a prototype built.  It took some effort to get the sails right and they had to try a couple times. They found out the hard way that they couldn’t use too stiff or too brittle wood for the mast.  They had to play around with different timbers.  The daggerboard and rudder were removable.  The boom could be removed as well.  Just to be safe, they added oars as well.  With the mast down it functioned just fine as a rowboat.

 

After the week passed several of the boats were created and Alex claimed the latest iteration.  “Hmm, I think we are just about ready to head down river but something has been bugging me.”

 

“What’s that?” Fufi asked, having claimed a spot in the water.

 

“Well, Merumeru.  I haven’t seen her all this time.  Has anyone seen her?” Alex asked the crowd.

 

One nymph answered. “Well, She’s popped in and out of the pipes in Bob and Martha’s farm a few times but other than that she’s mostly been out of the forest.”

 

“Hmm, weird.  Well sometimes she’s just doing her own thing.  Can Kaide tell her that we are going to head south next time she sees her?  We are going to go visit the nereids in the swamp.” Alex asked the nymph to deliver the message.