"You're having trouble making it?"

  Jadr found himself needlessly repeating the sword smith's words out of sheer disbelief. While there were a few smiths who were arguably better than the foreigner named Ran, he was still up there as one of the best.

  Moreover, his particular specialty was personalization.

  His blades were remarkably simple, yet always designed with their wielder in mind.

  In that regard, he was the best choice for those who couldn't bring out the best in other A rank blades, as well as the best choice for the two odd S rank adventurers who had outright transcended relying on their weapon.

  Of course, they were still high quality weapons made for high ranking adventurers. It was just that most of his clients were those who wanted to use his blade as a sidearm rather than a main weapon.

  It was a bit funny that his skills appealed to both relative novices and the living legends at the very top alike, while falling short for most serious swordsmen in between, at least when he was compared to the other master sword smiths of the world, but that's just how it was.

  So it really was unthinkable to hear that he was stumped on how to make something.

  And yet...

  "Yes," Ran confirmed. "When making a weapon for someone as young as her, it's important to consider their growth. However... I feel uncertain, no matter how I go about it."

  "Ah," Jadr still wasn't sure what to say, but since the sword smith mentioned Kid's age and growth, he realized that the sword smith's assumptions didn't exactly apply to her.

  But he wasn't sure how to bring that up.

  Even if a few senior guild members were aware of her circumstances, since it did affect how they should plan around her, he still felt she deserved her privacy with such matters.

  Even if people would eventually notice it on their own.

  That is, that Kid, the dungeon boss of the Lost, would probably never grow any older.

  "Is something up?" Ran asked Jadr, having sensed that the conversation had shifted.

  "I think your mistake is trying to consider her growth in the first place," Jadr explained, choosing his words carefully. "If she ever does outgrow it, she can get another one made then, but I don't think it'll be a problem for a while."

  A master sword smith being told his weapon could so easily be replaced might come across as an insult, but Ran considered his words laterally rather than taking it as such.

  "I see... so my instincts were correct in this case. How troublesome it is to have to throw logic and reason aside, but thank you for giving me the solution."

  Jadr found himself breathing a sigh of relief. He wasn't sure how much the sword smith gleaned from his words, but at least in his mind, he managed to avoid offending a master and also avoid intentionally spilling Kid's secrets in the process.

  If the foreign man somehow arrived at the truth from such a short explanation, there was no helping it.

  'Right?'

  ***

  "Any drink is fine."

  I received a parcel one day, which required me to walk the whole trip to the portal and back just to pick it up. Inside was a small envelope and several packets of seeds. The stationery and packets were all very pretty, but the letter in the envelope only had those four words.

  Those were the only imperial words at all, actually.

  There was none of the usual documentation on the package, so it must have been personally delivered.

  The seed packets had writing, but I couldn't read any of it.

  "I guess it's from Zaitenmodi."

  "Wait, seriously? You got a gift from the demon king?" Savi asked, her tone incredulous for some reason.

  I nodded.

  "I think they're haoma seeds. I'm going to plant them."

  "Huh...?"

  They received the same treatment that the two adventuring species, aglaophotis and moly, got.

  A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  One with Terran soil and fertilizer, and two with hybrid fertilizer and lost soil, with the second of the two getting a ground up mana shard.

  I even got my test crossbow out to hunt up the mana shard, since I was getting a bit low. If I just kept using them without getting more, I'd eventually run out.

  "I wish he told me how to care for them though," I muttered as I worked.

  There wasn't anything my phone could access that described how to raise haoma, only that it was once served like coffee before the trade agreement with Naraka shifted from exporting consumable goods to advanced mana cores, the kind that was used to make the very phone I'd used to look all this up.

  If I had more resources, I'd just plant more haoma seeds, but I didn't have much viable hybrid fertilizer, and it seemed pointless to experiment with just Terran stuff.

  'I hope the seeds aren't short lived...'

  ***

  When I'd went to Terra to pick up the package, I'd learned that it had gotten pretty cold over there.

  It was winter in Terra again.

  Of course, the forest and adjacent mountains of the Lost were perpetually temperate year round, as far as anyone could tell. My own studies confirmed this too.

  Naturally, it always felt temperate, but more importantly, there was no notable deviation in the sun's daily movement, whereas you'd expect such deviation to slowly accumulate on seasonal planets, or at least the seasonal parts of such planets.

  It could just be that we were in the tropical paradise of a world that otherwise had seasons.

  Kazzim had implied that there were, but it's possible his ritual had killed them too. Since he lived underground ever since, it was a blind spot in what he could teach me about his world.

  Anyway, while there was no winter in our part of the Lost, imperial winters meant snow.

  Children usually love playing in the snow.

  

  I asked the guild for a small favor on Lilac's behalf.

  

  Somehow, without anyone asking me, the favor grew all on its own.

  Well... it was for Lilac anyway, not me...

  ***

  In the meantime, Savi was learning how to speak and write the Lost language very quickly.

  She really was a prodigy.

  It wasn't like she'd become fluent in the few weeks it's been since she'd moved in, but it reached a point where she was past the very basics.

  What this really meant is that I could rope Lilac in on the lessons.

  Her exact age was a mystery, even perhaps to Lilac herself, but even if only thanks to being a slave for as long as she could remember, her knowledge was a bit rusty.

  Kazzim had been a surprisingly excellent teacher, and I'd picked the language up in only a couple years under his tutelage, but I couldn't help that my very nature was causing a revisionist version of the language to take over.

  After all, I wasn't a native speaker. I'm sure I had countless biases that the old late king never had a chance to correct.

  "(Thank you for the lesson,)" Savi had taken to saying. You might expect a know-it-all prodigy to be arrogant, but she was oddly shameless when it came to learning.

  "Is living here what you hoped for so far?" I wondered.

  "That awaits to be seen. You're awfully meticulous about your experiments, I wonder if you even need me here."

  "But you're here to take care of Lilac, not me."

  "Haha, did I touch a sore spot? Yeah, I get it. You both are immortals, huh? So I'll probably be old and gray in the blink of an eye. Guess I bit off more than I could chew, for once."

  "It'll take the same number of blinks, whether we're immortal or not."

  Though she was partially right.

  It's difficult getting attached to people when you know you'll either outlive them, or you pointedly won't and they might become the reason why.

  In that regard, fellow immortals like Kazzim and now Lilac were... a bit unique.

  But never mind inevitably outliving Savi, even if I died before she did, I'd still eventually forget her.

  That was the real inevitable outcome.

  "You're looking somber there. Failed to convince yourself?"

  "Huh? No. What I said is still true. It's just that I have so many blinks to get through..."

  "Oh, I see. How... long have you been alive?"

  "I don't know."

  Fortunately, Savi was an impeccably honest girl, and I saw no point dwelling on immutable facts never mind letting them get me down, so the dour mood didn't last long.

  After that, I showed her my brickwork plans.

  She said something like, "Huh, you really did have a plan for all these bricks."

  I'm pretty sure she was just teasing me though.

  ***

  

  RedOwl: Ah. I think Kid came to enjoy the snow.

  Indigo997: Why, what happened?

  OutsiderFan71: Ugh... what a day to not have a ride... think I could get there by bus?

  Indigo997: I think stalking a dungeon boss is weird.

  OutsiderFan71: I'm not stalking anyone! Sheesh!

  RedOwl: Well, it's snowing out, and the guild brought her and the other girl a ton of snow clothes.

  OutsiderFan71: Aw man, that sounds so cute too!

  Indigo997: Do I have to report you...

  ***

  

  It was finally time to show Lilac snow.

  Though it was always a bit difficult to get information out of her, it didn't seem like she'd ever played in the snow before, so this would probably be a first for her.

  Savi stayed back at home.

  "Here you go, Kid. We got some stuff for you and Lilac," Suon greeted me when we arrived, handing us some winter coats, extra pants, gloves, and even earmuffs and scarfs.

  Since this visit was for Lilac, I begrudgingly accepted it all, and helped her put everything on.

  The would-be adventurers who came to practice everyday were a bit sparser than usual, and it was amusing seeing the couple who'd entered as we arrived switch out of heavy winter coats to adjust to the Lost's usual warm weather.

  "Ah... it feels good to be here in the winter."

  "I live alone, so it saves a lot on heating coming here everyday."

  "Oh yeah? Too bad we can't camp out here, huh?"

  I overheard them as they got ready, since we were also getting ready but in reverse.

  There were change rooms at the kiosk on the Terran side, but they weren't as much help in the winter. Besides, we were just adding layers while they took their extra layers off, so nothing inappropriate was going on anyway.

  Though since most adventurers and would-bes were men, it wasn't too uncommon to see one take his shirt off, and even the girls often wore shorts or short skirts. That was all pretty inappropriate by Atlantean standards, but the Empire was much more relaxed in that regard.

  They were only technologically and industrially enlightened, after all.