A quest popped up just as Wilona finished talking. It was another one of those encouragement types, and this time, it was telling her to start making some things out of leaves and grass—sticks to make racks, tougher rope by drying out some leaves and knotting them together, and then weaving fibers to make baskets or whatever else she thought she needed.

  [New Quest! - A Comfortable Home]

  [Quest Type: Encouragement]

  [Rewards: Cooking Pot, Frying Pan, Bowls]

  "Looks like you have finally managed to set up the foundations of a proper home! Now it is up to you to ensure that your time there is as comfortable as it can reasonably get! Start crafting some useful furniture!"

  "Right," Wilona sighed and stood up. "What's up with this system thing anyway?" she asked Fuzz. "I feel like it's listening to me all the time to give me quests."

  "It is," Fuzz confirmed. "But it is not really alive in the same way we are. It's rudimentary at best, and at worst, it's some basic mind that understands your feelings to give you appropriate encouragement to do things."

  "Mmmmm..." Wilona hummed. That made sense. "Does it also know what needs to be done whenever I'm doing something?"

  "Yes, it does," Fuzz answered. "That's what makes it so useful—beyond the easy access to power the system gives its users, of course."

  "Ah, got it. I'm gonna go now, by the way. I, uh, need to do something. Start weaving, maybe?" Wilona thought that her survivalist profession would be useful for that in particular. "The rewards this time are actually pretty good. Some cooking pots? I want those. Well, goodbye now."

  "I'll see you around," Fuzz replied from somewhere beneath the earth.

  Wilona gathered all the things she needed for this task. Branches were collected from beneath trees—there were a lot of them, honestly. It was kind of shocking. Reeds were cut, some plants turned bald thanks to her knife, and she also cut the ones with longer leaves so she could start weaving them. The shorter plants would be left to dry since she'd tie them together anyway.

  Once everything was collected, Wilona sat around the pile she had made, which was, expectedly, near the area where Fuzz had spawned. She wanted someone to talk to while making things. The rack was weirdly easy to make, but weaving wasn't. Not because she couldn't do it, but because it would take a while to finish.

  So she might as well have someone to talk to. "Earth is actually pretty interesting," Wilona said, seemingly to herself. "We didn't have racks there, as far as I'm aware. Actually, the three racks I made were the first time I even saw something like that before."

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  "Is Earth that advanced?" Fuzz rhetorically asked. "I knew that the world you came from had more developed technology compared to other places, especially in terms of communication, entertainment, and weaponry, but you guys also had plenty of comfort?"

  "Yep." Wilona went into silent focus as she passed the head of a leaf under several crisscrossing pieces. "We basically had technology to do the work for us. It could clean for us, cook for us, start a fire for us, prepare a bath for us... or just do a lot of things, honestly."

  "Humans still manned them?"

  "Eh, sometimes. Well, always, since A.I. isn't really that good in my world at the moment. But yeah, it only takes a little bit of human effort to do things. The rest is done by a washing machine or something. Maybe a coffee maker?" Wilona shrugged. There were plenty of examples, and those were just the ones that popped into her head.

  "That sounds convenient," Fuzz pointed out. "And too good to be true."

  "Oh, it definitely is—on both things." Wilona's grin had a painful edge to it that the myceloid could not quite place. "Uh, people still work, but thanks to factories, it kinda got harder to find jobs. Construction work also now only requires very few people, and since my world is more focused on earning income, only a small part of the population has money."

  "That last part—that is the most common way a human society develops. Nobles at the top, or some other special title, and peasants at the bottom," Fuzz argued. "Though I believe that everything else you said has a point, I think you're also over-exaggerating the depravity of the ones leading you."

  "They make bad decisions, you know?" Wilona raised her eyebrow. What was Fuzz even talking about? Like she would downplay that sort of thing.

  "And kingdoms fall because a king goes mad for love, or revenge, or some other reason." Fuzz's rebuttal caused Wilona to fall silent. "It is common, like I said."

  "I mean..." Wilona raised a finger and opened her mouth, then closed it again. No words came out. "Hm... Yeah, you're right. It's weird how I'm so hung up on that."

  "It's because you were living in it." Fuzz's tone was nonchalant, weirdly enough. "From the eyes of an outsider, however, they would think that it's the same story over and over again. It gets quite boring."

  "History repeats itself, huh?.." Wilona muttered to herself. She hated to admit it, but the mushroom was making sense. And that was kind of insane, wasn't it? She just lost an argument to a mushroom.

  Their topics became a lot tamer after that. They just talked about favorite foods, colors, opinions on certain things—same old, same old. Wilona would have found the entire thing boring if she hadn't been talking to a mushroom, honestly. She had heard it all several times before—her friends liked to rant, and they were very mouthy once they got going.

  Wilona finished making a basket eventually, but she didn't stop there. She also decided to weave a pillowcase she could stuff with leaves. She purified it so she wouldn't wake up with an itch and then made another one. And another. She decided that three pillows weren't enough and made a mattress stuffed with leaves too.

  From morning to noon, she did nothing but weave. She also found out that the food in her satchel wasn't to Fuzz's liking. She was apparently a vegan who preferred rotting leaves instead of salted meat.

  Wilona didn’t hate her for it. In fact, she was thankful to have more food to herself.

  She learned to make some clothes too, all with weaving. The shirt she made using leaves was a bit stiff, but Wilona thought it was pretty good if she just wore it on top of her regular clothes.

  Lastly, she decided to finish her quest by tying some dried leaves together to make rope. When she got her pot, frying pan, and bowls, Wilona thought she wanted to make something special for the occasion. She now had a mattress and a few pillows, after all!

  Oh, and a door too. She weaved a large-ish wall to cover the entrance because a torn pair of pants wouldn't cut it. Pun intended.

  "Hey, Fuzz?" The mushroom answered with a rumbling hum. "Do you know any plants with good roots under them? Non-poisonous ones?"

  "You have a book about that, don't you?" Fuzz replied with a quizzical tone of her own.

  "Oh yeah..." Wilona snapped her fingers and left for her tree stump. She had completely forgotten about the survival kit, honestly. She also had jars in there too, didn't she? Those could be used to store food in. Neat.

  Now armed with her survival kit—knife and all—Wilona left the vicinity of the tree to collect some roots. As it turned out, though, she didn't have to go far because she found some pretty edible plants moments after leaving.

  She collected tiny leaves, roots, even a few bitter and spicy fruits. The latter were the size of her fingers and didn't have much flesh to them, and Wilona remembered then that the fruits she enjoyed back on Earth? All of them were selectively bred for generations. Would she have to repeat that here? She hoped not.

  After going back to camp, Wilona sat down by Fuzz's spot and asked her something. "Do you think I can fish something delicious from the swamp?"

  "You can try," the mushroom answered. "Are you sure about this, though?"

  "Yep," Wilona was already standing up. "I wanna eat fish!"