Wilona hopped down and landed with a soft huff. She fixed her clothes as her staff levitated in front of her and then took a moment to observe the wetlands. It really expanded beyond the horizon. Drobit had said that during his prime, back when he was still a cartographer and an explorer, he reached the ocean and realized the wetlands were partially a mangrove swamp. At the end of the line is an ecosystem rich with salt and fish.

  Wilona wanted to see it for herself, but apparently, she needed to travel literal miles to even get to it. And since she's not that fast, it's like driving across states and the journey would take her at least a day.

  It sucked that she couldn't do it now, but maybe in the future when she's fast enough. Even Drobit himself had stated that it took him months to go back and forth between the mangrove and Crowdal, and when he came back, he looked tired and extremely exhausted—and that's despite him having access to a lot of water.

  "The wetlands get deeper the closer you get to the sea, huh?.." Wilona muttered. She wanted to explore and see what's out there. Maybe she could even meet the dragon that lives in this swamp at some point? That would be fun.

  Wilona stopped fantasizing and walked up to the bridge the Castorimorphians built for her. After she talked to Borrzon about how she didn't want to swim every time she visited, the large beaver basically offered to make a bridge for her convenience, and that is how all the burrow lodges ended up becoming connected through a series of carefully constructed bridges.

  None of the Castorimorphians used the bridges, of course. In fact, they were too small to be used by anything other than the children. Even then, no one except Zizzie used them to get around as everyone simply preferred to swim.

  And speaking of Zizzie, the little shit could be anywhere by now, so Wilona made sure to keep a careful eye on her surroundings—otherwise she was gonna get tackled by the young beaver. Zizzie had taken a liking to her for an unknown reason, and ever since Wilona got to experience one of her "pranks", the calf never stopped bothering her every time she went to visit.

  Ylvin had offered to tell Zizzie off on Wilona's behalf, but since the calf never really did anything that's truly harmful, Wilona told the older beaver that she didn't mind it at all and that she could deal with some childish jokes. And besides, how dull would her life be if she couldn't laugh with a kid once in a while?

  She'd always feared that she'd end up like one of those miserable old people who just screamed all the time, and playing with Zizzie sounded like a good way to prevent that from ever happening, so she went along.

  "Ha! Got you!"

  Wilona dropped her barrier, letting the ball of flowers fall. She crossed her arms and shook her head. "Good morning Zizzie, how's Glimgrim?" She smiled when Zizzie giggled. "I'm guessing he's okay now if you're laughing like that?"

  "Yep! Big sister Brixa took care of him! You should have seen it!" Zizzie hopped out of the water and crawled along one of the support beams that held the bridge upright. She landed in front of Wilona and grinned. "He was all 'uh-uh-uh!' And he talked pretty quickly too!"

  Stolen story; please report.

  Wilona chuckled. She moved forward, tailing Zizzie. "So much for his tough guy act he puts on all the time, huh?"

  "Yep!" Zizzie nodded eagerly. "He's all gloom and doom when he's watching the pod during the night, but then he stutters when faced with big sister Brixa!"

  Wilona rubbed Zizzie's head. She didn't have the time to entertain Zizzie's antics for the time being, so she needed to send her off. "Well, you can go take care of him now. How about you tease him about it? Doesn't it seem fun to laugh at him when he still can't move?"

  "Yep! Bye Miss Wilona!" Zizzie hopped off of the railing and disappeared into the depths of the wetlands with an accompanying splash.

  Without Zizzie to interrupt her, Wilona walked in a straight line towards Jablin's smithy—though that word doesn't really appropriately describe the burrow lodge properly, as there's no fire going on in that place. But a lot of carving does occur, so a woodworking shop would be more accurate. At the same time, the wood that Jablin is working with is ironwood.

  And if the name isn't obvious enough, ironwood is wood with the properties of iron. There's also a rumor that it's a species of tree made using advanced alchemy in the past, but that's irrelevant right now.

  Essentially, Jablin's burrow lodge is stuck between a smithy and a woodworker's lounge.

  Wilona wanted to visit this particular beaver because she wanted to get a branch of ironwood she could use for the latest rendition of her magical staff. If possible, she would have also asked Jablin to burn it for her and make it tough, but since Castorimorphians do not work with fire unless they're cooking, her request is next to impossible.

  For her to get ironwood that's been burnt, she’s going to have to do it herself—and luckily, they have a forge for that exact same purpose. Kind of. A kiln for pottery is the same as one for ironwood. Probably. Fuzz said it was fine.

  Wilona entered the burrow lodge after a knock and waited for the beaver to come out of one of the many underwater tunnels he used to traverse his home. The greeting area did not have anything, so Wilona kinda just practiced her spells until Jablin came out of his workshop.

  Like most Castorimorphians, Jablin was bulky as all hell. He had a large chest and biceps the size of tree trunks, his bucktooth lined with sawdust from ironwood so that they wouldn't get damaged when he chipped away at them, and his overalls had tools hanging from them.

  "Oh thank fuck," Wilona sighed in relief once the beaver made his presence known. "I thought you died or something, what took you so long?"

  Jablin laughed and wiped the soot on his hands on his shirt, staining it. "I was working on something—one of the things you requested, in fact. Tell your dungeon friend that the club for his latest summon is almost done."

  "Oh yeah, I forgot about that..." Wilona murmured. An ogre had been spotted around the town lately and since Rottie acted as its main guard, he took it down and revived it.

  Everyone she asked answered that the ogre was too healthy to be an outcast and too aggressive to be some kind of emissary—they told her this after laughing at the thought of ogres talking to people—so chances are, it must be some kind of scout. Which means the ogres she let go of are coming back.

  "Well, you shouldn't." Jablin shook his head. He seemed disappointed that Wilona didn't think much of the ogres, which like, totally isn't her fault. She thought the pseudo-giants would leave after seeing her power. Apparently, they didn't—and now they're back for more.

  "Yeah, I'll remember next time." Wilona sighed. The next time the ogres come back, she's gonna make sure to kill all of them and leave no survivors.

  "So what did you want?" Jablin crossed his arms. "I have a lot to do, so you better make it quick."

  "Yeah, yeah," Wilona rolled her eyes. This guy is such a prick sometimes. Like the least he could do is feel bad for her when she's feeling guilty. "I want a branch of ironwood that I can use to make a magical staff—something of this size maybe?"

  Wilona spread her palms apart from each other, and the space between was roughly the size of her head. Maybe a little bit bigger, which made sense since Fuzz told her that the ironwood would shrink as they burned away the impurities within the material and by the end, they'd only be left with a quarter of the original size.

  "I can get something like that," Jablin nodded.

  "Really?!" Wilona said excitedly. "Well, I won't disturb you any more than this then! See you!" She flew off. Stopping Jablin from working can only mean that he has less time to get the material she requested—so like, this is for efficiency.

  Wilona's next destination was the result of a detour—she decided to visit Rottie. She found the crow in the auditorium and got greeted with a caw after she landed. "How's it going?"

  "It's been well so far," Rottie replied, "but there's been a few developments. A noble from Cielrous is coming here."

  "That's the capital, right?"

  "Yes, it's the capital. He comes with his wife and I do believe an influential figure from Nythfyr."

  "Uhuh..." Wilona frowned. She should have been excited for this; she'd been told by Phocles what that particular name meant. "One of the magical schools?"

  "Yes."