The best answer to the ticket examiner's question was silence. But as she continued walking down the train and the man followed them, she answered him with a noncommittal "It was the first time I saw another person doing such a technique." Which the man accepted and stopped pestering her and Xochipilli.

  Once they were alone on the train viewer, Xochipilli took the chance to be the one asking the question. "That was the fire flower, wasn't it?"

  "Indeed," Aloe answered with a sweet giggle.

  "What's funny?" The child tilted his head in confusion with a forming pout.

  "Nothing, dear," she chuckled again, though this time it was from his reaction. "It's just that plants have multiple names – their species name and their sobriquet – from the parchment-like plant I have shown you, and the Blossomflame's sobriquet was something like that. Although I can't point out quite yet the name."

  Dunes, I really can't. That irked Aloe. The human mind and its memory were a fickle thing, and it pestered her how she could perfectly remember the Thousand Cuts veritas description even when she had seen it once two centuries ago, yet she had lagoons of memory respecting one of her most valuable plants.

  Wanting to have answers and having them at an arm's length – quite literally at that – Aloe evolved and grew a miniature Aloe Veritas on the back of her hand. Even though the evolved succulent was fully grown, it looked like one of those potted ones that didn't expand beyond the size of a fist.

  "Oh," Xochipilli exclaimed as he saw a plant appear from his master's hand out of nowhere.

  Aloe snapped off one of the Aloe Veritas leaves and carefully drenched the miniature Blossomflame with it. These miniature plants were still an early test, something grown out of the necessity to have her plants in public places, but so far, they didn't show diminished power. By all accounts, they were just smaller versions of the plant but retained all their capabilities.

  And if they didn't… well, she could always shove a lot of vitality into the plant to ignore any loss of power like she had done with the Blossomflame a few minutes ago. Even a hundred Haya hadn't fazed her. The verb 'faze' was even a misnomer as it had been so inconsequential that classifying it as an action of the magnitude of a blink was still an exaggeration.

  She rolled her eyes and turned back to thinking about more consequential but still trivial things like the Aloe Veritas leaf in her hands.

  "Can you read what it says?" Aloe handed the leaking leaf to the child as she remembered that not only she had to teach the boy about the vital arts but also to read and write.

  "Hmm…" Xochipilli glued his eyes to the leaf trying to decipher the meaning. "Some words."

  "Tell them to me," she pushed him to continue.

  "I read: s-species. B-b-bo-blo-b…"

  "Blossomflame," Aloe helped him.

  "Blossomflame," Xochipilli reiterated and nodded before continuing. "S-so-sobriquet!" He exclaimed happily after getting such a hard word. "Life, fire, flower."

  "Life and fire go together, it's a compound word," she clarified.

  "So it's lifefire?" Aloe nodded to his question. "That was the name you were thinking about when you giggled before, Lifefire Flower, isn't it?"

  She nodded again. "But there's more text to be read, come on, let us try to finish this description."

  What continued was a handful of slow but satisfying minutes as Xochipilli read the veritas description. The boy knew the words and had uttered them, but it was one thing knowing the words orally, and another thing seeing them written.

  "Good job!" Aloe praised him and patted him on the head. "You are learning fast, Xochipilli."

  "It's because you are teaching me…" The boy said with a blush as he toyed with his fingers.

  Noticing that her plants were getting in the way, Aloe plucked the Blossomflame and the Aloe Veritas out of her hands, but after seeing how much the latter was bleeding, she decided to chuck them out of the train instead of storing them in her Slowtide pocket lest she ruined her dress with the ink. Once she had disposed of all the detritus, she put on her glove again.

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  Considering a handful of her plants had become known and used, she didn't have many issues if those two also ended up being discovered. Once upon a time, she would have lost it if her plants were unearthed, whether one or many, but now she couldn't care. And not because some had already been discovered…

  They continued studying for a bit, but soon they got bored and their conversation faded to the background as they instead decided to gaze at the Whistling Sands. The stampede had previously taken all their attention, but now they could calmly take in the singing dunes.

  "Why do they whistle, Aloe?" Xochipilli asked her.

  "I don't know," she admitted, and the kid opened his eyes like plates. "Why are you making that face?" The vegetable woman pinched his cheeks. "It's not like I know everything."

  "Ow," he simply responded.

  "It must have to be something about the sand. The whistling you are hearing is the wind traveling through the grains, but that much is only what I can tell."

  Xochipilli didn't enquire further, and they just stood there taking the noon sun. She had grown bored of the song of the sands when she was originally traveling through this place ages ago, but as background noise on a laidback ride… it was sort of appealing.

  Fearing that Xochipilli's skin would go from chocolate to charcoal, Aloe led him back inside. She could take in the wind and the sun for all eternity, but the same couldn't be said for the kid. Especially since he was tapping with his foot more frequently, meaning that he wanted to go away, even if he was too polite to say otherwise.

  As they roamed the train, they passed through the restaurant car they were stopped by a server.

  "You are the lady that stopped the stampede, aren't you?" The young man asked.

  "That would be me, yes," Aloe cordially responded.

  "The chef is very thankful for your contribution and would like to reward you with a full course if you are willing."

  Aloe looked at Xochipilli and the child nervously gestured to his stomach. The Radiating Undergrowth was most likely still in effect, but she wouldn't turn down free food.

  "We would be delighted," she answered with a bright smile.

  The server was taken aback by the gesture, but after he recovered his breath and composure, he responded. "I will notify him at once. Please take a seat," he gestured at the table next to him.

  The table was for four passengers, but he had no problem offering it to only the two of them even when there were many passengers in the car. The server even offered them one of the tables with a cushioned bench instead of those with only chairs.

  "Do you want the bench?" Aloe asked her disciple.

  "Yesh!" Xochipilli responded with glee.

  She didn't care much about her comfort, so Aloe sat opposite to him on one of the chairs. The table was brimming with cutlery, and whilst the number of utensils wasn't anything new from her time at the palace of Sadina, she didn't expect such traditions to translate to a commoner place like the train. Though now that she looked around, each and every passenger in the restaurant car was well-dressed and certainly not the average worker she had seen around.

  People of different classes seemed to share the train, but they didn't quite mix.

  "Is there no menu?" The druid asked after remembering the café of the other day.

  "We only serve the course of the day," the server bowed.

  "That's fine," she answered. "I didn't know what to ask either way." Nor I would have understood the contents. I already have forgotten half of the contents of that café menu. I still don't know what a quiche is, though. Should've asked.

  "One last thing," the young man interrupted. "Does any of you have any allergies?"

  "Allergies? What's that?" Aloe didn't recognize the word.

  "I… uhm…" The question confounded the server, but he swiftly recovered. It seemed to be a common thing for him to react that way. "It's like a… strong reaction against a substance, especially food. Coughing, sneezing, itches, any of those things."

  "No, I don't think I have any of these 'allergies'." I doubt I can even have these symptoms with my constitution. "Do you, Xochipilli?" The boy shook his head, too nervous to speak in front of the server. "We don't, dear. Feel free to bring anything."

  "Will do!" The server gleefully marched to the kitchens.

  What followed was truly a feast that put to shame the word 'course'. The chef was truly grateful for Aloe's contribution and showered them with food in kind. However, at the same time, the other passengers were getting the same treatment.

  "What is this food?" Aloe asked the server as he brought a plate with some sort of red chitinous creature. "Don't tell me it's a djinn's offspring."

  "Oh, heavens, no!" The young man chuckled. "It's called lobster and it's a sea creature. It has become quite the delicacy in the high tables of Asina."

  "I've lived all my life," Previous life, she corrected in her mind, "near the coast and I've never seen or heard of these lobsters."

  "They don't live on the historic Ydaz coastline, nor Loyata's, they are only seen in on the southern sultanates or the colonies of the new world."

  "I see…" Aloe responded without much fanfare and let the server do his job.

  Fortunately, Xochipilli was acquainted with lobsters, though he called them a poor man's and abundant food rather than a delicacy. Still, after she was swiftly taught how to dismember the dead creature, Aloe couldn't deny she enjoyed its taste.

  All the plates and the desserts were superb, and after they were done with the food, Aloe asked the server to send his compliments to the chef. She was getting tired of eating when she didn't need food in the first place no matter how good that food might be, and also of being observed by so many people. There would be a point when the pride of being gawked at would surpass her social anxiety, but she had yet to reach it.

  For now, she wanted to be alone with Xochipilli and separate herself from the gazes.