Event Log: February, Outpost Problems

[faileas]

Event Log: February, Outpost Problems

I. Adventuring We Will Go (Tomorrow) The word gets around pretty quick. Anybody who plans to journey with the group of Wilders venturing out to set up a new outpost is invited to attend a traditional gathering they have before an expedition: the packing party. On the evening of the 15th, the Wilders' HQ is bustling with activity. The whole group is present making the final preparations, sorting gear, and checking the carts for maintenance. The atmosphere is easy and upbeat, very casual, with Wilders laughing and telling jokes and stories as they work. One has to have a little fun before it's time to be serious, after all! A lot needs done, and more hands are always welcome. Camping gear and provisions need to be checked, inventoried, and dispersed into enchanted rucksacks that can hold twice as much as you might think they could - there will be enough rucksacks for each explorer in the party. Everyone is expected to carry their own. Shrunken-down construction materials for the new outpost need to be loaded into the three self-propelled carts the party will travel with (if only they were self-steering as well!). The carts themselves haven't been necessary for an expedition in a while; they could probably use some fixing up, greasing the axles and making sure the enchantments are fully charged with magic. And, too, this is a chance for the group to mingle and get to know each other. You have to be able to trust your fellows out there in the Wilde, after all. So there's a table with food bought off a few street carts: fried hand pies in meat (no one's sure what kind of meat, but hey!), veggie, and fruit varities; a pot of simmering jellied eel to be scooped into cups and eaten with spoons; fried squabs on sticks dripping grease. Beer is plentiful, as are bottles of a non-alcoholic ginger beer. Everyone is encouraged to eat, pack, and get to know each other. Especially because, the lead Wilders on this expedition will say, it's recommended that everyone going out there have a Bonded - whether it be their own normal Bonds if they're also going, or temporary Bonds with their fellow party members. The table also bears a few dozen of the temporary Bonding potions, and it's highly encouraged, though not required, that more experienced explorers temporarily Bond with those who are much newer to Aefenglom. It's nature's buddy system, you know. Whatever you're going to do, do it before the morning - the group leaves at first dawn, and will not wait for anyone too hungover to be on time. While having a Bond isn't required for the trip, the Wilders will strongly encourage it for anyone who isn't Bonded or whose Bond partners aren't going. The three-Bond safety limit does still apply to temporary Bonds, though! If you'd like to tag around for potential temp Bonds, head over to this thread right here!

II. The Silent Forest It becomes clear that, while the journey starts off easy, it won't remain that way. The group leaves out at dawn and passes first through stretches of land considered 'safe' - safe enough to be generally habitable, and the first couple of hours see the occasional farm on the way. There are few to no signs of Cwyld this close to the city, but then they start to slip into the region considered 'in progress'. These are the lands the Wilders have been focusing on, and so while there are the occasional patches of infected plants, they're easily dealt with by small, controlled burns. As the day drags on and the hike continues, though, the landscape changes. The trees grow thicker and the underbrush more dense. The machetes have to come out at points to clear the path for the carts; whoever is currently on cart-steering duty, please don't damage them! The atmosphere, too, changes around this time; the laughter dies down, expressions become more serious, Wilders are noticeably more alert to the possible presence of Shades or hostile creatures. By evening, the forest is thick and dark, the trees around them ancient and twisting. No one has ventured out to this area in quite a while, the more experienced Wilders will say, and that becomes very obvious. The once-beautiful forest is heavily infected by the Cwyld, and the small cabin that served as a Wilder outpost is overgrown, still bearing the 5-year-old corpse of a dead Wilder. Adventurers are advised to take caution when touching anything - wear gloves and heavy boots and watch your step out here, folks. The way still needs to be cleared. a. The Flora The oldest of the trees present are fully dead, thick trunks turned black and shiny, letting in light from above where their leafless branches reach out to the trees around them. The brush is thick and thorny; even small pricks and cuts in the skin are liable to be infected, a black ring forming around the wound, darkening the veins branching out from it, and need immediate treatment to keep it from spreading. It's hard to avoid other than by simply wearing thick clothing and hoping for the best. Nestled in the roots of the trees are pitcher-like plants filled with a sticky sap; the Wilders are excited to see these, and despite the dangers, comb through them to see if any remain uninfected. The sap in infected plants is black and tarry, while in uninfected plants it runs clear. This sticky liquid is excellent for smearing over wounds to seal them and draw out minor infection, and they'd be delighted to take some whole plants back for cultivation. As well, a certain breed of tree seems to have escaped infection entirely; these tall, woody trees have shiny green leaves, a contrast to the rest of the forest, and bear small green fruits that smell (and taste, should you eat one) deliciously sweet. All is not always as it seems out here in the Wilde, though - be careful which fruit you choose to imbibe. These trees are not immune to the Cwyld, they only hide their infection well. It can only be determined which trees are infected by cutting into them and inspecting the sap (difficult, because the sap of all the trees is highly toxic, and even inhaling near it will have nasty side-effects of vertigo, vomiting, and even temporary blindness). If it runs black at all, the tree is infected, and the fruit, sweet as it might taste, is deadly poisonous. Trees that are only mildly infected are a Russian roulette: you have an 80-20 chance of getting a toxic fruit or a good one. Most of the Wilders don't feel it's worth the risk. b. The Fauna The party spends a couple of days in the Silent Forest out of necessity. Initially, it seems as if there is no animal life left on this desolate patch of land. No birds chirping, no mammals scurrying about, not even an insect to buzz around the explorers' heads. It becomes quite clear that the Cwyld has consumed nearly everything, and the life left is hardly life at all. Shades are not uncommon. When camp is made for the night, capable fighters will have to rotate guard duty and patrols around the campsite, to fight off the shadows of what used to live here as they sense life and magic to consume. Dessicated, white-eyed bucks with cracking antlers, bloated and mutated birds screeching angrily, even, perhaps, the Shade of a bear, huge, enraged, and difficult to take down. But that second night, those who are alert may get the tingling sense that they're being watched. They are, in fact, by a band of nomadic Monsters, primarily Harpies and Arachne passing through. They don't approach the camp, and they won't speak to any of the Wilder group, merely watching them with something like curiosity before they flee into the forest again. It's hard to get close to them before they disappear, more at home in this dead forest than you will ever be, but close observation shows that all are scarred in some way; missing parts of limbs, eyes, or bearing even worse marks on their bodies. c. The Solution It's too thick an area to clear simply by burning. They'd set the whole dry patch of forest alight and kill who knows what along with the Cwyld. Some smaller areas can be taken care of with fire and careful supervision, but the rest of it... The lead Wilder on this expedition, a prematurely-greying Witch named Rilla Sparks, puts forth a suggestion. She admits, it's one based heavily on theory and speculation, along with the findings of certain prominent researchers in the city. If they can find the leyline, she thinks the Witches in their party can flood it with enough positive, nurturing magic to 'flush' the Cwyld out of the vicinity, so to speak. Or, she hopes, enough to make it passable in the future. It's experimental, but isn't that what this trip is about? Discovering new things? If enough of the party is game, the first step is finding the leyline in the area. This can be sniffed out by Witches and Monsters both, as they're drawn to sources of magic, even tainted magic; and, too, if anyone takes a look from the air, the leyline becomes obvious, as it cuts a much darker, more heavily infected line across the forest floor, like a blackened vein. Once it's found, it's up to the Witches in the group. Gathering over the blackened ground, anyone who wants to participate in the ritual should join in pairs or groups, down on their knees to be closer to the earth, and should 'push' their magical energy into the leyline through their hands pressed to the dirt. Each push results in a pulse of light beneath the blackness of the ground, weak at first, but stronger the more magic is expended. It will take several hours, which means the occupied (and then spent) Witches will require the protection of their Monster fellows, and interacting this closely with a tainted leyline will have side effects. A low degree of Cwyld infection is possible in the hands, but not guaranteed. Intense fatigue and dizziness is certain, along with pain when casting spells, and terrible nightmares for as long as the symptoms last - anywhere from 2 to 6 days, depending on how much magic the individual Witch expelled and how much rest they get after. It will take some time to see if their labors bear fruit. They'll check on the area again on the way back; they can't stay in one place for too long.

III. Ruins of a Past Life In the next couple of days, as the journey commences, the obvious signs of infection lessen in the landscape. The trees thin out again as they head further north. With the Wilde just barely dipping toes into autumn, and no thick canopy of foliage to block out the sun, it's a hot, uncomfortable walk. Those on cart-steering duty are considered lucky, getting to sit for a few hours, but it doesn't last - the duty is rotated between volunteers. Enjoy it while you've got it. At one point, with the sun high in the sky, they stop to refill canteens and jugs with fresh water and to take a bit of a swim. Here, the water cascades into a wide lake below, which eventually feeds back into the main river that cuts through Aefenglom farther south. At the top of the waterfall, it's much easier to see something in the distance, that isn't specifically on the route but is a small enough detour (only a mile or two off) that the guides permit it. It's the ruins of a former settlement, clusters of shells of burned out houses and buildings, a dried up well, and the crumbling remnants of a wall - reminiscent of the Bright Wall, but much, much smaller, only about eight or nine feet high at its tallest point. There is no magic left in it, though, nor any people in the ruined town. There haven't been for years and years, judging from the mossy overgrowth and state of disrepair. Some signs of the former inhabitants can still be found in the houses; the Wilders agree to make camp here for a night, to give everyone some time to explore. a. In The Daytime The ruins are depressing, but safe, in the daylight. It isn't hard to put together what happened here - a Cwyld outbreak must have come on them quickly, and judging from the hasty, half-burned homes, it was poorly contained. Some homes still contain skeletons in rotted scraps of clothing, some bones charred and others picked clean by animals. Many of their possessions still remain, except there are no books left anywhere in the town, even on shelves where books obviously were before. The patterns in the dust indicate that the books, all that survived the fires initially, were removed much more recently, within the last year or two perhaps. Otherwise, much is untouched. There are still dishes and flatware on broken tables, rotted blankets on beds, children's toys scattered over floors, axes hung on walls. A sort of thick, somewhat mucous-y grayish-green moss grows in flat sheets over most of the ruins. It isn't infected by the Cwyld; in fact, the areas where it grows seem to be free from it. Coincidence? Not? The Wilders have never seen anything quite like it, and are interested in taking samples back to study. (And for those of you who can't help but put things in your mouths: yes, the moss is edible. It tastes a little... earthy, but gives a pleasant caffeine-like buzz and burst of energy. Good for Witches still feeling the effects of the leyline flushing.) Outside the remnants of the wall, there are years-overgrown gardens, and perfectly good potatoes, asparagus, and raspberries can be found still growing, hardy and perennial even without human hands to tend to them. These people lived a more simple life than those in relatively-modern Aefenglom, as there isn't any magitech to be found, but somehow, they made themselves a home out here in the middle of nowhere. b. Ghosts of a Forgotten Settlement After nightfall, the dead town comes alive again, in a morbid sense. The party will soon find that the sunset brings the emergence of specters of the town's deceased residents - ghastly semi-transparent echoes of humans and Monsters, men, women, and children, in the state they were in at their deaths. Some are badly burnt, others were obviously infected, on their way to becoming Cwyldtid. Now, they go about their former lives every night, filling the ruined town with a sense of dread and foreboding that is impossible for the living to ignore. The ghosts cannot be touched or physically interacted with, and many of them simply ignore the Wilders and Mirrorbound completely. Spectral children play in the streets, adults tidy shops that are no longer there, or head out to the field to farm. They do so with expressions full of sadness, and desperation, as if trapped in this cycle of un-life. Others not only notice the group, but try to turn on them, enraged at the sight of intruders, though their shouts and screams are silent. They can't do any damage, but if they pass through you, you'll feel a bone-deep chill, despite the late-summer heat hanging in the air, and the specters' 'touch' will fill anyone with an aching, heavy despair, or rage - echoes of the emotions the ghosts experienced before their deaths.

IV. The Northern Outpost The sparse forest thins even more to the north. The terrain grows more uneven, rockier and hilly, with drier soil and hardy, sun-bleached grass instead of moss and leaf litter. Several natural rock formations can be spotted in the distance, growing larger as the group gets nearer. The trees here are few and far between, shorter and sturdier, casting only small circles of shade on the baked landscape. Wildflowers dot the grass in every color of the rainbow in the areas that remain uninfected. A low degree of Cwyld infection can be found here, turning the grasses overgrown, dry and brittle, and the sparse trees gnarled and blackened. This is to be expected, though. You can't venture this far out and expect anywhere to be completely untouched. The spot Rilla Sparks chooses for the new outpost is cradled between two large spires of stone, with a cliff-face at the back of it - protected on three sides to defend from animals and Shades, with a relatively clean stream within an hour's walking distance. Construction has to commence immediately. Once they land, it's a flurry of activity, as there is much work to be done. The building supplies are returned to their original sizes and it's all hands on deck to put together the low wooden building. With everyone working as quickly as they can, it should take about three days to get set up enough to consider the outpost open. Also on the to-do list: setting up the teleporter waypoint given to the Wilders by the Coven, to shorten the trip from Aefenglom to this far-flung outpost. It's smaller than the one in Dorchacht, only able to transport three people at a time, but the technology is the same. They'll need as many magitech-capable hands as they can get to calibrate it to the local energies and get it up and running. While all this is going on, exploration of the local area is high on the list as well, to ferret out any potential dangers that may be inherent to setting up here, or potential boons that can be taken back to Aefenglom, and to start work on their maps. There's a job for everyone, and while they're happy to let people do what they're good at, or rotate between different tasks, anybody slacking off will get the stink-eye - you came to work, right? This is no vacation! After the first day, though, things start... getting a little weird. Items start disappearing at random times, just out of nowhere, no rhyme or reason to the things taken. Hammers, half-drawn maps, scraps of wood, your half-eaten lunch if you look away from it for long enough. Personal items may go missing as well, if left unattended, so keep your precious things and weapons close. You may hear muffled voices - laughter, indiscernible chatter - around the times when stuff goes missing; it could be the voice of a stranger, or maybe it's the voice of someone you know, someone you've been traveling with for the last several days. But why would they want to steal your pen, or your handful of nails, or your drink cup? Weirder still, holes in the dirt start turning up in the night. Maybe six feet deep, dug at an angle like the beginning of a tunnel, and cutting off abruptly. Digging further down in these holes doesn't turn much up at first, but checking enough of them will turn up only a handful of the smaller missing items with teeth marks in them. Inconsequential, uninteresting, inedible things, or straight up trash in some cases. With enough persistence and maybe a good old fashioned stake-out, the culprits turn up: a pack of sand-colored, hyena-like animals that perfectly mimic human and Monster voices that they hear (often repeating words out of context, like much dumber parrots - they don't know what they're saying, only what the words sound like), and scavenge for whatever they can get their paws on. The hyenas are aggressive when confronted, and pack-oriented, but can be won over eventually by feeding them, or talking at them: different hyenas like different sounds and different words, so it might take some trial and error. Several bear low-level infections that can still be cured. Maybe eventually they can be trained. But then, where is everything else they stole? Please note that only a very small number of the items missing will be found on this trip! If you don't want something of your character's gone for an indeterminate amount of time, don't have it stolen. It's just possible they might turn up at a later date, however...

Welcome to February's event log, Outpost Problems! The expedition will last about an IC week for everyone who completes the trip; characters can return to Aefenglom with a pair of Wilder scouts at any stop along the way, though. As always, please direct your event-specific questions here! You can tag around for temporary Bonds in this thread, and if your character would eat the fruit in the Silent Forest, please post here for your dice roll (we did say it's a Russian roulette). Enjoy the trip outside the Bright Wall, everyone!

Comments

[yesdoubt]

[Momo hums a little at that, looking over her eyes and ears himself to see if he can catch much just looking at those. But at the question, he waves a hand hastily, still not entirely out of habits drilled into him by his particular choice of career.]

Nah, I'm sure I'll see whatever's showing up there eventually. Unless you want a second opinion, but there's probably more qualified people than me here for that.

[It's not like he's been here long enough to know what she's turning into even if he does see it.]

[stopfen]

It's fine. I had to go to the infirmary for it when it first started growing, they think they know now...Just waiting to see if anything else happens. [But the chances were slim. The weakness to iron narrowed it down, and rabbits didn't have shells like that. Mikasa was just waiting till she knew for sure that was like the creatures in the forest village. ]

I hope the rest of the changes itch less... [Her white shirt was ruined.]

What did they say you were?

[yesdoubt]

What exactly is "it", though, now that you're talking about it? [He thinks back and automatically thinks wings, but he also figures that if Mikasa had started growing wings in, it'd deform the shape of her clothes a bit more.

As for himself, he has it a bit easier, and flourishes one hand with fingers flickering in a "sparkly" sort of motion, winking along with it.] I'm a witch! So I don't have to worry about transforming, just misfiring spells and maybe exploding. You know, normal problems.

[NORMAL PROBLEMS. He doesn't seem that fussed talking about it, though.]

[stopfen]

I'm not sure. I can't see it. It's like a shell... [That's why she offered to let him see. And Momochan...He just gets the Flat Stare. She even stops walking to do it.]

I have even less things to worry about. I just need to get some cream to stop the itching. [She was a bit more bothered about her body changing than she let on. But really, honestly? She'd rather be a monster than need a bond as much as a witch did.

...If she'd been a witch she might not have bonded anyway. It was better than being controlled. Wasn't it? Even if she hadn't noticed the control befo-]

We should keep working. [And she's turning, bunching her shoulders, closing off. ]

[yesdoubt]

[Momo's humming curiously for a moment about the "shell" and takes a second to notice her stop, which gets a quizzical look out of him like he doesn't know what he did to warrant such treatment.]

What? I've heard weird stuff from monsters and witches both already... [But he can practically feel that walling off with how he is at reading people, because it's not like it's subtle. He doesn't press it, but he waves his hands a bit in a cheerful sort of manner, coming around to one side so he's not right in her face, but not turned back on completely.]

Sure, are you going to take on the ten ton weight again? [Diverting to what he considers a safer topic with a joke. He doesn't tend to completely let conversation die from that sort of thing so much as realign it if he can.]

[stopfen]

[Even with that, she couldn't answer. The shard that she'd managed to snap off had been solid. Like a lump of thin stone, but she could still feel things that touched her back. But it was all getting a bit to close to talking about bonds and the side affects of not getting one for her. Which meant it was time to hush that topic.

She'd already been told by at least three people to get one. Regardless of how she'd felt about it.

Mikasa watches him move, neck craning to see where he's going out of habit. Silent for a moment, then he gets a snort.]

The supplies here are light. I had to carry more when working on the railway.

[yesdoubt]

[That explains a lot, and Momo nods sagely like he's impressed by the prospect of working on something like that.] Oh, that'd be a big job without cranes and stuff to move supplies...it's pretty rare that work in my time needs people to lift that much weight. Unless they're a professional powerlifter or something.

[Even construction workers tend to rely more on equipment to lift things now, so he can't exactly picture them taking a metal stretch of railway line too far themselves unless it was more than one person.] But I like to keep in shape even if I don't really "need" it. It feels way better to be working out than being a couch potato.

[stopfen]

We had a small train on the rail carrying the rails and beams. Then I'd move them to where they needed to go, the others would adjust and hammer them together. [Fun facts~ Oak sleeper beams weight more than metal railway lines. Mikasa can carry six of them in a heatwave.]

...I'm not sure what that means. I've been good at carrying things for... A long time. [There's a lull as she dwells on that for a moment. Then tries to hide it. Frowning.]

Why don't you need it? Everyone should be capable of working...Even if most nobles aren't... [Are you a noble Momo?]

[yesdoubt]

[At least they had that much, though Momo isn't too surprised, since extremely basic rail has been around for a while. He has to laugh at the quip about nobles, though - while he's not a noble in the technical sense, he's rich and famous enough in his own world that it's probably comparable.]

Well, talking generally, making humans do work like that is dangerous and can damage their bodies in the long run, so in my time we have machines that people operate to do the lifting instead. The thing I mentioned, a crane, is a sort of tall lifting machine that can take huge amounts of weight to really high-up places, so we use them a lot to make super tall buildings. It's still work for the builders, but a different kind, more about the putting things together and the details than just the heavy lifting. As for me personally, I'm in a job where I'm supposed to be cute and unthreatening, so being tough doesn't really benefit my work much.

[Though he does get some unique clout from being both cute and sporty, which is a nice bonus.]

[stopfen]

How long is the long run? [It's not a trick question. She was serious. She was considered...Well not old. But older than the average. Sure that had gotten better. But the military training age was twelve. While those that lived past their first year on active duty, tended to live a while. The ones that didn't really pushed the average down.]

You mean like pulley? To lift horses and supplies over walls? I need to use them. Even if I can carry it, it's too steep for me to get over. [Then she tilts her head at him. And he's getting another question.] Cute? [doubt]

[yesdoubt]

Hmm...people usually start working full-time when they're around 20 or maybe a tiny bit younger, and that kind of damage can show up by your late 30s or early 40s. So fifteen or twenty years?

[A fairly long "long run", but modern worlds do tend to have higher life expectancy, so Momo's not going to assume twenty years isn't a good half of someone's lifetime in Mikasa's time, or possibly more than that.

A pulley is a close enough concept, so Momo nods a little...and then gets thrown off his answer by that terrible insult to his person, which he responds to by puffing out his cheeks in a huge pout, his voice rising to a high, childishly affected whine.] Momo-chan is plenty cute to people who don't hate cute gestures!

[He's holding the wink thing against her. But he puffs his breath out after a moment to return to the point about pulleys.] Pulleys are similar, cranes are just more advanced and can take a lot more weight, and they have their own structure so you can use them to build things high and not just pull something up something that's already high.

[stopfen]

...[Just...He just gets the flattest of flat stares.] I'm nineteen. I've been in the military for seven years... [The aot life expectancy was bad.

Then he does the cheek puff. No. She's lifting a hand to smush them, ruin it! Bit then he stops and goes back to talking. So she frowns at him.]

But how do you build them high enough for that?

[yesdoubt]

You what!? [Momo looks absolutely and unabashedly horrified at that, one hand over his mouth before he realises he should probably explain the volatility of his reaction.] It's a war crime in my world for anyone younger than eighteen to be in the military...ah, eighteen is when people are considered adults in most parts of my world.

[He almost looks reluctant to shift topics after that revelation, but concedes to explaining how cranes work, at least.] The really tall ones go up in pieces, and some of them can be lifted from the ground so new pieces can go in at the bottom. It's weird to explain, but it works.

[stopfen]

[That just makes Mikasa blink, squinting at the sudden volume. ] ...We're considered adults once we finish training. [Not really though. It was more of a thing to make it sound better when most of them died.] I've seen children in other countries' militates. [The girl and boy who'd snuck on to the airship with a rifle...AoT!

But the other part just gets a nod. Yes, makes sense. Like most buildings. Put the framework up, climb up and build. And hope no one falls off.]

[yesdoubt]

[Momo looks a bit pale at that, but he supposes it's not entirely dissimilar to the history of his own world, and he grimaces a bit at the thought.] Some of my world's ancient civilisations started military training at that kind of age, and I guess the actual laws against it came in fairly recently...there's definitely no country left that would allow its entire military structure to rest on something like that, though. Kids go through an education system until they're eighteen in most places, and then military training happens after that if someone wants to join.

[It's not like some countries don't still conscript, either, but that follows those particular rules of war as well. He's used to child soldiers being a terrifying minority that a few places still haven't managed to prevent yet.]

[stopfen]

What is an education system? I can guess what it means, but... [Her parents had taught her. Then they'd been taught a few other things after joining training. They kinda needed their soldiers to be able to read the plans after all. ]

[yesdoubt]

It's basically a series of academies - institutions, schools, whatever you call them - you go to during the day to learn stuff that's useful in life and work, from when you're five or six to about eighteen. Reading, writing, working with numbers, learning stuff about the rest of the world and history...things like that. Every country's system is a little bit different, but most of them have that same duration of about thirteen years.

[While he's not going to get into the real nitty-gritty of it unless she asks, since it'd probably be boring and not make a lot of sense minus context, he tries to at least make it a decently clear concept of how big a thing it is in the childhood of everyone in his world.]

[stopfen]

Aren't your parents supposed to teach you those things?

[She tilted her head slightly. Because all that seemed...Well pretty basic. She hadn't met anyone who didn't know these things. Sure, some might know more than others. Depending on where they'd lived, but she couldn't see how that would change.]

[yesdoubt]

In my world, they only kinda lay the groundwork - like, most kids will start reading before they start school, their parents get them onto that. But it's more structured with a proper education system, and you have people who are actually trained to teach kids. Some parents aren't gonna be as cut out for that as others, you know? And having a different teacher for each subject means they have more specialised knowledge for when the work gets more complicated.

[There's the whole issue of schools also being mostly aimed at funneling people through exams and getting them into tertiary education so they can go out and continue the job cycle, but still. He feels like there's benefits to it compared to just assuming everyone's parents will do right by them, because he unfortunately knows better than to think that.]

[stopfen]

[Mikasa just nods, thinking what he says over. It made sense. And maybe it was a thing in larger towns. But she'd been raised in the woods, and Shinganshina wasn't exactly the richest of areas. And after the wall...Well. Education kinda went out the window.]

Back when I was in training, there were people who'd come in and explain the gear and talk to us. Is it like that?

I can see how it'd help, but I don't understand how they'd get so many children that close together.

[yesdoubt]

Yeah, kind of like that. [Definitely closer than unstructured homeschooling would be, at least, since even that's fairly tightly regulated in most places he knows of in his world. Which is why he hasn't yet brought it up, since it'd probably require more explaining as to why parents don't just get total free reign.]

Kids that are the right age have to attend school, so either their parents take them there or they take themselves there, but everyone goes there. Bigger countries have thousands of schools to make sure there's not too many in just the one school, and then they're divided by year group, which is basically how many years they've been in school. And then those are split into classes, which are usually around thirty kids to one teacher, though they can be a tiny bit bigger sometimes.

[stopfen]

Thats... A lot of children. It sounds like a nice thing. [She liked kids. Wanted her own someday, as unlikely as that was. But that wasn't a topic for now.

Not that she really wanted to talk too much about the other thing. But she swallows. Her voice getting tight.]

There was nothing like that near me when I was young. Only my father left the woods to go to town, and that was only if he really needed to...

[yesdoubt]

Well, my world has a lot of people. [It sounds like Mikasa's might be on a smaller scale, which would make sense if it's comparatively less advanced. It's not like the world didn't have a ton of people before the 21st century, but it did blow up a bit in recent years.

The emotional shift in her tone is hard to miss, and Momo gives a slight, understanding smile.] That sounds like a pretty isolated place to grow up. My world is really interconnected, so it must've been a totally different experience.

[stopfen]

[There's a non-committal noise from her. Nah, not elaborating there. ]

How was it so interconnected? Were there things like the internet?

[Thank you, to the person who told her the basics of that.]

[yesdoubt]

Yeah, the internet was invented a few decades ago in my world. There's a lot of young people who don't even remember a world without it. [He's at least thankful someone else explained that one, because he's found he's not the greatest at explaining things without using other modern terminology that might be confusing.]

So it's pretty normal for people to do things like have friends in other countries or go overseas a lot. Even people who live out in isolated areas can contact others quickly, or have ways to get into the big cities that aren't too troublesome.