"I can probably handle marshy if it's necessary."

Nod. "Still, there are probably some hiking stuff that might help. I will look into that."

"You guys have fancy shoes. I bet some fancy shoes will help."

"You mean like hiking boots? We have those."

"So many nice things. It's a lot easier to use a thing to do a thing instead of using magic."

"I am noticing."

Boots are acquired.

(So are some light snacks.)

He closes his eyes and thinks for ten seconds and spends five white points and says- "That direction. I've got a mental map. Away we go!"

Carrying their supplies, Adam follows.

He is ten steps out of their yard before realizing that this is suspiciously adventure like. But now he is committed.

Walking is a bit more exciting when you're walking towards someone with interesting new magic. "Wanna chat about clockwork and stuff while we walk? I thought about that intangible connection thing. I could probably do it right now actually, but it's probably better to write about it some like the scry."

"Of course, I was thinking if there was a way to disengage..." and they proceed on the clockwork conversation.

They make their way out of town. Nico will see some of the people he saw last night. Most children appear to be going on the opposite direction: to the beach.

As the houses get sparser their surroundings get greener and more dominated by wild trees and shrubbery. They approach the lake and start making their way to an area with much denser vegetation. Sometimes Adam will wave and say hello to animals who sometimes wave and say hello back.

He steers their journey slightly right. "Talking animals are normal here? They fey?"

"They are... fey-ish? This island has an entrace to fairyland and sometimes those have talking animals."

"Huh. None of these are gonna try and do fey things to us though?"

"Talking animals are harmless. Well, they are dangerous like humans are."

"Fair enough... The direction keeps going right. Think the house is moving?"

"I guess? I don't know how often she moves her house."

The terrain beneath them is getting muddier, though not that hard to transverse. "I think if it keeps going like this... her house might be on the lake?"

"Tch. Flying is expensive. I think I'll try yelling first, if it is." Tromp, tromp, tromp.

Tromp, Tromp, splosh, shaking the right leg until that goo falls away, tromp, tromp... they reach the edge of what can be considered water, though the trees here rise from the shallows themselves. There are some oddly out of context lily pads making a path across the water's surface. They are huge.

"What do ya think, Adam? Trust the circle plants, or don't?"

"It sounds witchy enough..." he agrees.

"Alright, let's go then." He confidently strides onto the first lily pad.

The lilypad is obviously magical, it sinks, but it's like sinking on a cushioned surface instead of a liquid. Nico's boots don't even touch the water.

Adam tries it as well, experimentally. The leaves can hold the two boys. And they lead up head deeper into the water.

"Just to be sure, you can do something if a water creature tries to attack us? I don't think there are any in the lake."

"If a water creature attacks us I can make us both fly for like a minute and get somewhere solid to run away from."

"Okay, just checking."

And they follow the lilypads into the water... right into the water the trail abruptly stops in the middle of water.

"Huh."

Nico catches a glimpse of something under the water, not a creature, but... something shiny?