Well, it's still all metal.

"Nobody can do everythin'. Thanks for trying, that's probably enough attempts, though."

"Any time. So where do I sleep, is there a room I can borrow?"

"Was gonna give ya the bed and sleep on the hay in the shed. Or other way around if you didn't work that much. Sound alright?"

"I'll take the hay, all the times I've been on beds before are bad memories."

A naked girl slave, who hates beds. Well then. Kar's not going to bring it up, though.

"If you say so. Night's not for another few hours, though. I'm gonna put these away and go make preserves, you can do whatever. Just... Careful of the edge. And the pigs. And no fire."

"I'll be careful of the edge and the pigs and not set any fires."

He nods. "Later, then."

He gathers up the attempts at tools and goes inside his little house and starts doing various things to berries.

Valanda vainly wishes he were a knowledge mage. Instead he lies down and watches the sky. The part of the sky that's above him.

There are clouds! There are a variety of birds and floating critters and plants above and around! There are other islands in the distance.

Any of the other islands close enough for him to see what's on them?

Not in very much detail. He can tell a large, lumpy one over there has a small forest on top (and leaning perilously over the side). There's some kind of big tentacled creature resting on that one over there. That one is just bare, blackened rock with a few... Orange things... On it?

He watches the creatures, trying to figure out if they're people, if they're dangerous, if they mind being watched...

None of the creatures do anything particularly people-like. They fly around, they make noise, they eat things (sometimes other critters). The two-foot-long ones with teeth and clawed tentacles that swarmed a diamond-shaped gliding thing and ate it are probably dangerous!

None of them seem to notice they're being watched. Though, after it finishes eating, the one resting on an island clings close to it and turns brownish-green. He probably wouldn't be able to spot it if he didn't know already.

It's nice to watch it all.

He watches the sky until he's ready to go hit the hay.

Kar offers him a taste of preserves - something like strawberry jam, made with some kind of slightly different tangy but very sweet fruit instead - on a piece of hard bread just before nightfall.

The night is uneventful.

It's such a good uneventful night. On such a good island. With such a good host.

It's raining in the morning. And kind of windy. Kar stays inside, wood carving. Seems to be making handles, to try and make tools out of of the various metal bits he has now.

He's not sure what to do with himself. He sits and waits in case Kar comes to ask him for something.

A hermit's life on an island is pretty boring, isn't it?

The rain stops after a couple of hours.

He goes out and looks around. Are the same creatures out? Are the islands the same distance away?

The islands have all moved around! There's a new one and some are missing. That island waaaay over there has a dozen buildings on it, barely distinguishable as squarish shapes in a line against the sky.

The burnt island with the orange things is closer. Now he can see that they are also red, and spiky, and frightening to all the other critters.

Kar's flag flaps in the wind.

He likes the terrifying orange things!

He takes a look at the flag. Maybe he can make some guesses about the people here from what Kar expects will get their attention.

The terrifying orange things do not evince an opinion on Valanda.

The flag is brown and has a crude picture of a pig on it. There's a second one right under it that has a depiction of berries.

That's better than if they thought he was tasty!

With the light-on-dark design that flag could stand out to most species, so there's no telling what sorts of people he'll meet here.

Kar emerges from his house a while later with lunch. The titanium has already paid for it.

And then he starts doing various farm work.