"Hi?" a small piping voice calls back. It's jaunty, almost inherently cheerful, but also questioning, much as the girl's must sound. A dozen or so yards in front of her, a child's head pokes out of the tall grass, framed by a mass of curly, cornsilk hair. While they (gender being difficult to discern from that distance) aren't smiling right that second, their lips and whole face seem built for the expression. "Is someone else here?"

"Yeah!" she says, standing up and waving. "Do you know where we are? Do you know anything, actually, I just know the language and what colors are and weird stuff like that - "

The boy--and with his nakedness, it's quite obvious now he's a boy--steps out of the long grass. "Not really, he replies. "Don't even know if there are any other places, actually."

She's quite naked, too. Other than annoyance at the scratchy grass, it doesn't really strike her as a problem.

"Huh. Do you think it's just us?"

The boy thinks about it for a moment. "Maybe if there was just one of us, but there's two, so could be three, or four." He giggles. "It's funny knowing numbers like this."

"Yeah! Two's a weird number. There could be ten! Or a hundred! Or - or," and she stops to think of the biggest, hugest number she can, "Or fifty quintillion!"

The boy laughs. "Or fifty quintillion... and one!"

"Nah. That's too big."

"Should we go look for others?"

"Yeah! Let's. I wanna know what's making the trickling and chirping noises, too!"

The boy runs into the distance, suddenly aware of how much energy he has.

She runs after! She's not quite as coordinated, tripping a few times, but the few bumps and scrapes she develops just elicit giggles and fascinated poking at the one scraped knee that draws blood.

"Cool! I wonder what it's doing? And why it's slowing..."

Something inside the boy recoils from the sight of the graze. And yet another part is fascinated by the sight of the girl... changed. The way the red contrasts with her skin, while matching her hair...

"Hey," he says. "What do I look like?"

"You're pale. Like me. A couple spots on your face, freckles I think? Light yellow hair, I think the word's blond. Your hair's curlier than mine." Or at least what she can see of the strands.

He decides to return the favour. "Your hair's really red. And your cheeks are kinda red too? And your eyes are dark. And the things between our legs are different but you probably saw. I wonder why all that stuff is so different? Do you think anyone else will look different or like you or me?"

"It'd be cool if we all look different! Someone looking like me would be weird."

"Yeah, it'd be confusing. Hope you're not the only one with red hair, though. It's nice."

"Wonder why our hair's different colors? There's gotta be something in it that's different..."

The boy proceeds to move in close to the girl, so she can get a good look at his hair.

Hair is frustratingly hard to focus on up close! Stupid eyes with their stupid focal lengths.

"The texture's a bit different," she comments after some poking.

With that tentative discovery, the children continue their search. With how much... each other they have to sift through, it's perhaps unsurprising they drift from looking for others to following the trickling sound.

It's a stream, that flashes and sparkles a bit in the light, falling over some very pretty and interesting rocks in little waterfalls. The girl promptly picks up one of the rocks, turning it over and examining how it glitters in the light.

Then, there's a flash of color in the water, and another, and when she leans in closer she spots little moving things with rainbow scales.

A word occurs to her: "Minnows!" She doesn't, actually, know what minnows are, but they're pretty! She darts her hand in, tries to grab one, but it avoids her. They're quick, and aiming under the water's strangely difficult.

There's a word welling inside the boy, beating against his chest trying to escape. It quickly succeeds:

"Pretty!"

He jumps into the stream, trying to grab at the minnows as well. Even as he fails, he suddenly realises how amazing the feeling of water around his his ankles is, and how much fun splashing is.

Splash! Fascinated tangent about water! She cups some in her palm, lets it run down, pokes at the beads on her skin.

"It's cold!" she notices.

The boy proceeds to splash at his companion. It's funny. Not just because it is funny, for reasons he can't put into words. He wants to irritate the girl, but only because he likes her. Odd.

She gets annoyed at the first splash, then splashes back, and is quickly giggling.

He flinches at the cold drops on his chest and face, but somehow the discomfort makes him giggle, too. 

Methodical testing of how to make the best splashes!

Then, there's a noise in the distance - a prolonged rustling, and something very like a voice on the wind. Maybe even a 'hello?'

Big wave. "Hi!"

"Hi!" the girl calls, craning her neck and standing on her tiptoes to see.

"People!" someone responds, more clearly now, "I told you so!" The rustling heads towards them, and one kid then another emerges from the grass. They're both a bit smaller and rounder than the two in the stream, shaped most like the girl. One has light brown skin with cool undertones, very dark eyes, and long, straight black hair, while the other has darker, warmly brown skin with a smattering of barely visible freckles, light amber eyes, and very, very curly hair a shade of brown that's faintly red where the light catches it. "Hi!" says the curly-haired one, grinning broadly. "I knew there had to be other people somewhere! She thought you guys might be monsters."

"I did not!" complains the straight-haired girl. "I just said we shouldn't be shouting, what if there's something out there?"

"Yeah!" The boy searches his memory for things that are alive, but not like him and the other children. "Like rhinos... and cats!" Cats can be big, right? "Looks like you were right about people looking different," he says to the girl. 

"Yeah! It's really cool, I wonder why our skin and hair and eyes are all different and what's going on with that..." the red-haired girl says.

"I think vampire ghosts would be worse than even rhinos," says straight-haired girl seriously. "Or things with teeth, that hide in the grass and jump at you!"

Curly-haired girl looks a bit fondly exasperated. "Well, we found humans first, so."

The straight-haired girl bites her lip, mumbles, "But I gotta be ready so I can protect you..." Her skin warms up, red rushing to her cheeks.

The first girl lights up, says, "How is your face doing that?" and seems to be very valiantly holding herself back from poking the other girl's cheek.

"It's weird, isn't it?" The boy points to his companion. "Your cheeks kinda look red like that all the time. And what's a vampire? Or a ghost?"

"Huh. But why the change?" asks his companion.

The straight-haired girl, though, simply says, serious, "Vampires suck your blood out. Ghosts can go invisible and untouchable and can throw around distant stuff."

"Why would they want our blood? Is there no food around?" His stomach grumbles. "Food I think would be good right now."

"Blood is vampire food!" straight haired girl explains. "I dunno what's human food really, though?"

"When we were on that hill earlier, I saw some trees and bushes," says the curly haired girl. "They had colorful bits. I think fruit's colorful?"

The boy's companion nods. "Orange is both a fruit and a color," she says. "So that makes sense."

"...I know fruit tastes and smells good? I don't think I've seen any, though."

"I haven't seen any either! But things that taste good are probably more likely to be food?" says his companion.

The curly haired girl nods. "Yeah. C'mon, it was this way, if we want food now?"

"I do, I do!"

"Lead the way," says his friend.

The trees and bushes are a bit of a trek, but not too bad of one. They ring the top of a rather tall hill, and his friend gets sidetracked by looking out at all the things. There's a dark line on the horizon in the distance - "Mountains!" she identifies after a moment - and more trees off to one side that look vaguely ominous. The horizon curves both noticeably and differently depending on where they look.

The trees and bushes do indeed have fruit - berries in blue and red and purple on the bushes, fist-sized fruits in red and green and orange and yellow and pink on the trees, which might be apples. Most of the good apples aren't in grabbing distance, but the trees look invitingly climbable. 

The boy tries clambering up the trunk and shaking off some of the good apples. He manages to dislodge a few, but in the process winds up with some splinters in rather sensitive areas. Pain is... not good. He's known discomfort since waking up, but nothing so sharp. Expected and unsuprising, yet unwelcome and new.

"Are you okay?" his friend asks, worried.

"I--I think so? " There's some tears welling in his eyes, so that's new, but he doesn't seem set to bawl.

"Maybe we should figure something out so we're not getting scratches and splinters," she says, remembering all the times she scraped her knees trying to run amok.

Maurice recovers pretty quickly once the splinters are out and he's scoffing down some fruit, his chin and bare chest stained by the juices. "Eating is good! And maybe some kinda... covering?"

He feels conflicted about this idea, but he's proud of it.

"Yeah! That's what I was thinking," his companion says, methodically trying each color of fruit to see what tastes like what.

The girls quickly start discussing what things they've run across that could be used. Straight-haired girl thinks most of the grasses are too scratchy, while curly-haired girl remembers that the nook she woke up in had some softer grasses. They could attach the strands together somehow, maybe?

Maurice keeps trying to contribute, but he's having trouble making it clear which girl he's addressing or referring to.

The curly haired girl has this problem, too! (Straight haired girl solves this by numbering each of them. She's three, curly haired girl is four, red haired girl is one, boy is two. The newly dubbed one and four both complain about numbers being a silly way to distinguish between people.)

"Well, things have words that mean the thing. Maybe girls could have those too?" He just realises that he's a boy in contrast. "And if there's more than one girl, there's probably more boys?"

"Probably, yeah. Hm. I want a new word, I think." His companion starts trying a bunch of sounds. The curly-haired and (reluctantly) the straight-haired girl do, too.

"I'm Laashya," the curly haired girl announces after a bit. "I think Bina's good for you!" the newly dubbed Laashya says to her straight-haired friend. "You don't have to keep trying a bunch."

"Maybe," says possibly Bina. "It does sound nice..."

His companion takes longer, because there's so many variants of possible names, but she does eventually settle on 'Malen.'

Despite having not seen that many, the boy knows he likes colours. He searches his contextless collection of knowledge for colourful things, things he's never seen but knows, like words only read and never heard pronounced.

"I wanna be Opal."

"Okay!" says Malen. "That's a good name. Opals are rainbow stones, right?"

"I think so! Really hope nothing in our heads is wrong."

"That'd be bad, yeah," Malen says, nodding.

"Though it might be nice if Bina's wrong about a few things," Laashya points out, to a quiet 'hey!' from Bina.

"Maybe vampires are actually friendly!"

"We shouldn't presume!" Malen nods seriously.

"They definitely drink blood," Bina says, crossing her arms.

"But what if they lick scrapped knees?"

"I guess that could work," says Bina dubiously.

Malen just nods. "And I'd trade blood for answers to stuff, too, maybe they know bunches!"

The vampire debate goes for some time, between bouts of chasing and exploration and fruit gorging. Eventually, the light starts to fade, and the strength seeps from their limbs.

Being sleepy is so weird. Malen ends up asleep leaning against the trunk of an apple tree, while Bina and Laashya yawn and lean into each other.

Opal curls up beside Malen. He wonders if he'll remember anything when he wakes up.

There is much exploring in the morning.

Malen gradually leads them in the direction of the forest. It's more interesting than the plains, and nearer than the mountains, after all. There's a lot of bouncing between convenient copses of various fruit and nut trees on the way. 

The forest is very dark and very ominous, with grey branches reaching like grasping fingers and thorns curling around the base. There's a hint of a path, if you squint, half overgrown. It's very still, and the little birds that populate the plains don't seem to come here.

Bina eyes it dubiously. "I don't think I want to go in there," she says. "There's probably vampires. Or werewolves. Or goo monsters."

"I don't know what any of those look like, so it'd be cool to see one," Malen replies.

Opal tilts his head like a curious bird. "What could a goo monster even do to you? It's goo. Also, there might be stuff I could use to make things pretty."

After breakfast, Opal had insisted in streaking everyone's cheeks with dried fruit sap. 

Malen has rubbed at the dried fruit sap a bit, smearing it. It's itchy.

"It'd engulf you and then eat you!" Bina insists. "And the pretty stuff in there is probably all a trap!"

"A trap? By who?"

"Awful things that want to eat you," Bina explains.

"I'm not sure anything wants to eat us at all," Malen says.

"Have we seen anything that wasn't an us or minnow or a sky-minnow." 

"Nope," Malen says, popping her 'p'. "And I think the sky-minnows are birds."

"That's a much better word!"

"Uh-huh. You guys don't have to come," Malen says to Bina and Laashya. "I want to see what's in there, though."

Bina visibly hesitates. "I don't want you facing those things alone, though."

"I'll go with her. If we don't get eaten, we'll meet you back by the stream?"

"I think that's good. We can try making clothes while you're exploring!" Laashya says. Bina nods after a moment.

"Good," Malen says. "We'll try to be back in a few days?"

"Less if it's boring."

"We'll send in the cavalry in a week!" Laashya says, taking Bina's hand and leading her away as she waves.

("What's a cavalry?" Bina asks as they leave.)

("Dunno. Rescue?" Laashya replies. "I think it's just a phrase. Came to me.")

"See you guys!" Malen calls, waving back.

Opal trots along behind her into what he's decided are the Spooky Woods.

The Spooky Woods creak and groan spookily! It's very aesthetic.

Malen spots all sorts of new things, pointing out different types of trees by their leaves, guessing at creatures that dart by in the distance ("That was kinda like a deer? Though I thought deer were brown..." "Wait do foxes have antlers?")

They have to wade across a stream at one point, broader and deeper than the little brook. Luckily they're able to find a point where it's shallower to cross, the path veering along the bank for a while.

As it's getting close to nighttime, there's a mossy clearing near the river, with strange long, white rocks scattered about on one edge, grown over with little nodding flowers. Malen, ever curious, peers at them. One rock's rounder, and - "It looks kinda like a face! See, those're the eyes, that's like a nose, that's - teeth..."

Opal turns the rock over in his hands. "Two sets of teeth," he says, indicating the slightly larger teeth recessed above the main ones. "And look at these, it's like someone laid these rocks so they looked like a hand!" He claps. "Maybe someone else wants to make things pretty!"

"It is a very sort of fitting pretty for a spooky forest, I guess," she concedes. "Some of the trees looked like they have fingers, maybe someone made them that way?"

Opal nods. "And that means there's people here! People who make pretty things!"

"Yeah! Maybe here really long, they might know a lot!"

Opal calls out. It hasn't failed him yet. "Hellloooo!"

There isn't a response, other than the wildlife briefly quieting. 

"Come out, come out, wherever you are!"

"Maybe they left?"

"Yeah, maybe." Opal seems a little put out by that.

"We can go look for them! Maybe they left more pretty things. Though it's late right now..."

Sleep is had. Then more exploring. It's like time travel!

If Malen knew about the concept of time travel, she'd have so many questions, so it might be for the best that she hasn't ever thought of traveling anywhere other than forwards in time.

There's more random bursts of flowers as they walk, sometimes in sun patches and sometimes in the shade, oftentimes with the same style of pretty white rocks, sometimes not.

"Someone must really have liked their person rocks," Malen says, looking at another arrangement. This rock arrangement is lying on its 'front,' one 'hand' outstretched towards a long stick.

Opal picks up the stick, hoping he isn't ruining someone's pretty-exercise (he's sure there's a better word for it) 

"Boy, this stick is sharp," he says, tapping the end of the stick with his thumb.

"Probably really good for poking things with!" (Malen has seen more than a few things up out of her reach that she really wants to poke.)

"We could use it to get fruit!"

"Yeah! That way we won't have to climb."

"I wonder how the girls are going with those clothes thing."

"Do you want to head back and ask? It's only been two days, but if we go much farther we might take too long returning."

"Might be a good idea, yeah."

"Okay! We can come back here later."

As they walk back, though, there's a sound through the trees - one an awful lot like voices.

Standard greeting protocol ensures. "HELLLLOOO!"

An echo of his own voice, then silence, and the voices resume. Slightly farther away.

"They're that way!" Malen says, pointing. "C'mon, we might be able to catch them!"

Opal takes off running.

"Hey wait up!" Malen says, tripping along behind him. Forest floors are even worse for running on than plains.

Opal is a bit carried away with himself.

The voices get closer and then farther and then closer, and by the time he's really, really far away from the trail, they're right past that bush - 

Then a clearing, and they dart around him in a circle, and then vanish into silence.

Malen is still shouting for him, but her voice is faded and distant.

And there's something glinting dully in the corner of Malen's eye.

She trips, skins her knee and scrapes her palms again and just. Sits back and grumbles, then glances over at the glinty thing.

It's... not like the birds. A bit like the minnows, though. A thick cord of muscle gilded in black scale.

That's pretty!

Opal had the stick, so she watches it with her head tilted while she waits for her hands and knees to stop stinging so badly. She then gets up and walks over to it.

The scaled think looks at her, before letting out a long, rattling hiss, it's thin, forked tongue shaking in the air.

Cool! She hasn't seen any animals other than the birds and minnows.

"Hi! What're you?" she asks, not being able to recall the thing's name immediately. "You're pretty." And she crouches down in front of it, trying to get a closer look at the scales.

Like a fork of lightning, it strikes, biting girl on the hand.

Ow! Mean, bitey land minnow!

She screams, loud and high-pitched, and falls back.

The land minnow slithers away into the undergrowth.

A few seconds later, Opal wanders back, worried. "Malen?"

Whimpering, sweating, breathing harshly, and in general not doing very well at all. She doesn't react to his approach.

These... do not seem like things that should be happening. He shakes her side gently. "Malen? Why are you all wet? Were you in a stream?"

Gasp and a sobbing cry.

Hug. "Do--do you need fruit?"

She keeps crying. Eventually, she starts getting quieter, having more trouble breathing.

Opal somehow isn't reassured. Some muddled knowledge drives him to try compressing her chest.

Not helping!

He then tries lifting her to her feet. Maybe one of the girls will know what to do.

She flops and is in general dead weight.

Before he gets her very far, she shudders and then stops breathing.

Mouth to mouth is a thing he sort of knows!

She's still.

And then her skin becomes sort of faded and papery and starts to slowly turn to dust.

A scream! Almost as loud and high pitched as the one that brought him here!

She continues crumbling, until her ashen flesh flakes off leaving only cold white. Like the rock arrangements from before. The bones fall to the ground, and flowers almost immediately sprout to twine around them, a riot of reds and oranges and peachy pinks.

Opal proceeds to have a Horrifying Realization about the other rocks, and breaks down weeping.

Malen, meanwhile, wakes up somewhere thoroughly strange.

Specifically, she wakes up in a flooded field, beneath a grey, slate sky. Literally. There appears to be a stone ceiling above her, stretching out unto infinity in all directions. Instead of stars, there are thousands upon thousands of diamonds set into the sky. No sun or moon in sight, but dull light seems to permeate everything. Stalks of yellow grass surround her, and in the distance, she sees what looks like a mountain. An unusually circular mountain. 

Luckily, the water isn't too deep.

Not hurting anymore is nice.

She gets up, calls out, "Hello? Opal? Anyone there?"

She hears a voice coming from some reeds. "Uh, hi? Not Opal, whoever that is."

"Uh. My friend. Do you know where we are? I was in the Spooky Forest, then I saw a land-minnow and got bit and it hurt and now I'm here."

What is probably a boy emerges from the reeds. His skin is covered with a thin layer of black fur, catlike eyes catching and throwing back the dim light of the chamber. "Oh, you never die before?" he asks. "This is the underworld." A tail swishes behind him, somewhat like the land-minnow. 

"That's what happened? Dying? Nope. And you're really cool, you don't look like any of the people I've seen!" Which admittedly hasn't been many.

The creature looks her over, whistling.  "Wow, you must be real new."

She doesn't like that tone. "What do you mean?"

"You look new. No improvements."

"...You can get improvements?"

"...Yeah. So you can survive better."

"Surviving wasn't a problem in the plains! It was just that weird land-minnow!"

"What's a land-minnow? And the plains? Survival isn't a problem? How?"

"It was long and shiny and hissing, and I don't know its name so it's a minnow. The plains are where we woke up, they've got grass and streams and a bunch of fruit. I guess survival could be a problem if you were really bad at finding fruit, but even the Spooky Forest has fruit, it's just all spiky."

"Sounds nice," he sounds a touch jealous. "Never heard of a place like that. And I think that was a snake."

"Snake! That's it's name. And you said died before, if you can die a lot how do you get back? You could come with me maybe? Or find somewhere else to go."

"Could do... and there's some boy-thing called a god that shouts at--"

A plume of water bursts from the surface, falling to reveal a boy--somehow more real and terrible than anything Malen has seen before in her short life. Darkness whips around him, along with the pale shades of what look like the memory of children... wriggling their smokey fingers and going "woooooh"

"You talkin' about me?" 

The creature prostrates himself before the figure. "No, Lord Veles, I swear!"

Malen is extremely Not Impressed.

"The land-minnow was spookier," she tells him haughtily. 

"Mind your tongue, mortal."

"I am. You're not scary."

"I control your future!"

"That sounds fake."

"It's not," the furred boy whispers out the corner of his mouth.

Veles rolls his eyes. "You a firstie?"

"First time dying, if that's what you mean."

A sigh. "Follow me."

Arms cross, then "Fine. Where're we going? Who're you anyways, how'd you do the water thing?"

"To the Exit, duh. And I'm Veles, the god of death and reincarnation."

"I'm Malen. Human. What's a god? What's reincarnation?"

"In order: better than you, and how the dead go back to the Gardens."

"The Gardens are where we started? And that's not an answer, 'cause you're not, and also that doesn't tell me what's different!"

"I am so better than you. I'm never going to die, and I made the underworld. And yes, the Gardens is 'where you started'. The Garden of Sophia, specifically."

"Wait, I thought it was the Garden of Bilas?"

"Different garden, cat-boy."

"There's other gardens?!"

"What're Sophia and Bilas?"

"Don't know who Sophia is. Bilas is the god of war."

"Sophia is storytelling."

"Stories? Like of heroic deeds?"

"Not my job to explain, mortal."

"You're a jerk."

"And you're dead!"

"How's that matter? I'm still talking and moving around, aren't I? And what's it mean, to be a god of something?"

"To be in charge. And I guess if it doesn't matter you can hang out in the reeds forever."

He starts walking towards the maybe-mountain.

She stomps after him. "How do I get back to my garden? Opal was there, he's probably really worried."

"Stop asking dumb questions and follow me and we'll get you back."

"Questions aren't dumb!"

"Sorry to break it to ya, but yours are."

As they walk, more children emerge from the reeds, some as odd looking as the catboy, others no more unexpected than any human Malen's seen. 

There's a girl and a boy, both with skin darker than Laashya's and short, tightly curled hair, emerging from the reeds. They're talking - more arguing - the boy saying, "I know you don't wanna go back, Kenet, but I think it's important for me, I'm figuring a lot out about injuries and my team could really use someone like me around. I know we reset, but - I don't want them hurt."

"You've just been getting sad's all, Eman, and... I'd say sure if it was important, but it's really not, it's just some god's game. We don't have to play," the girl, likely Kenet, says.

"Well, maybe you can look at some other gardens? And I can start trying to teach people. It'll be good to get knowledge from lots of places, too," the boy - Eman - concedes. Kenet nods.

The girl notices the two kids and one god, then, and - "Hey! Veles! Are you telling kids about options yet?" Before he can answer, she turns to Hazel and Malen. "If he's walking you I bet one'a you's new. You can switch bodies, I think all the gods allow it, I woke up first time in a boy's body, so if one of you wants to be a boy or a girl or something else that's possible. And there's a lot of gardens, they're all different. Most've 'em have humans or altered humans, but I think one has wolves?"

"I didn't know there were even other gardens!"

"Doesn't Bilas hang out in your garden? Why do I have to tell everyone everything?"

"You're a centralized resource! You should be a guide to the afterlife and what comes after!"

"Well if you're so helpful why don't you become a ghost and go around telling all the deadies what's up?"

The smokey children that linger around Veles suddenly resolve themselves much more clearly... and much more smugly.

"That shouldn't be my job, I don't have the magical ability to sense where everyone in the underworld is. And I have bigger plans."

"What do you think, ghostly minions?"

"Veles is the best," says one ghost, with a Spooky layered voice.

"He shouldn't have to sit around holding your hands," says another.

"Yeah! He's the god of death, not the god of babysitting!" says a third.

Kenet rolls her eyes. "Your chorus needs more material."

"I think they just know what's up."

Veles and his chorus lead the shades to the base of the Definitely More of a Wheel than a Mountain. Its face is segmented into many differently coloured slices, though with how washed out the light is down here it's hard to tell, covered in strange, scratched markings. At its base is what looks like a hole, water draining into it from the flooded field. Rising from behind the wheel are stone pipes leading up into the ceiling. 

"Everybody line up!"

"Which garden are you from? What's it like?" Kenet asks Malen while they walk (having steady solicited both kids' names).

"Sophia's, I guess. There's lots of stuff, but it's pretty safe I think?"

"Think I might go back with you, then, at least this loop."

There's a rumble and a flash, and a girl wearing a many layered, fluffy dress appears floating above the water in front of them. "Have we heard correctly? Does someone petition to enter our august realm?"

"Hi Sophia," Veles says, casually. "Yeah, I think a few of Bilas' lot want to bail."

"Only the worthy may enter!" she declares. "And you have not passed the test!"

"What do we kill?" asks the catboy, or Hazel as he says his name is.

"No killing! Instead each who wishes to enter must answer my riddles three!"

"And riddles are..."

"Questions that you answer. They're a test of your intelligence and wit!"

"Oh, Billas said those were important for killing things that are stronger than you."

"Bilas is stupid. They're important for everything."

"Can I try them? And last boy who said Bilas was stupid ended up here."

"That's why he's stupid. And a butt face. And of course you can try. Your first riddle is: I run without legs, I have a bed but I never sleep and a mouth but I never talk. What am I?"

"...Do snakes sleep?"

"I think the one that bit me was sleeping. And they don't have beds," Malen says dubiously. "It won't be something obvious. Maybe something not alive?"

"Something dead then? But the ghosts talk..."

Kenet and Emen start muttering 'bed' to themselves. "Lake bed, death bed, river bed, bedbug," Kenet lists.

"What's a death bed?"

"Uh. The place where you die, I think."

"So, the boiling lake, drake jaws, the valley of thorns..."

"Bodies have legs and don't run though, so I don't think it works. Lakes don't run, bugs have legs, rivers run?"

"Rivers have mouths!" Hazel realises. "That's where the pain-spiders have their nests."

"It's a river!" Malen declares.

"Good!" Sophia says, clapping get hands. "Now: a red jewel in green nest am I. Those who take me die. Those who use me live. What am I?"

"Easy," says Hazel. "Poison berries. That got Dimestria once."

"You guys are doing well! Hm. I cannot be seen, cannot be felt, cannot be heard, cannot be smelt. I lie behind stars and under hill, and empty holes I fill. I come first and follow after, end life, kill laughter. What am I?"

"Death?"

"Nope!" she sing-songs. "Two more guesses!"

"I'm guessing she doesn't mean the moles." 

"It's behind stars. Probably either a color or the sky, and the sky isn't under a hill. I don't think."

"A really quiet bird?"

"You can see birds. And colors."

"I think there's an invisible monster in our garden."

"Can you touch it? Is it behind stars? I think this's a trick like the river one. I don't think it's a thing."

"Night time?"

That seems to give Kenet an idea. "Not nighttime, but what's in nighttime! Darkness!"

"Exactly! Congradulations, you have passed my test! Which of you wishes to enter my realm?"

"I think I'd like to. And that's good that worked, I was gonna guess 'the goddess Rune' next and she's a bit of a stretch..."

"Are there less horrible things in your garden?"

"I like to give people a chance, it makes for a better story! There's still dangers though, it'd be boring if everything was safe. But if you stick to the starting area you won't die too often. Dunno why you would though."

"Then I'm in!"

Emen declines, and then Sophia nods and says, "I'll be glad to have you!"

"Well, get back in line."

The kids do.

One by one, Veles roughly escorts children to the hole in the wheel, pushing them down it. Some of the whoop.

This is highly dubious, but no one else seems alarmed, so Malen goes along.

Hazel is first, pushing off with a cheer.

Malen watches Kenet and Emen go, then climbs in. She's not sure why this is fun.

Veles pushes her. Suddenly the water is forcing her down the stone tunnel... then upwards.

Very not fun at all!!!

Suddenly, blinding light!

...And she opens her eyes, dry and in the Spooky Woods.

She sits up, disoriented, and calls out, "Hello? Hazel? Kenet? Opal? ...OPAL!"

"I look like a firstie!" Hazel cries behind Malen.

By which he means he looks like a standard human boy.

"Ugh, I feel weak," groans Kenet. "Who's Opal?"

"My friend. We gotta find him."

"Where's my fur! And my tail! I died twice for that!"

"If you don't like it you can go back and request your old body again. Sophia must not allow upgrades."

"She coulda told me."

"Stop complaining. Let's go find Opal. We were closer to the plains, but I don't know where this is..."

"I can climb a tree. I'm pretty decent at not getting splinters."

"I'd offer, but the balance is kind of gone without the tail."

"Thanks."

"No problem!"

Kenet identifies a sufficiently tall tree, cllimbs up, and calls out, "Plains are that way! Look pretty close."

"You notice they respawn different here?"

"Yeah. No running back to your body. Nicer. Though we still don't have our stuff. Maybe we're close to her body though?"

Hazel looks around, stupid duller eyes. "Huh, skeleton. That yours, Malen?"

"Those are skeletons? Dunno. There's a bunch around here. Opal!" Then, at the top of her lungs: "OPAL!!!"

"...Malen?"

Running towards his voice: "Opal! It's me, I came back!"

She is collided with by a teary, huggy Opal.

"I thought you were... gone!"

"I did too! But there was this weird underground place with water, and other kids and gods, including a god of death. He pushed me into this thing and then I woke up here. Two of the other kids decided to come back with me, there's a bunch of places and the one they're from is horrible."

He's shaking with relief. "Kay, kay... what's a god?"

"A really powerful jerk. I think they have control over a specific thing? And they make gardens, which is what the places kids wake up are called. The death god says they don't die, too."

"So, this is Opal?" Hazel says as he catches up.

"Yeah! Opal, this is Hazel, and over there's Kenet!" (Kenet waves.)

"We're from the Garden of Bilas. Usually I have fur."

"This is the Garden of Sophia, apparently. She showed up and made them answer trick questions before she'd let them here."

"In our garden we train for the war that never ends"

"He's being dramatic, but yeah. There's a lot of fighting and dying."

"Ten times!"

"I've died... I think I'm on life thirteen? And I tended to spend a bit of time dead talking to people."

"What's it like being dead?"

"Kind of boring. The underworld's got a bunch of reeds standing in water, and the sky's rock with diamonds. Sometimes Veles the really annoying god of death comes to talk at you."

"Gods sound weird."

"They kind of are!"

"Think it's fun?"

"Being a god? They sure seem to enjoy it."

"You guys wanna meet Laashya and Bina?"

"Sure."

Opal leads the party out pf Spooky Woods. 

When they're not stopping to explore, the way back to the stream is much, much faster. Kenet spends the first little while jumping at every rustle, and freezes when a small furry creature springs across their path at one point, but does slowly unwind.

"What do you do for meat around here?"

"Meat? What's that?"

"The flesh of the slain."

"...Why."

"So you get strong so you don't get eaten."

"Getting eaten's not a problem here?"

"And where would you get the flesh? It all crumbles when something dies."

"Really? Huh. Does everything do that? Like, plants, fish, birds?"

"...Don't know, actually. Just seen Mal do it."

"Bina and Laashya might know? If they've managed to catch any minnows by now."

"We should tell them about land-minnows!"

"Yeah. And warn any other kids we meet. Those don't look as bad as they are..."

"So, you just walked up to one?"

"I ran past it while following some voices, and then it looked interesting."

"...It's a snake."

"It was shiny! I'd never seen one before! It looked a lot like a minnow, too, those're harmless."

"Do ya stick your head in the fire, too?"

"...What's a fire?"

Hazel blinks, then looks back at Kenet. "They got it easy here!"

"Sophia said it doesn't stay easy, though. We don't know how hard it gets eventually. But it's nice for now."

"Less pain spiders, I'm happy."

"Hopefully things don't develop in that direction."

The children eventually emerge onto the plane.

Bina and Laashya can be found back at the stream still. They've gotten a solid experiment in the beginnings of a camp going - someone's managed a loosely woven mat propped up on sticks. Bina is working on more weaving, while Laashya pulls apart some grasses to twist their insides together.

"Hi!" Bina calls. "We met some other kids who said water falls from the sky sometimes so we're trying to make a dry spot. How was the Forest? Who're the new kids?"

"Spooky Woods was kinda good and bad. Malen got dead, but she's back now. Turns out there's other places kids live and these two are from one."

Bina bites her lip. "Was it a vampire ghost?" 

Malen shakes her head. "Nope. A really long land minnow, apparently a snake? If you see one don't walk up to it. These guys are Hazel and Kenet. How's stuff coming along?"

"Lots of it's too scratchy to use, but we found one a couple hours walk from here that's good. It's not near water, though, but - I'm not sure how they get new plants but they all come from the ground so I'm planting a bunch of bits. There's a part of them that's food, too. It's slow going making a covering, though, we've got maybe two hands worth so far," Laashya says.

"Have you figured out fire yet?"

"No. What's that?" Laashya asks.

"Way of turning wood into hotness."

"It's plenty warm already though," Malen points out.

"We used it to cook."

"What's cooking?" asks Bina.

"Making food tastier by burning it just the right amount." 

"Does it work on fruit?" Malen asks.

He shrugs. "Dunno."

"Fruit is pretty tasty already. But it'd be interesting to try. We'll have to be careful with the fire though that it's not near the grasses, I think."

"Yeah. It'd suck to die and end up coming back to ashes."

"Would get lots of other kids in trouble, too."

"Yeah, come back to life, get beaten to death again."

"Kids around here are nice," Laashya interjects. "But it's still rude."

"Nice now..."

"Why d'ya think people will change?"

"War?"

"Why'd we go to war? There's plenty of everything."

"I think he's just adjusting."

"I am too, really. It's weird that it's so different here."

"Light!" Hazel remembers. "Fire also makes light. At night I mean."

"That'll be really useful!" says Laashya. "We could do stuff when we weren't sleeping."

"And it'd scare aware the vampire ghosts and other monsters, they come out most at night," says Bina.

"Oh, there's monsters here?"

"We haven't seen any, Bina just knows about a bunch," says Malen. "Like how I knew what minnows were. They might not be in this Garden, maybe?"

"Let me light a fire when the sun sets and I'll tell you about some of ours..."

"Why not now?"

"Spooky stories don't work when it's light out."

"What're they supposed to do?"

"...Fun scare you?"

"Like Spooky Woods?"

"Spooky Woods weren't really that scary until the land-minnow. Just cool. Are the stories like that? Why does the fire help?"

"The lights sorta flicker. Come on Ken, you know what I'm talking about."

"It's really not scary. People just think it's unnerving."

The argument goes on for some time, long enough for the sun to actually start setting. Hazel insists on at least showing them how to light fires that won't burn the camp down.

Kenet helps! She was support, so often had the fire duty. She guides the others through building starter fire-places in interesting shapes.

Once they have a decent fire going, they gather around it for dinner. And, mostly because Hazel just sorta started, campfire stories.

"...And it turned out the nerve worms were wearing the kid's body all along!"

"How's that possible?" asks Malen. (Bina's eyes are wide.)

"...I've never had to explain it before. I keep wanting to say 'puppet'?"

"What's that?"

"A-a... toy?"

"What's a toy?"

"Something you play with I think?"

"Huh. Sounds neat. What're other toys?"

"...Balls? Dolls? Knives?"

"Why's a knife a toy?"

"You can whittle."

"Huh. How're knives made?"

"Um, mostly stone and bone? Some of the kids Bilas really liked got this stuff called obsidian." 

"Huh. Is there a certain kind of stone?"

"Flint we called it."

"We can find some of that, then. Maybe you and me can look while the others figure out more stuff?"

"Sounds fun."

"I can help them figure out better shelter. Don't wanna get all our stuff rained on."

"Yup. Rain can be fun, though."

"Not when it's getting over everything."

"True, true."

And off to explore, discover, and experiment!

Off to make things pretty!

Off to find a decent knife!

Days pass. The world's as mostly-safe as promised, with most of the hazards keeping to their assigned places. Other bands of kids wander by - some with useful advice for making things, if they've been in the Garden longer - and something resembling a trade network starts assembling itself. The kids get a proper shelter built, figure out grass hats (Malen invents them after getting rained on, which she takes as the sky personally insulting her), experiment with tools and foods. Animals do indeed crumble if killed, but the bones can be useful. Clothes are hard, the reeds are scratchy even when dried and pulled apart - the insides can be twisted into twine and rope, but none of them want it on their skin. Some kid who's been here a whole two years and who had a lot of random plant knowledge when they woke suggests a way of drying and then beating them so the insides are softer, but it's apparently time-consuming. Still, Laashya and Bina get started.

One evening, as the sun dips below the Spooky Woods, Malen is approached by the palest child she or anyone else in the Garden of Sophia has thus seen. 

"Hi! Who're you? Are you new?" Normally only new kids don't have friend-groups.

"I am as old as the world, mortal."

"Huh? Are you a god, then? I thought this was Sophia's Garden."

The girl snarls, revealing fangs. "You wish I was a goddess!"

Fangs are alarming! "Hey! Don't be mean!" she yelps.

The girl proceeds to hoist Malen over her head with one hand. "My kind grow stronger as the prophecy goes unanswered." 

That gets a startled scream!

And now the probably not a girl by certain definitions is booking it for the Spooky Woods. Quite fast.