"Some of the older cities, rather far from where Evara's from, have large universities? Lots of books, lots of space, rather high-status but not much is done with it."

"A decline, eh? I'm sad to say that's the case with Cloudbank, too. Maybe creating metal will slow it down."

"The magical creatures were, apparently, less of a problem in our history."

"So it's the critters' fault?"

"They have quite a lot of impact on trade and exploration, and people seem mostly content to just… sit inside the walls that were built to protect them."

"There's nothing wrong with safety. I suppose the knock-on effect of impairing trade is pretty bad in the long run. Are there flying magic evil creatures?"

"Yes, but less of a problem and the walls can keep a lot of them out anyway."

"I was wondering if airships would be viable, or easy targets, mostly."

"It seems like you can go quite high up, and you'd be pretty safe up there, but if you tried landing at night I expect you'd have trouble."

"I don't know what the pressure ceiling on your planet would be, but I can definitely imagine going several miles up. Landings are easier during the day, but overnight stays would be needed, and there would need to be docks built, and supplies for the ships. I doubt you have float-grass drifts that I can just cast out a net and get more hydrogen from, like here. It's native."

"Yeah, it would definitely take a lot of doing to get airships going back there."

"There's no guarantee there's a way back, anyway."

"It can still be interesting to speculate on things that are unlikely or will never be, though."

"Taking your world's knowledge of technology and our world's… I mean, fact it has a ground you can dig into, seems like we'd both be better off, yeah. Shame about the various creatures."

"Like I said, I don't necessarily know that we can actually build a lot of stuff I've heard of. Lightbulbs are pretty far up there as far as tech level goes."

Shrug. "If anything it might be inspiration for people working on this sort of thing."

"Lightbulbs have been around for a while for us – perhaps been around again, I'm not quite sure if they existed at some point in the past – but things are mostly stalled except in a few small locations."

"I'll show you my books in... Maybe twenty minutes. We're probably clear now but better safe than sorry. And then I have quite a few chores to take care of."

Nod.

He continues operating the controls, munching on bread and blueberries. He seems perfectly at home here, humming slightly.

Evara fiddles with her bracelet a bit more, then talks to Akien, quietly.

And then he sets down on an island with a fair bit of maneuvering and shifting around, and quickly runs outside and ties down rope to various points of attachment on the chunk of rock he found, then comes back in and says, "We're good for now. Sunset is soon, too, but let's go see my workshop. Or the books if you want those first."

"… Workshop is probably a good idea, first – I have a feeling he's going to try starting on the metal sooner if that's okay."

He rolls his eyes and smiles. "That'd be preferable."

"Right this way."

The workshop lets the fading sunlight in from outside through some kind of arrangement of mirrors. There are also lanterns, all currently unlit. There are a bunch of what look like half-finished projects neatly lined up on shelves (one looks nearly done, some kind of fold-up glider), and rows of tool racks or piles of - stuff, components, timbers, springs, so on - on more shelves taking up the middle of the room.

The hot-box is a small section off to the side made of glass laid over sturdy-looking wood and rubber.

"The whole area is resistant to fire but anything truly flammable I work on in that box. I could probably light up some gunpowder there and it wouldn't start a fire."