"Oooh! Fun idea! If I take enough oranges, maybe I could even bring another fish back for us to have for dinner after, trade twice with her today! And experiments go well with lunch!"

"Sure. C'mon, let's get these put away and we can get a sack together."

Lily selects onions, carrots, and a few potatoes to go to Hazel, and several big round shiny oranges to go to Palla.

And once everything's put away, Ruby grabs one of the previous sacks as a spare to hold the fish on the way to Hazel's.

"Thanks, Lily!"

"See you later! Don't worry too much if you can't make it back for the afternoon harvest; you can still stay the night either way, I'll just send you off with fewer vegetables tomorrow morning."

"Thank you!"

She totally still gonna push to make it back for the afternoon harvest.

She quickly runs off toward the lakeshore. They have a plan to figure out what's up with Palla's place when she gets there.

The lakeshore sparkles quietly in the late morning sun. It looks just the same as ever. No ominous ripples in the water this time.

Oh good. So they only seem to notice it when looking back toward Palla's from Hazel's. So she's going to double-check the path once first, and then walk backwards.

There's Palla's hut up ahead, plain as day! It would be really difficult to miss, it's right on the shore.

What.

What.

Let's make sure she understands this. She was facing north, checking the path to make sure she wouldn't trip while walking backwards to prevent whatever prevented her from noticing it while walking toward Hazel's normally, but intending to go to Palla's. This was the second time she'd done this on the route, a bit north of the path to Lily's.

And then it was just. Right there.

What.

Okay no. That rules out camouflage and graph-based locations wait is it intent?

She scribbles a quick note in the notebook that the actual goal was going to Palla's, and that this is an intent test.

<Sable, hard reset for me please, your goal after is to go to Hazel's, and read the notebook as you go.>

She closes her eyes.

There's a moment of internal discontinuity.

What was she doing? Right, going to Hazel's.

She looks up to see where she is.

Just south of Palla's hut, looking right toward it. Palla is napping on her blanket, her tail sweeping back and forth in lazy arcs as she dreams.

Awww, Palla's cute. She pulls out her notebook and reads it.

She looks back up, shocked, as all the memories load back.

Well, that rules out most ways it could be intent-based, but maybe it doesn't change that fast? This is bizarre.

Well, let's visit Palla for now. She walks up. "Hey there, Palla. Up for an orange trade again?"

Yaaaaaawn. "Always. How much fish? And are you staying or going? I won't eat with you but you can use my firepit no problem."

"Going. And two fish, one now and one on the way back, if you don't mind. Having lunch with Hazel and then dinner with Lily."

"Suits me just fine." She yawns again. "Gimme the oranges, I'll leave them in my house and then go grab your fish."

She passes Palla all the oranges with a smile.

Palla grins back, then ducks into her house to put the oranges away.

There's a tall man trudging south along the shore, just coming into view past the obscuring bulk of the hut.

She waves at Torok with a grin. "About to take a fish to Hazel's for lunch and experiments, if you wanna join us."

He perks up a little. "Sure!"

Palla emerges from her hut and glances at Torok. "Lunchtime for everybody, huh?"

"I'm with Sable."

"Awwww," she says mock-disappointedly. "All right, back soon." Splash.