"So what inspired claiming a lovely oasis with an elaborate tent?"

Diran shrugs. "It just sort of found its way into my hands, and I decided I felt like settling down."

"Absolutely valid. You've got a lovely place out here. There's a stark beauty to the desert that not many people appreciate. I can definitely see why you'd want more books, though."

"Yeah. Best thing about having my own oasis is not having to deal with people or travel or the people you meet when you travel; worst thing is boredom."

She nods. "Makes sense. The boredom would get me, probably. I need people like sane people need food, but at the same time I need space to run off and tinker with things. Solution I've settled on is eventually building a house by the lake, once I've got enough business going that I can keep making money away from the city. People can come visit, several people will be heavily encouraged to come visit, and otherwise I'll just tinker lots and come to the city intermittently."

"Sounds nice. I'd be worried if I were you, though, about making a business out of crossing the desert on the regular. Eventually, anybody who keeps crossing the desert will meet the witches."

"I've heard them mentioned, but no details really yet. I take it they're to be avoided?"

"They have some way to fight the demons but in my personal opinion they're almost as bad. What does a demon do if they catch you? Corrupt you, and when they've got you corrupt enough, take your soul and turn you into a demon. What does a witch do if they catch you? Hypnotize you, cast a bunch of spells on you, and when they're tired of toying with you and letting you go, they drag you back to their hideout as a slave. Not much of an improvement if you ask me."

She winces a bit. "That does sound unpleasant. Limit my travel until I can hold them off or move too swiftly for them to catch, then."

"I think the two of us could probably handle one witch... but maybe not more than one, and I bet they'll get more annoyed about us the more we fight them."

She nods. "Guess I'd better get a lot tougher a lot quicker."

"Guess so!"

Diran munches her last chunk of carrot.

"Well. It's been nice meeting you, but if you've never been to the city before you probably want to head out sooner than later, so you don't take too long finding it. Just keep heading east and thinking city-shaped thoughts."

"Likewise, Diran," she smiles. "Can I get a quick look at your book collection to make sure I don't buy anything you've read a hundred times already?"

"Sure."

She gets up and stretches, plates of chitin clicking gently against each other, and ducks into her tent. A moment later she emerges with six books, handwritten and bound in worn leather. When she flips them open to show the titles, they mostly prove to be just the sort of thing she was looking for: someone's travel diary talking about their adventures in the swamp, a book of collected folk tales, an adventure story, a second adventure story with worse handwriting and worse prose, and a fairly dry-looking history book purporting to cover "the Ancient Days". The odd one out is a book of recipes.

The books get noted down as well, because they are not about to gift Diran a book she already has.

"Thank you. Hopefully we find something good."

Also, handwritten? Does this world not have the printing press?

That's macroscopic enough it shouldn't run into any stupid glitches. She'll start brainstorming designs based on the fragmentary pieces they remember.

But for now it's time to go. "Off with us, then. We'll not darken your pretty little oasis any longer. Thank you for the hospitality."

"See you around," she says amicably.

Torok waves, and off they go.

Once they're a decent ways, she remarks, "She was pretty nice. You really do have good taste in friends."

"I like her! But I like most people I've met around here, it's not that I'm only picking the best ones, I'm mostly just picking the ones who're friendly and don't try to rape me." He pauses a moment to consider this and then amends to, "And some of the ones who do try to rape me if they're friendly about it. I don't know, maybe people in Mareth are mostly just nice? Or maybe people are mostly nice if you're nice to them?"

She grins wide at that last point. "Oh you get it. Yes, that's the trick I've seen. Be kind enough and you find more kindness most of the time. Some people are stubborn assholes no matter what you do, but most turn out to be nice enough.

"What about those books, though?", she asks, tilting her head. "Does Mareth not have the printing press? Does your world?"

"...huh? What about them? The what? Are books different where you're from?"

"Aha. Yes, they are. In our old world, there were large machines that could be used to print many copies of the same book very quickly. They had metal plates that you filled with little metal blocks that had letters on them, and you used them to stamp the ink onto the page. Machines like that allow books to be produced in bulk, which brings the cost down and makes a lot more knowledge available to a lot more people."