Extra chapter: Karaza's notes (Self education edition)

The road to becoming a citizen was a confusing one. Karaza pondered as she put charcoal on a plate for the bowl of lemons to eat. Though they couldn't move they had the ability to move things in the air if such things were close enough.

She sat on the floor watching the charcoal fly to each lemon mouth.

"From all the foods out there, charcoal?" She ate from her Cascadia takeout. She tried to give them a bite but they weren't a fan, except for one charred piece.

They emoted something to her.

"The stand? Oh, you mean the station. How does it work? Hexagono magnets power stuff probably."

As the bowl of lemon joined her daily life as a keychain attached to her hexagono they stayed confused about the city despite developing some understanding about it.

"I get it. This land is weird. No carriages or vehicles, not even a bloody horse or something." She reached for some of her unreadable notes where Patitcha wrote some notes on the transportation system.

"Well, there are many stations across the city, and then one simply chooses the destination station and gets inside the room corresponding to it." She reads, squinting and stuttering a bit.

"Apparently the room moves by a magnet pulling it to the destination, then another magnet pulls it back."

The bowl emoted in response.

"Yeah, I too barely feel any movement, there are chairs in the room too for long rides. Elevators work the same way too apparently."

She opens a mango quenchy bottle which the lemons show interest in.

"Is it safe for y'all?"

Fluid flies to their mouths, and they approve.

"Wonder if y'all can have classic quenchy too?"

A note paper about quenchy flew to them but it didn't help much, so the land of the unwanted guide flew to the rescue. Here the lemons realized they were illiterates.

"Quenchy is extracted from a waterfall on a mountain full of minerals and nutritional algae, where then it's taken to further... I can't read all this." She closed the book after a wave of stuttering.

"In a nutshell there are two types of quenchy, classic one which comes in a small bottle is all you need for a day, and supplementary quenchy they put in juices and sauces, even in chili oil to add nutritional value."

The lemons emoted with a concerned look.

"It doesn't change anything about the food's taste, why would you care? You eat charcoal."

'I guess they need to do that, food shortage is a thing here.'

The guide explains thoroughly how the environment of the land makes farming challenging and how exporting food is a huge risk. She remembered a popular story about a time when the land exported food in a rough time only to discover the nation that sold it poisoned the food.

Luckily they caught that at the border, preventing the catastrophe. But that pretty much was the turning point to depend on quenchy that they can extract from their own land. And cultivate duckweed and mushrooms.

The lemons were shaking as Karaza told the story. Some are emoting, others still.

Why do others do that? It has always been this way I guess? If a human is sick or infertile or old or different they get this treatment? I was once chased to be burned."

She played with her unusual silver hair.

The lemons emoted one heck of a long sentence she took time to understand.

"Yeah, the rumor y'all heard decades ago still holds true. A lot of humans are born with deformities or something they call... inter organs fibroid adhesions."

'My smoking time with doc is paying off.' She bragged to herself till the lemons asked for the continuation.

"Well most people die or live difficult lives with that, it's mostly not treated outside of here."

They emoted. 'Why?' She didn't know the answer.

"I guess this is how it is? If one is a burden they get abandoned, many creatures do the same. Minus the chasing and killing I believe?"

Actually, this is a reason why they are obsessed with surgeries here. In other nations the sick people chug all kinds of medicines with many side effects that hurt in the long run. But since they discovered ultra obsidian rocks here, they made really good scalpels and mixed that with magnetic stuff to perform difficult surgeries."

She went on a tangent thanks to all the smoking sessions information she has now.

The scared lemons became intrigued, asking more questions about conversations they heard in the city.

"Yup, almost half of humans are infertile. Doc says nothing can change someone's fertility though. Also two thirds of the newborns are females and dudes are getting extinct."

'It's not as obvious here though, maybe because newcomers come all the time.'

They ate tiramisu on the balcony, enjoying the view from the high apartment. The lemons asked about money and the house market like any lemons do, probably hearing these from Antonio when he visited.

"Yeah, the moro is a weak currency. This apartment was 5 million moro I think. Which is... nine months worth of work for the duke."

She looked at the bank statement in her hexagono. 40 million left.

"It's nice not to worry about money, I can figure the beekeeping thing out."

The lemons were too excited about the bees.