He turned to face her fully, those blue eyes intense.

"I mourn the world that was, but I see hope in the rebuilding. These mimics chose to create rather than steal. You are a cook who sees tools as partners, who feeds people based on need rather than payment. Alexander is a mimic who looks at his people and sees potential, not just survival."

Keeper gestured broadly at New Brookvale.

"The old world had master craftspeople who understood their tools," he continued. "But you, Marron Louvel, are learning to understand them in a world that largely forgot such partnerships were possible. That's not the same as what was lost—but it's not lesser, either. It's different. New. A different kind of hope."

"I don't know if I'm worthy of that comparison," Marron said, her voice small.

"The tools think you are. I trust their judgment." Keeper's voice carried something that might have been amusement. "They're older than me, after all. And they've waited a long time for someone who sees them correctly."

"As partners, not possessions."

"Exactly."

They stood together in the growing dusk, watching the settlement prepare for evening. Marron could see Alexander directing people toward the communal area, could see Mokko helping set up serving tables, could see Millie talking with a group of mimics about something that made them laugh.

"There's much hope to be found in the future," Keeper said quietly. "Not the same hope as the past—that's gone, and mourning it is right and necessary. But new hope. Different hope. The hope of people who choose to build rather than take, who choose to create rather than steal, who choose to feed rather than hoard."

He looked down at her.

"You carry three Legendary Tools now. Three pieces of the old world, brought forward into the new. Each one teaching you something those old masters knew: care, patience, generosity. There are four more lessons waiting. Four more pieces of that lost wisdom."

"Do you know what they are?" Marron asked. "The other lessons?"

"Some of them." Keeper's voice went distant. "Precision. Discernment. Respect. And something else—something I remember feeling but cannot quite name. A lesson about... completion, perhaps. Or understanding the whole rather than just the parts."

Seven tools. Seven lessons. Marron's mind was already trying to imagine what tools would teach precision, discernment, respect.

"Will you tell me about them?" she asked. "The old world? The craftspeople who made these things? Tonight, maybe, if you're willing?"

"I would like that," Keeper said, and something in his voice made it clear this was true. "I so rarely have someone who wants to listen. Who understands that remembering the past is not the same as being trapped in it."

"After dinner, then?"

"After dinner."

Keeper moved away toward the communal area, and Marron followed at a slower pace. Lucy burbled softly from her jar, forming a gentle spiral of curiosity.

"Yeah," Marron murmured to her slime companion. "I want to know too. About the world that was. About the people who made these tools. About what they hoped for when they poured years of their lives into creating something that would outlast them."

The evening meal was simple—the same group from last night had made a vegetable stew with dumplings, hearty and warming. Marron didn't cook, just sat with her friends and the mimics, eating and listening to conversations about the day's progress.

But as the bowls were cleared and the fire burned down to comfortable coals, people began to settle in a loose circle around Keeper. This was apparently a tradition—evening stories from the one who remembered.

Keeper stood near the fire, his tall form casting long shadows, his mask reflecting the flames. When he spoke, his voice carried easily across the gathered crowd.

"Tonight," he said, "I will tell you about the world before the cataclysm. About the craftspeople who made things with intention and care. About a cook named Therra, who spent three years making a ladle that would understand need."

Marron leaned forward, the Generous Ladle warm in her lap.

And Keeper began to speak of a world that was lost, but not forgotten.

+

"The city was called Ashenbright," Keeper began, his voice taking on the cadence of a practiced storyteller. "Built at the meeting of three rivers, known for its food markets and its craftspeople. This was... seventy years before the cataclysm, perhaps eighty. Time blurs when you've lived as long as I have."

The fire crackled. No one spoke. Even the forest seemed to quiet, the whispering leaves falling still.

"Therra ran a soup kitchen in the lower quarter," Keeper continued. "Not a restaurant—she didn't charge. She simply cooked for whoever came. The hungry, the poor, the travelers, the lost. Anyone who needed a meal could come to Therra's kitchen and receive one."

Marron's breath caught. A soup kitchen. Like what she'd accidentally created in the dungeon.

"She was a master cook," Keeper said. "Could have worked in the palace, could have made a fortune in the restaurant district. But she chose the soup kitchen because—and I remember her saying this—'If I only feed those who can pay, I'm not really feeding people. I'm just selling food.'"

Millie made a soft sound of understanding. Several mimics nodded.

"Therra's challenge was portions," Keeper explained. "She saw people come in starving and take small servings because they didn't want to appear greedy. She saw people come in well-fed and take large servings because they could. She saw children not eating enough, elders taking too much because they remembered hunger, travelers confused about what was appropriate."

The fire popped, sending sparks into the darkening sky.

"So she decided to make a tool," Keeper said. "A ladle that would understand need and serve accordingly. Not based on what people asked for, but based on what they truly required. It took her three years."

"Three years to make a ladle?" someone asked, awed.

"Three years to understand need," Keeper corrected. "The crafting itself—the metalwork, the handle wrapping, the physical creation—that took only months. But understanding need deeply enough to imbue a tool with that knowledge? That took three years of serving people, watching them, learning to see past what they said to what they truly required."

Marron looked down at the ladle in her lap, at the symbols that had finally become readable to her. Three years of someone's life, distilled into this tool.

"When she finished it," Keeper continued, "Therra used it every day in her kitchen. And people noticed. The starving were given more. The comfortable were given less, even when they protested. Children received portions that helped them grow. Elders received portions that sustained without overwhelming. Everyone received exactly what they needed."

"Did they complain?" Cara asked. "The ones who got less?"

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