"See anything you like, Josh?" He doesn't answer me immediately and, instead, wanders about the room. He feels some of the rocks and flips others over. His patented, serious expression hardened on his face.
"This one. This is good limestone."
"Is limestone strong enough?"
"Yes, we just have to be a little careful."
"Why not granite?"
"You need hardened steel or Mythril tools for working on granite."
"I didn't know that. Let's get some limestone down to the basement." The three of us each carry a sizable stone down to the lower level, with Inari watching us from a distance. Once we arrive, I discuss the next step with Josh.
"Can you make the same size plates we have now out of limestone?"
"Yes."
"Perfect. And I hope this isn't asking too much, but can you make a smaller set for Woohee?"
"Okay. Woohee is nice."
"Awesome, thank you. Sakura, let's go and get him more rocks while he works."
"Okay!"
"I'll stay here. I want to see what methods this human artisan uses." Inari flies closer to Josh and looks over his shoulder as he pulls out his hammer and chisel. I walk behind Sakura as we head upstairs. I can just barely hear Inari whispering into Josh's ear.
Sakura and I arrive in the other room, each picking out a stone. We walk our stones down and return to the side room. We make a small pile of stones near Josh over the next hour. Exhausted, Sakura and I collapse next to the pile. The sound of my raspy breaths and my pounding heart fills my ears.
As my breathing calms down, I notice Inari speaking softly.
"You chip down the rock by concentrating the force at a point. You humans come up with creative ways to destroy your environment."
"But I'm making something," Josh replies.
"No, you are destroying something." Inari counters. I sit up and give my two cents.
"Creation is an act of destruction; you need to destroy to create."
"So, we're both right," she says confidently.
"More like you're both wrong!" I shout while pointing an accusatory finger at the leader of the fairies. Inari glares at me silently. "I'm just kidding; please don't kill me."
Inari breaks her stare with a grin and turns back to Josh, who is too busy working to pay attention to our antics. He's carefully carving a pair of large plates down to size. I walk over and tilt the one he isn't working on currently. The stone seems a bit rough, but these are just temporary measures, so I'm not too concerned about it. Our next step will be using actual metal weights, but I need to figure out a way to have them made without drawing too much attention to ourselves. I turn my focus back to Inari and Josh.
"Seeing you humans work like this has convinced me. You are an existential threat to all life on this planet. You will continue to destroy in the name of creation until nothing is left. You will continue to consume infinitely, and for what purpose?" Inari's words make me think back to my old world. I watched humanity destroy that world in the name of the economy as if that were an innate aspect of reality. We would watch our species spiral towards its destruction and act like it was inevitably unavoidable. I heard many people ignore environmental scientists because it might cost money. The focus on cost over the long-term viability of our planet slowly brought us to the brink of ruin.
"I can't disagree with you on that. We call it progress."
"Progress towards what?"
"Growth? Expansion? I don't really know myself."
"You are worse than the monsters that inhabit our forest. You are a plague unleashed upon our planet, and you must be stopped."
[This can't be the first time she's realized this. What is she getting at?]
I narrow my eyes and wait for her to finish. I can't shake the feeling that she's testing us for some reason. Inari stares at me and begins to fly slowly towards me. She has the power to kill us instantly at any distance, so her approach isn't particularly intimidating.
"Nothing to say?"
"What do you expect me to do? I agree with you. I've seen it all before, much worse than what you've seen so far. I'm sure you have some idea of what we can do, but I assure you it's much worse than you can possibly imagine." I think back to the stories of rivers catching fire from the waste being dumped in them. An absurd horror we created for ourselves.
"So, you wouldn't complain if I killed you?"
"Killing me won't save the world, and there's no way you can destroy humanity at large, so it would just be a waste of time. I also don't want to die." Inari's devilish grin deepens at my response. Out of the corner of my eye, I can see Sakura starting to tear up next to me.
[She's probably never been threatened like this before. I'd be much more frightened myself if I didn't know that Inari is playing a game right now. I may not know the goal, but I know it's a game for her.]
I calmly place a hand on Sakura's shoulder and smile slightly. On the other hand, Josh is blissfully unaware of our predicament as he is engulfed in his work. I turn back to face Inari.
"Are you done yet? What are you getting out of this?" The smirk falls from her face and collapses into a frown.
"I was hoping you would disagree with me. I would like not to face oblivion at the hands of your species."
"Same here. Maybe things will be different. Maybe good people will be able to rise against the complacent evil of progress. I don't think this is very likely, but with the radical concentration of power magic provides, maybe it's possible."
"Fufufu, ever the optimist."
"Right now, I'm just trying not to get murdered."
"It's the immediacy of death that forces action. Humans are quick to make excuses when annihilation is a distant prospect; 'I don't want to get old' is a particularly funny excuse. You always change your minds near the end." Inari sneers at us as she finishes. I nod my head and take a second to form my thoughts.
"This is the price of our individual sovereignty. Each person has to figure out who they are, what they think is right, and how they want to spend what little time they have on this planet. All these things and more need to be determined throughout one's life, and there isn't any guidebook for how to live. At the end of the day, we have to learn from other, equally flawed humans. We can try to work towards slowly improving the situation of our society at large, but the people in charge, those with the most power and influence, don't necessarily gain anything from doing so. Humans, for the most part, are just small fish swimming in a big pond. We take what we can get and try to survive to see the light of tomorrow, just like any other creature. Each individual person has very little impact on the direction of our society as a whole."
"You humans are so pathetic. How can you create something that you can't control?"
"That weakness is also our strength. If we were as weak as you claim, you would have wiped us out long ago. Our large, complex society is the key to our safety. If an existential threat does arise, our immense numbers can be levied to combat it."
"This is frustrating. I'm tired of talking about it."
"Too complex of a problem for even a god to solve. I never thought I'd see the day."
"I never said that."
"We both know you'd be calling humans pathetic and stupid for not realizing the answer if there was one." I smile mischievously.
"I'm going outside. I'll be at the fort if you still want to meditate." Inari scoffs, deflecting my accusation.
"Let me know if you come up with a way to slay the Leviathan." Inari doesn't even turn around as she flies out of the room. Once she leaves, I walk over to Josh and tap him on the shoulder. "How's it going, bud?"
He's so focused that he doesn't even respond. There's a growing pile of plates around him. I asked him to focus on making the larger weights and then go down from there. We'll still have the wooden plates, but I also included small and very small-sized weights in the list. These will come in handy not only for us but for the fairies too. I don't know anything about fairy physiology, but some concentrated exercise shouldn't hurt.