Uninterrupted, the Muscheron take the stone cicada shell and spirit it away in the Stump's gnarly roots, reverent as though handling an offering. A moment later, a red-capped toadstool fairy emerges from a burrow hole carrying something. It's an old pink tamagotchi, and appears to be from the original US run in the 90s. In the little Muscheron's arms, the electronic toy seems burdensomely heavy, and it sighs a great puff of air when it sets the egg-shaped device down where the cicada had been placed a moment before.

"Thanks you, human spore. Return-tzl-ay sheshii koreytl," the red-capped Muscheron says to Armani before scurrying off, and though that Appalachian Mushkin is impossible to understand, he still gets the sense that not just the Muscheron, but the Stump, too, are all grateful to have something returned to them. A deep calm washes over Armani, though it is tinged faintly with something strange, a feeling like melancholy or guilt.