I made a mistake.

  I was curious about the portal, so I pricked my finger with my pocket knife before going back to the Lost.

  Earning a few curious stares, I hopped back and forth through it to try and trigger the healing effect, but nothing happened.

  It seems that it only heals injuries that happen in the Lost itself.

  In that sense, the other world was quite dangerous in comparison. I really didn't understand why others didn't try living in the Lost like I did.

  By the way, I hadn't quite realized it at first, but there was another difference between the two worlds.

  The Lost had no insects, but the urban world did.

  This was most likely related to that man's explanation, that the Lost couldn't actually sustain life.

  If nothing grew, then I could use it to store all manner of perishables... but it seemed more likely that nothing grew only because there was no available nutrients, and that food I bring in from the outside would carry its own future contamination.

  Though, perhaps stuff like canned goods would last longer even after being opened.

  Of course, it's also possible the world had alien contaminates that would rot things over time in place of a more organic ecosystem.

  ***

  After contemplating things, I got to work hunting.

  The smaller fauna seemed easier to hunt, but in reality, they were more troublesome. They couldn't kill me, but they still put up a serious struggle, and damaged my robes in the process.

  I didn't have any way to repair that damage yet, and it added an expense even if I did.

  Furthermore, they were harder to find.

  Deer could kill me, but ironically, because it was easy for them to do so, they didn't struggle as much. They didn't try biting, and their hooves weren't sharp, so there was less collateral damage.

  I just died.

  A lot.

  But even with my shoddy equipment, I could earn about three shards a day by hunting them, and still have time to head to the store, cook food, boil water, gather more information, work on improving my situation, and still get a good night's sleep.

  Since I was perpetually a child, a good night's sleep was about nine to ten hours.

  I worked myself pretty hard, but all within acceptable parameters.

  At an income of six big coins a day, I could afford enough flour for all my caloric needs, a bonus to cover extra nutritional needs every other day, replacement pocket knives, and still save about one of those six coins each day.

  Though, rather than getting six big coins, I usually got a paper note and two big coins. It seemed that paper notes are worth four big coins, or twenty small coins.

  Of course, I died a lot in the process.

  Even when I got used to killing the deer, my tactics ultimately required taking advantage of the Lost's gift of immortality. My first few kills were messy, but eventually, I settled into a routine that I slowly adapted, targeting the same weakpoints.

  My goal was overall reliability.

  I didn't want to test what the so-called dungeon did if I died from starvation.

  Notably, although it healed my wounds upon leaving, it did not restore any sense of hunger or thirst I accrued while inside of it.

  So food was important. After a few days, I'd gradually saved up enough that I could risk taking a day off or not earning enough, but that was still undesirable, because I'd rather save up to buy things.

  And thus, dying sometimes as many as twenty times each day simply became routine.

  ***

  Some of the rookie adventurers, mostly mere would-bes with no actual Skills, watched in a mixture of concern and awe as the small red-haired girl padded off for the sixteenth time that day.

  "Surely this is a sign of child abuse. Isn't there some dungeon regulation against this?"

  "Nope, although if her parents don't know, I'm a bit worried about what'll happen when they find out."

  "Does she even have any parents? I never really see her leave."

  "Good question..."

  But it wasn't like she was the only troubled kid who showed up. Although she went about barefoot in a strange robe, she wasn't even the oddest rookie any of them had seen.

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  Just a few months ago, they'd all watched some younger middle schooler show up trying to cast dark magic. Though that other kid had used all sorts of intricate incantations and other seemingly arcane and sophisticated methods, nothing ever seemed to come of it.

  It wasn't even odd to see a rookie be cavalier about hunting, although they eventually got discouraged from it.

  After all, they were there to learn. They'd develop bad habits if they treated the dungeon's resurrection as anything other than a safety net. Some people even believed that if you died even once in a beginner's dungeon, it was a sign you should give up then and there.

  That was a minority perspective in the Lost, which accepted everyone regardless of talent or potential, but some guilds enforced it as a rule in other dungeons as a way of weeding out the weak.

  But it was still jarring to see the very opposite of that philosophy.

  Especially since it was a young girl.

  "Hey, does dying in here... y'know... hurt?"

  "How should I know?"

  "I heard it does. I don't want to find out though."

  ***

  I did take some days off though.

  On those days, I wandered the city, collecting unused bottles as I explored.

  Eventually, I found two extremely useful buildings.

  The first was a larger grocery store that had basically everything I could ever want. However, purchasing things worked by some automated system, and while the machinery was easy to learn just by watching others use it, I felt that I'd at least have to learn how to read numbers before I could shop there.

  The shopkeeper at the smaller store was, in comparison, willing to barter with me without exchanging words. Although he could have been taking advantage of me, he was still quite helpful.

  The second was a library.

  I was worried that the libraries of this world might be exclusive, but nobody stopped me from walking around or trying to read any of the books. Of course, I didn't try to leave with any of them.

  I noticed that people occasionally did check out books, showing a small card during the process.

  I didn't have such a card, though.

  Although there was a tremendous amount of literature, I went to the mostly unused little kid's section, and read picture books designed to teach the very basics of the language.

  It was a slow process, but it was one I'd done across countless lives in the past.

  I also gradually learned to avoid traveling during the day.

  Children my age were rarely seen except between the late afternoon and the early evening. Presumably, they were being educated or trained before those hours, and then expected to go home or even to bed before it got too late.

  So those hours became my working hours.

  Because I died a lot while hunting, I couldn't hunt without being seen. It was a pretty harsh restriction, which doubled as the biggest reason I could only earn one and a half notes a day.

  But it was fine, because I could use the rest of the day working on stuff by myself.

  I worked on making sharpened sticks to try fighting deer with, better clay bowls and plates by trying to improve the mixture, and even a makeshift shelter of branches and leaves in case it ever rained. Though that man said nothing grew in this forest, I was able to make some basic charcoal, and left-over ashes seemed to work well at making more sturdy clay.

  Though, that nothing grew in the forest raised a natural question.

  How did it stay so clean?

  ***

  I learned part of the answer by watching the people by the portal.

  They generally cleaned up after themselves.

  Considering there was some litter in the city, I wondered if there were stricter penalties for littering in a dungeon.

  I was a bit worried I might get in trouble, if they found my camp and decided it was against the law. I already lived a bit away from the portal, further than most people seemed willing to walk, but the possibility did make finding a better home a bigger priority than it already was.

  But even then, that didn't explain everything. After all, usually, the ecosystem would absorb waste if given enough time. The fact it did so was usually the reason littering was avoided in the first place.

  Yet there supposedly wasn't a functioning ecosystem.

  I learned the answer to this mystery by watching the animals.

  They didn't rush about or show any signs they were struggling to survive, but if they happened to chance on something that didn't belong to the Lost, and if it was small enough...

  They ate it.

  I suddenly worried about my camp, but when I lead a couple animals to it, I found they didn't bother with most of my stuff. If I dropped a smaller coin, it might get eaten up, and they cleaned up some of the flour and ashes that had spilled, but that was about it.

  Putting things in bags seemed enough to deter them.

  In other words, this world was so convenient, it even had something like an automatic cleaning service.

  ***

  The senior librarian had found himself watching after the small, red-haired girl who occasionally came to read.

  He'd been heartbroken with the latest generation of kids, since so few of them ever came to read, so every exception seemed like a small victory to him...

  But this girl always went to read books for kids half her age, if that.

  Wearing a slightly tattered robe, she looked like she was homeless or else very poor. The fact she ran about barefoot made him wince, since it was just understood in this country that you should wear shoes outside and go barefoot at home.

  But she was obviously an outsider, and her robe was almost certainly of outsider make. It's possible it was a cherished reminder of her home. It's even possible it was far more valuable than it looked.

  So, he correctly presumed the young girl was trying to learn how to read.

  It was a bittersweet realization.

  After all, watching a child diligently come to practice was a somewhat heartwarming thing for the old librarian, but he had to wonder why she had to come there to do so. Weren't her parents teaching her?

  'Perhaps they can't.' He mused. After all, they could be in the same boat as her.

  But the most bittersweet part was that the books she so diligently studied... were ones he had once donated.

  Although watching children come to read was a small joy in his life, it was a library. The girl could just check them out... except, she probably didn't even know that she could.

  And though he tried to talk to her once or twice, there was no indication she understood him.

  Of course, the girl always put the books right back when she was done with them. There was no way to easily give them to her.

  But he planned on doing so anyway, and ordered copies to replace the books he intended to give her. When they arrived, he kept them at the counter.

  Until she came in again.

  That's when he took them over, and started replacing the ones she'd been reading with the new copies, making sure she was watching.

  Each replaced book went in a plastic bag. There were a few, but not too many.

  The last one to be 'replaced' was the one she'd started reading, though her attention was on him by this point, a confused expression on her face.

  He showed her that last book, pointing at it. Eventually, she got the picture that it was the same. Well, she probably knew from the start, but he made sure she confirmed it.

  Then he put the book in its place nearby.

  The little kid's section was set up a bit differently. Books, chairs, and toys all mingled there, to make it easy for kids and parents both.

  After that, he tapped her copy, pointed at the bag, and then handed her the bag.

  It took a bit of insistence after that, as she kept trying to return the books, not even just that day but over the next couple of visits, but she eventually got the picture that they were hers now.

  He felt it was the least he could do.