Exactly! This planet can't really afford to give up its natural resources for old-fashioned books. I never realized that many people were attached to them. But for all I know, there's a VR for that, too. They're big on recreating that sensory kind of experience.

[He shrugs, cheerfully, as they make their way. It's an interesting thought to him: all this time he's thought of the VR as being a waste of time that only exists for the benefit of the natives, not the offworlders, who can still feel and smell things. But maybe enough people will end up missing the experiences of less mechanized worlds to partake in it.]