As Rin and her teacher walked back to Libera, the nerves from battle went away and all the rookie was left with was a feeling of victory bubbling up in her heart. The day seemed brighter, the air smelled fresher, and Rin's hopes were at an all-time high.
From the moment they left the forest, to when they arrived back at the city and walked through the streets leading to the Academy, Rin was smiling so much her cheeks hurt. They arrived at the academy's gates as the sun was just an hour or two away from falling down the horizon, and Maria stopped in front of Rin.
She let out a breath that clearly sounded relieved, for some reason, and then turned toward the student.
"Good work out there," Maria said. "We'll go over some stuff tomorrow. I want to write a little review of what I saw, and then we can iron out some of the issues you had. By the way," Maria said. "You should try to get yourself some more armor. Later on in your career, make no mistake, it will end up being useless, however, as for right now, a good breastplate could stop a kobold from stabbing you, understand?"
"... Yeah," Rin said, and her smile faltered for just a moment.
"I can buy you another small set later, but you should try to get some armor of your own." Maria let her know. "For now, feel free to rest up and celebrate. You've earned it."
When she heard that, Rin all but squeaked as she ran up and wrapped her arms around her teacher.
"R-Rin!?" Maria asked, remaining completely still.
"Haha, thanks teach'! See you later!" Rin told her, before promptly running inside the Academy.
She nearly collided with a couple of older students, but that didn't stop her as she raced up to the second floor and made a beeline for her room. Here, she opened the door, and she'd intended to get Xhez, bring her out somewhere private, and share what had just happened.
However, she saw that she didn't need to.
"... Huh?" She stopped at the door, looking into her room and seeing that Xhez was sitting on her bed, in her usual disguise, while Elisa was laid down on hers, covered up from the neck-down in a soft-looking sheet. The two had been talking to each other, casually, as Rin walked in.
"Oh, Rin!" Xhez greeted her, as Elisa looked over at her with a little smirk. "Goodness, you smell terrible," she said, still smiling.
Immediately, several things went through Rin's min.
[Crap, how much did she tell her? Does Elisa know already? How did she react? If she does, is she going to tell anyone else?]
But, she forced her mind to quiet down as she gulped and walked over to her bed, sitting beside Xhez.
"Hey roomie," Elisa smiled at her. "How'd your mission go?"
"Uh... good, good, as you can see," Rin replied, gesturing at her own body. Then, she took a deep breath. "So... W-What have you been up to?"
"Elisa and I were talking about the different villages!" Xhez let Rin know. "She told me about these towns located southeast and northeast of here called Alcalira and Prodden. Apparently, in the past, hu- I mean, people, used to go through all sorts of dangerous forests just so they could listen to the music in Alcalira, they were famous for it!"
"Wow, you were really paying attention," Elisa chuckled. "But, yeah, Xhez told me neither of you had been to any of those places before, so I figured I'd tell her a little about them."
For some reason, Elisa gave Rin a bit of a knowing glance, but Rin couldn't tell why.
"Elisa is so knowledgeable!" Xhez pointed out. "I have been learning so much!"
"Uh, awesome, I'm glad," she replied, though, she couldn't deny that a small part of her felt a tad bit inadequate after hearing that. Of course, someone like Elisa, who had been to many different parts of the world already and had received some of the best education money could buy, probably had more to offer in regards to knowledge than Rin did.
"... How did your mission go? Everything went alright?" Rin asked Elisa.
"Yeah," Elisa nodded. "Cara had me go and take out a few kobolds. Pretty easy, overall. Honestly, I'm hoping we get to the serious stuff soon. It mostly feels like we've been messing around."
"..." Rin blinked.
Here she'd been, so excited after beating her Rank D opponents, and Elisa all but shattered that excitement by reminding her that both kobolds and the cheren she'd just fought were, in fact, some of the weakest enemies out there.
[... Right,] she sighed. [I still suck. Can't forget that.]
Suddenly, to her right, Xhez's eyes flared up a little and she gave Rin an awkward smile.
"Um, Rin, c-could you take me home? I am afraid I have been out for a bit too long."
"Oh!" Rin nodded. "Yeah, sure, sure," she replied as she stood up and subtly tried to get Xhez's bag as the sprite said her goodbyes.
"It was a pleasure meeting you!" Xhez said.
"Likewise. Feel free to talk to me anytime. I'd love to show you around the city. You too, Rin," Elisa suddenly offered. "If you're up for it."
"Oh?" Rin was surprised to hear that. "Um... Maybe."
The sunlight-haired woman nodded and Rin walked out with Xhez by her side. They moved into the nearby bathroom and, here, Xhez quickly took off the clothes Rin had given to her as her disguise went away.
"I wish my spell lasted longer," Xhez told Rin. "I was having fun speaking with her. She is a very interesting person."
"Yeah," Rin nodded. "More than you know."
"Oh, by the way!" Excitement then bloomed on Xhez's face as she said, "I spoke to the non-human!"
"What?"
"Dylan! Your classmate," Xhez explained. "I found him in the cafeteria while you were away. I managed to have a small conversation with him. He seems like a good person!"
"But, what is he?" Rin asked.
"He is an incubus," Xhez revealed to her. "I must admit, the details of his existence are confusing to me, but I have confirmed that he is, in fact, not hostile to humans. So, don't worry!"
"Uh... Cool, I guess."
Rin had no idea how to take that first bit. Mostly, because she didn't know what an "incubus" even was. However, considering that Xhez managed to speak to him and she felt she could vouch for the boy, Rin was slightly relieved.
"Ohh, maybe later, you could speak to him? He already knows I am a water sprite, and I told him about how wonderful of a person you are, I am sure you would make good friends!"
Rin chuckled, blushing.
"Xhez, I'm not all that, but... Sure, if I get the chance, I'll try to get to know the guy."
And, with a pair of smiles, Xhez jumped into her bag and Rin went back to her room. She walked in and found Elisa looking out the window, the early evening sunlight landing on her face as Rin walked inside, finding some clothes to change in.
But, Rin was stunned.
This brief moment was like something out of a dream. She hadn't noticed it before, because Elisa had her sheet over her body. However, seeing her now, Rin realized that she was half-naked. The woman was wearing only some white panties and a white bra as she stood out in the open, with her flame-like hair falling down her back, ending just above her legs. She turned to look at Rin, and those green eyes mesmerized her.
"Well," Elisa said, "I didn't know beauty ran in the family like that."
Rin chuckled, a little embarrassed, putting Xhez's bag down over her drawer and then heading over to her bed. She kept her eyes low because she knew that if she looked up at Elisa, she wouldn't be able to tear her eyes away.
One of the unfortunate side-effects from having gotten laid a week ago was that now, Rin was painfully aware of what she'd been missing out on by focusing so hard on adventuring.
There was one other side-effect, but she wasn't thinking much about it right now.
After a while, Elisa went back to her bed and covered herself up again, and Rin could finally let her head rise, though she saw the blonde smiling coyly at her.
"I'm being serious, by the way," Elisa told her. "About that offer. If you want to head into the finer parts of town with me, I'd love to show you around."
"I know," Rin nodded. "Thanks for that. I'll probably-"
Before Rin could continue, someone knocked on the door. Rin stood up first, walking over to go open it and when she did, she found Eve there.
But, the fairy wasn't alone. Lisa and Dylan were there as well. Naturally, after her conversation with Xhez, Rin's eyes went to Dylan, and although he was wearing that same polite smile he usually had, his red eyes did hold some curiosity in them as he looked back at Rin.
"Uh... What's up?" Rin asked.
"We're gonna go celebrate!" Eve announced to her, spinning around in mid-air and nearly hitting both Lisa and Dylan with her wings.
"Really?"
"Yeah," Eve nodded. "Everyone did a good job today in their missions, so, we figured we'd share a drink or two. Are you down?" Eve asked, before looking behind her. "Oh, Elisa, you can come too, if you want!"
"... Sorry," Elisa called out. "The mission took a little out of me, I kinda just wanna lay down for the rest of the day."
"Okay, suit yourself," Eve shrugged. "Well, Rin?"
"..." Rin thought about it. Admittedly, everything that had happened in the last half an hour or so had caused some conflicting feelings to surface within her. And, how better to deal with those than to drown them out with copious amounts of alcohol?
She still had the plat that Sye had given to her, after all. In her mind, she'd earned a night like this.
"Sure. Are we going now?"
"Yeah!" Eve looked happy to hear her response.
"Okay, let me get ready then."
---
Almost an hour later, after Rin had changed, Eve, Lisa, Dylan, and Rin were all at the same bar that Rin had been to before. Only, tonight, it was absolutely packed. [People really go this hard on Mondays in Libera?] Rin wondered with a smile.
She was dressed in the same outfit she'd worn when she went to Sye's hotel, a firm reminder that she still needed to buy more clothes, and, of course, that she needed the money to do so.
At the corner of the bar, a couple of musicians were playing some songs with a hat placed strategically in front of them, just in case anyone wanted to give them some money. Ahead, at the center of the building, a crowd was dancing to their tunes. Behind them, was Rin's group.
"Wow, uh, can you handle that much?" Eve asked as Rin downed her fourth shot of the night.
"Oh, I'm a heavyweight, don't worry about me," Rin told her. All of those nights she'd spent drowning in alcohol after work had basically been training for stuff like this. "What about you?"
"Nah," Eve replied. "Two shots are enough to mess me up. Fairies are small, after all, buuut it's part of why we're the cutest things in the world!" She said, winking at Rin and the adventurer laughed, as Eve chuckled as well.
Eve was wearing a strange outfit that almost looked like leaves and vines were wrapped around her body. Lisa was wearing a sleek yellow dress with black stripes and black heels, while Dylan looked like he always did, wearing casual clothes.
Rin's eyes met his a few times over the course of their drinking, but neither of them talked to one another.
"Eve!" Lisa suddenly leaned in front of Eve, and her, quite frankly, gigantic tits nearly fell on top of the fairy. "I just wanted to say, thank you for inviting us! This is lovely."
At that, Rin noticed that Eve blushed a bit and muttered a quick, "you're welcome," before looking away.
[... Oh?]
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Before long, however, Lisa pulled Dylan over to the middle of the room, to dance, and Eve and Rin were left alone. Rin's eyes scanned the entirety of the room, aimlessly, wondering if she could see anything interesting happening.
However, suddenly, a man walked up to her.
"Hey!" He said, and Rin nearly flinched. He looked like a relatively young guy, with short, smooth brown hair and a shaved beard on his face. He was holding a drink in his hands, and, from the looks of it, he was alone.
Beside her, Eve raised a brow as he continued talking to her.
"Sorry, I just couldn't really get over how beautiful you are, I had to say 'hi', you know? What's your name?"
[Ah, I get it,] Rin nodded to herself.
He extended a hand at her, and Rin shook it calmly.
She went with the first name she could think of.
"Name's Triss," she said, with a lower tone than usual, trying to mask her real voice.
"I'm Jaiden, I was just..." He then leaned in bringing his lips close to her left ear so he could whisper something. "I was wondering if you were... you know, selling."
Rin blinked.
"Hey!" Eve said, "I heard that, beat it!" She said, pushing some Essence into her left hand, and when the boy saw that, he apologized and moved away from her. Eve sighed. "Ugh, the nerve of some people."
However, Rin's eyes remained on him for a few seconds, as he went over and sat down at a nearby chair, disappointed. Shaking her head, she went back to her drinks and pushed him out of her thoughts.
Eve ordered some more, all of which she paid for, as apparently money was no issue to her. That meant that Rin was allowed to fill her cup a couple more times, and, finally, she was feeling it.
A little tipsy, Rin found herself dancing alongside Lisa a few minutes later. She didn't really know what she was doing, but Lisa didn't appear to mind. The healer seemed like one of those people who, once they got going, it took a lot to stop them from having a good time.
The bar gradually grew emptier as things went deeper into the night, with hours passing in a series of blinks, and, a while later, Rin was holding Eve's hair back as she puked in a nearby alley.
[... Fuck,] Rin blinked. [I'm getting tired.]
"Is she alright?" Dylan asked, walking up to them.
"I'm fi-" Eve had started to reply, but she quickly puked again.
"Yeah, she'll be alright. I think."
Dylan chuckled a little. Rin guessed that Lisa was still inside somewhere.
"... By the way," Dylan said. "It seems we have a mutual friend, now. Well, another one, I suppose."
Rin nodded.
"Xhez told me," Rin responded. "I'm glad you two hit it off."
"I wouldn't go that far, but... She does have a very calming nature, I will give her that," Dylan told her. "I just wanted to say, I am glad to know people can still be so open-minded."
"... I'm not all that," Rin replied. "I think any normal person would treat Xhez well. She's great."
"Maybe. So," Dylan looked at Eve. "Should we get going? It seems you've had enough."
"Give me a few minutes," Eve replied. "Then, yeah, we can go."
"In that case," Rin said, "let me tell Lisa. I'll see if she wants to stay here on her own, or whatever."
Back at Dren, Rin would have advised against that, but Lisa was an adventurer. She could handle herself, Rin imagined.
And so, Rin walked back into the bar, and almost immediately, her eyes fell on the boy who had approached her earlier. He looked teary-eyed and heavily drunk, downing some liquor straight from a bottle as he sulked. It didn't take much to guess what was going on with him. Rin guessed that, maybe, it was the guy's birthday or something and he'd come out here looking to get laid for the first time, and, so far, he'd been unsuccessful.
Back at the Silver Rose, a few kinds of clients could be considered "common". One was the politician who had been married to someone for too many years and wanted to feel something new, another was the young man or woman who thought they could handle serious relationships and promptly realized they couldn't, and, another, was this sort of guy.
Putting that aside momentarily, Rin walked up to Lisa, who was shaking her hips with some strangers by the spot the musicians were at.
"Hey," Rin told her, "we're leaving in a bit!" She said, over the music.
"Oh, okay!" Lisa replied before pulling Rin in for a hug.
"W-Whahh!?"
"We haven't gotten to talk much, Rin!" Lisa said, embracing her. "You seem really cool, I'd love to know more about you!"
Rin blushed a little as their chests pressed together.
Rin giggled, pushing her away gently.
"Uh, tell me that when you're not running on this many drinks, and we'll talk."
"Okay!" Lisa replied happily before getting back to her dancing and Rin left her to it, figuring she'd come out in a few minutes.
Calming down, though, she was about to walk by the boy again, but she stopped.
[Hm... Why?] She asked herself, but, in truth, she knew exactly why she'd paused here like this. It was due to an idea that had been planted in her mind when she first came to this bar, a while ago,
The sad truth was that Rin still needed some money, even though she was at the Academy. She needed to be able to pay for some clothes, armor, equipment, all manner of things that the Academy didn't provide.
Maybe it was the alcohol in her system, maybe it was a result of some old habits, but Rin had realized something about this profession.
The adventurer she'd been when she started, when she went on her first mission, couldn't survive in this career. A true adventurer needed to be ruthless. Maria had made that clear to her at the cemetery and then on her test. A true adventurer needed to be decisive. The hesitance that Rin had shown before was clearly an issue she needed to deal with if she was to grow. And, a true adventurer needed to work hard. And, Rin knew better than anyone else that sometimes, "working hard" meant investing in your future, even if it meant doing something you didn't really want to do.
That said, if Rin was going to do this again, she was going to do it *her* way. She wasn't about to relive the last 3 years of her life.
The night she'd had with Sye had let her know that there were probably other women like her in this city, who wanted a bit of a female touch and simply couldn't get it. And, Rin wondered if she could take advantage of that somehow.
This particular case was just an exception.
So, Rin rolled her neck and stretched her arms before she leaned down in front of the guy.
"Hey," she whispered and he looked up at her, as though she wasn't even real. Rin put on a seductive expression, with half-lidded eyes and a little smile. "I can't give you what you really want, but... How much would you be willing to pay for some head?" She asked.
And, the guy quickly reached for his pockets, pulling out several gold varols.
[Yeah... That's a lot.]
Rin took them and put them in her pockets, gesturing for the guy to follow her.
---
"Eve, are you gonna be alright?" Rin asked as she carried her fairy friend in her arms, as the two of them walked back inside the Academy. Dylan was doing the same with Lisa, who was passed out in his arms.
"Yeh..." Eve said. "I'm just tired. Sorry that you had to see me like that, I swear, I usually know my limits. I was just... happy."
"We all were," Rin told her. "You don't have to apologize for that."
"... You are too kind," Eve told her. "Ugh, I am so glad I met you."
"Hahaha, come on, which is your room?"
"Ugh... That one."
After having been told about it, Rin went up to it and walked inside.
She hadn't thought that, like her, Eve was probably sharing the room with someone, so she didn't knock. When she walked in, she found a woman sitting by the back of the room, bathed in moonlight as she read a book in front of her. A black-haired beauty that looked back at her with apathetic eyes as Rin walked inside, dressed in a white nightgown.
"Oh, uh, Sara, hey" Rin greeted her.
"Hm?" The girl tilted her head at Rin.
"I'm guessing that's Eve's bed?" She gestured at the empty one.
"Mhm." And just like that, Sara went back to her book.
Rin dropped Eve off, giving her a last goodbye as she then walked out of the room and went back to her own. Here, she found that Elisa was still up, though she looked sleepy. Her radio was on, in the corner.
[Make it make sense, make it make cents, make it a beautiful night!] Some artist sang as Rin walked over to her bed. Elisa turned the radio off as Rin approached, but Rin held a hand out.
"Nah, you don't have to," she said. "I could use some background noise tonight."
"Okay..." Elisa blinked a little, looking over at her. "Had fun?"
"Yeah," Rin replied with a slightly raspy voice. "Um... Maybe you can come with us next time?"
"Absolutely," Elisa promised with a nod. "I just wasn't feeling it tonight."
[Even though you offered to show me and Xhez around?] Rin wondered.
"Eh, I get that, we all have those nights."
Rin slipped her shoes off and took off her clothes, feeling too tired to care too much about Elisa's eyes lingering on her as she did so. She laid down on her bed and stared up at the ceiling for a second.
"Well... Goodnight, Rin," Elisa said, as the music played in the background.
"Goodnight."
And, as Rin closed her eyes, she promised herself she'd take full advantage of her time here, and her skills. *All* of them, if she could.
Just for a short while, anyway, and of her own volition.