Chapter 275: 276: Long days

Fresh sits in the workshop, polishing several different moonglass lenses as she finishes making another batch of glasses in all manner of varying focal strengths. Obviously, it would be better to make these custom-fit to everyone’s personal needs for the lenses. But that isn’t a viable business model for them, it would take up hours and hours of her time. So, she feels that they’re better off making different kinds and just letting people try them out to see what’s the closest fit.

Is it ideal? No, not really. But when is anything ever ideal?

She sighs, looking at the moonglass statue of Mr. Mushroom that she has sitting on the workbench, across from herself.

“Nyah~” says Fresh quietly, wondering what Mr. Mushroom is doing right now? She bets that he’s asleep in his den, dreaming about something nice. She hopes so. Being a monster that lives in the dungeon sounds like a really stressful life.

The mushroom-statue doesn’t respond.

Jubilee walks in, sipping some of the bubbly sweet-tea. “Hey, goo-brain,” they say. “It’s time for bed.”

“Okaaaay~” relents Fresh, setting down the last pair of glasses and rubbing her tired eyes with her forearm. “Good night, Mr. Mushroom,” she says to the statue, walking out of the workshop past Jubilee, who is rolling their eyes.

“Stop talking to the statue, weirdo.”

“I’m not a weirdo!” argues Fresh. “I’m just being nice.”

“Basil,” says Jubilee, snapping their fingers. They point up at Fresh. “Is she a weirdo?”

Basil looks up, yawning. “As much as the rest of us.”

“Wrong answer,” sighs Jubilee, shaking their head. “You let me down more and more every day.”

“Mr. Mushroom was a really nice guy!” argues Fresh. “It’s only polite to wish him a good night.”

“I never got that whole ‘Mr. Mushroom’ thing,” says Basil, looking up from the table over to Shamrock. The man, still laying in his bed, shrugs.

As they get ready to sleep, Fresh goes on to explain her arrival here and her encounter with Mr. Mushroom. Basil isn’t thrilled about her story of eating the creature, more or less raw, but she does seem to find some humor in it.

“Wait,” says Jubilee. “You died?” they ask. “To the very first mush-mush in the dungeon? On floor one? Of the easiest dungeon?” Fresh nods. “I’d find that hilarious, if it wasn’t such a tragedy.”

“Right?!” asks Fresh. “I was so sad about having to kill him.”

“That’s not the sad part,” says Jubilee, shaking their head and walking back upstairs as they leave the washroom.

“It’s certainly a story,” says Basil, patting her on the back as they walk up the staircase. “Do you think that anyone else has ever been killed by him?” she asks.

“By a level one mush-mush?” asks Jubilee. “Yeah, some cripples and some orphans, I bet. Maybe even some crippled orphans. No offense.” Basil sighs, rolling her eyes. “Roll your eyes at me again and I’ll pop ‘em right out of your head,” threatens Jubilee.

“You’d have to reach them first,” replies Basil.

Jubilee nods as they head back into the upstairs area. “Yeah, you’re right,” they say. “Getting past your flat chest might be easy enough, but it might be hard to reach past that over-extended gut of yours.”

“Back at the orphanage,” says Basil, crossing her arms and lifting her nose. “The meanest kids were just the ones who didn’t know what else to do with their feelings,” she explains. “So I understand that you still have a lot of growing up to do.”

Fresh watches the two of them start to bicker again as she heads to her bed. “Good night, Shamrock!” she says, looking somewhat perplexed at the man who is still laying there. It’s really not like him. The dungeon and their business being closed seems to have hit him harder than she thought it would.

“Good night,” says the man.

“Hug?” she asks, holding out her arms. He shakes his head and she frowns, shrugging and dropping her arms. “Okay. Good night,” she says again, slipping into her pajamas and crawling into her bed. Soon enough, the other two finish their nightly conversation and find their way to their beds too and soon enough after that, sleep comes to them all.

The next day comes.

Fresh is sitting downstairs, staring out of the empty ice-cream sales window. “No customers again today,” she sighs.

“Beach is probably still closed, goo-brain,” says Jubilee. “Let’s close it up again. No point in wasting daylight.”

“Mm,” nods Fresh. “Do you think it will be open again soon, Jubilee?” she asks, sounding worried.

“Fuck if I know. Not until they catch that arsonist, I guess,” they say.

Fresh frowns and closes the window again.

After that, she heads upstairs and finishes the reconstruction of the fairy-house.

“So, one big room is enough for you guys?” asks Fresh, looking at the six fairies. “I could make you separate rooms too?” she suggests.

“Why?” asks Tarja.

“So you can sleep by yourselves?” asks Fresh, as if this were obvious.

The fairies exchange a confused look with each other. “Why would we want to do that?” asks Liro.

“Huh?”

Sauli chimes in. “It’s warmer and softer and safer if we all sleep in the same room,” he explains. Fresh nods, understanding. She feels the same way, but obviously, the fairies and herself have a different view of the world than most other people here. Privacy is a bigger issue for most people than it is for the seven of them.

“Alright,” agrees Fresh. “Is there anything else that could be better?” she asks, tightening some screws.

“Can you do anything about the heat?” asks Tarja. “Sometimes we get really sweaty,” she explains. Fresh nods. The small house was sitting right out on the desert beach, it makes sense that it will get hot. Though, maybe it also just gets hot because they all insist on sleeping in the same room. She can’t complain however, it’s the choice that she herself would make too.

“I can give you a cooling bead,” she says. “Just take it out into the moon once every other day or so to recharge, it should keep the room you leave it in cold,” she says, pulling one of the little beads out of a bag full of ready-made ones.

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By the time they’re finished, the magical-floating-fairy-house is more or less reconstructed the same as it was, with only some slight modifications. Wider interior door-frames, a better hanging of the ‘ropes’ in the fluff-filled sleeping area and she even plants a hamsa down beneath the floorboards.

“This’ll keep any foot-demons away,” says Fresh, explaining the purpose of the thing to Tarja.

“Is that a real thing?” she asks.

Fresh nods. “But don’t tell anyone,” she says. “They’ll get scared.”

Tarja nods, understanding.

Soon after that, the house is finished. “You guys can stay here until the beach reopens,” says Fresh. “I don’t know if you want to be out there right now. There are a lot of crabs,” she says, looking off of the roof. Without the adventurers to keep them in check, the dungeon and the beach seem to be overflowing with crabs that scuttle every which way. Hundreds of them.

“Thanks!” says Tarja. “We’ll make it up to you guys, somehow,” she promises. Fresh shakes her head.

“Thank you!” call the others, waving to her as she leaves.

“As long as you guys are safe and happy, then so are we,” she says, heading back down the hatch.

She sighs, closing it behind herself. But then she smiles, noticing that the fairies had finally learned to say ‘thank you’. Nodding to herself with a determined nod, she heads out to the open area and starts doing a light workout, in honor of her favorite fairy who is still out there somewhere. She’s sure of it.

The next day comes.

The beach is still closed. There is no news of any developments in the case. The guards suspect that the saboteur either vanished into the dungeon, where you could hide for weeks, if not months, depending on how strong one is, or that they’ve already left the city by now.

Fresh sighs, looking at all of the ice-cream that they have to throw out. Sure, it’s frozen. But without preservatives of any kind, it still got… weird.

She doesn’t really know how to describe it, but it just got weird. The texture feels wrong. It doesn’t smell off or taste funky or anything. But it feels wrong to eat. So, they’re chucking it all and she cries all the while.

“It’s fine,” consoles Basil, racking the new glasses onto a new shelf that was made especially for them. “I’ll help you make a new batch before we reopen, I promise.”

The next day comes.

It’s the first day that Shamrock could not only be coaxed out of his bed, but also the first day that he actually decides to leave it. The man, who has forgone his household duties these last few days in a very unusual manner for himself, now seems to have returned to his old self. But despite whatever might have been bothering him, he doesn’t want to talk about it. So Fresh leaves it at that.

The next day comes.

With dead eyes, Fresh opens the sales window.

“One milkshake please,” says the familiar dark-elf.

She blinks, staring at him. “Huh?”

The man shrugs. “A milkshake,” he repeats, making a shaking motion with his hands and sliding a coin over the counter. Fresh stares at it, not really sure what to do with it, until she realizes that he is trying to buy something.

“AH!” she jumps upright, looking around. People stream down the staircase, heading onto the beach and a great war begins to erupt between dozens of extremely pent up adventurers and the most violent crabs imaginable.

It looks like everything is back to normal.

“Coming right up!” beams Fresh, not sure how she is going to make any ice-cream on such short notice.

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