Chapter 65: Roots, Part Four

After the initial shock passed, and Jay internalized the fact that Rin had just shown up out of nowhere, she looked over at Xhez with tangible confusion in her eyes.

"Who's this?" She asked.

"..." She was about to give the usual "she's my sister" spiel, but then, she decided against it. Jay knew her and her family too well to be fooled by such a thing. Instead, she went with:

"She's a friend, her name's Xhez," Rin stated. "It's a little bit of a long story, but..."

"Hm. I don't have much time, but sure, go ahead, explain," Jay replied as she gestured toward her desk and the chairs near it. She moved over there, sitting on the desk itself while Rin and Xhez sat down in front of her. "So, what's going on here?" She asked, as her eyes were centered on Xhez.

[I doubt Jay would freak out about a water sprite being here. Even when things went south, back in the day, she'd always been one to keep a calm head.]

"Xhez, go ahead," Rin told her and, as always, a small look of apprehension came over the sprite's face, but as she saw that Rin was confident she nodded and as she deactivated her spell, her body briefly flashed a white aura, and then, the regular water sprite was revealed.

The only sign Jay gave of being surprised was a subtle, extended inhalation.

"... Okay," Jay nodded. "What exactly am I looking at?"

Hearing that, surprised at how well Jay appeared to be taking this, Rin went on to explain everything that had happened, much like she did with her mother. Jay listened intently, and although Rin had thought she was largely unaffected by this news, she noticed that Jay visibly relaxed a little, growing less tense as Rin's explanation went on.

"... So, it took you just two weeks before you got into some shit?" Jay asked with a small chuckle as Rin finished her story.

"Yeah," Rin nodded. "B-But, uh, everything's been going well since then. Thankfully."

"Good to hear that. Did you go see your mother already?" Jay asked.

"Yeah, it was the first thing I did."

At that, Jay sighed.

"Did she tell you what was up with her?" Rin's old boss asked. "She's been getting sick lately but she refuses to tell me what's wrong."

Rin blinked, but, then she thought that knowing her mother, Lyn probably just didn't want Jay worrying about her.

"Yeah, but, it's okay," Rin waved a hand. "She's just been tired from all the work lately, I think. It'll pass."

"Hmph," Jay crossed her arms. "I tried to tell her to take a couple of hours off every now and then, but that woman just brushed me off every time."

"She feels useful, maybe," Rin shrugged.

"She *is* useful," Jay corrected her, "but, I want her to take care of herself too. That Asahiro stubbornness sure is something." Jay took a more relaxed posture then, hearing that. Rin felt that maybe she'd managed to lessen her concern a little, which her mother would probably appreciate. "So, how long are you staying here for?"

"Just until Sunday. I'll be showing Xhez around town, for most of my time here though."

"I see," Jay nodded. "Well, kid, I should get back to work. If you want to get a beer or two later, I'd definitely like to hear more about what the Academy's like."

"Sounds good," Rin said, standing up. Xhez did the same. "Xhez, your disguise."

"Right," the sprite nodded, and then, she cast her usual illusion spell. Surprisingly, she got it on her first try, a testament to how well she had this thing memorized by now.

[Come to think of it, muscle memory is a thing too. Is a sprite's physical memory as good as their mental, or, I guess, literal memory?] Rin wondered.

Waving goodbye at Jay, Rin walked out of the room with the newly disguised sprite by her side, feeling strangely nostalgic about all of this.

[Okay,] Rin nodded to herself as she turned toward Xhez, while music and dancing went on around her. [Felix isn't in right now, so, I guess I'll just go ahead and show Xhez around. I can always come back later, or tomorrow.]

She did, however, have one other thing she wanted to do before she left this place.

That plan she'd come up with a week ago, it was still in her mind, and, as Jay had put it, the Asahiro's were a stubborn bunch. She was going to try her hand at it. In order to do that, however, there were a couple of things she needed that she couldn't get from Libera.

Gesturing for Xhez to follow her, Rin walked out of the brothel, not bothering to stop to say goodbye to anyone else, though she doubted that they'd noticed since they were all partying anyway. She walked to a store that was located just beside the Silver Rose, a place so small that if one didn't know it was there, they could likely never notice it during their trips to this place.

It was a shop as small as Rin's room back at the Academy, but this was where the workers of the Silver Rose got their much-needed potions from.

"Uh, Xhez, can you stay out here for a bit?" Rin asked.

She figured this would be faster without the shopkeep asking about Xhez and who she was, as he too would surely recognize Rin.

"Okay," Xhez nodded, and Rin turned back toward the store.

The door leading into it was old and thin, and it creaked as Rin walked inside. The store smelled of dust and stagnation, with a couple of shelves lined up to the right that made it feel cramped, and the shopkeep's counter to the left. The man himself was there, and he brightened up when he saw the adventurer.

"Rin! It's been a while."

"Y-Yeah," Rin nodded, though she refused to engage in much more conversation with him. She wanted to get this done fast in case anyone else came in and caught her doing this. She didn't want any rumors spreading, after all.

There were three kinds of potions she needed, and she wanted to take multiple of each one. One was meant to prevent pregnancy, just in case something happened.

Rin wanted to do this on her own terms, and that meant excluding guys from the pool of available customers. After all, sleeping with people she wasn't even attracted to had been one of the sources of her three-year-long depression. However, she also wasn't entirely an idiot. If one random noble approached her that would give her, for example, ten plats for a session, she would swallow her pride and accept the money in a heartbeat, hence why she wanted that potion.

Another was one that could, temporarily, either shrink or enlarge different parts of her body. The trick was that as you drank it, you had to envision the changes you wanted to implement. She wanted these, not just because different people had different preferences in terms of the women they bedded, but because it would make her less recognizable. Finally, of course, there was the potion she used to change her hair color, which served the same purpose as the previous one.

The only real issue with this was that, in the case of the hair color changer, these things would run out quickly, as Rin would have to drop the contents of those flasks onto her head. As for the others, however, since Rin wouldn't be working nearly as often as she had before, she could stretch out their use for a long time, she figured.

The first was the only one that presented a problem. She needed to figure out how she'd get more of these, without having to come back here every week.

[... Wait,] she paused, just as she'd been picking up one of the flasks. [Xhez.]

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Instantly, she felt a little dirty just thinking about using her friend's magical skills for this venture, but, at the same time, it made a lot of sense.

[Xhez wouldn't care either, I think,] Rin thought. [Hell, if I asked her, she'd probably be happy to do it.]

That hair-changing potion was the only problem. If she got around this, her idea would be far easier to execute.

Deciding that this was the best way to go about it, she put the flask back onto its shelf and instead, walked over to the shopkeep with only the ones meant to change her body and prevent pregnancies in her hands.

All in all, she had four flasks of both potions, eight in total. This was enough of those to last an entire month, maybe more, if she paced herself well.

"Could I get a bag for these?" Rin asked, with a rapidly beating heart, before she went to pay for all of it.

---

{Xhez}

As the sprite stood outside the store, she looked around and wondered why there weren't as many people here as there were in Libera. It wasn't all too different to that city, from what Xhez could tell, and yet, everywhere she and Rin had been to had been practically empty.

She'd noticed that when she first arrived. The station had been absolutely packed, sure, but, the streets weren't. Instead, there was a general sense of emptiness here, as far as the population was concerned.

"Well," Rin said, as she walked out holding a bag in her right hand, "time to see the sights, although there aren't exactly many of them," Rin said, and Xhez instantly brightened up.

However, she did ask about what she just noticed before they did anything else.

"Rin, why aren't there more people around?"

"Hm?" The adventurer appeared a little confused by that. She shrugged, and answered, "uh, well, apparently, ever since the Railroad got built, a lot of people just go north when they feel like they've had enough of this place."

"Why's that?"

"... More opportunities," Rin explained, as the two of them began walking down the street. "More places to see, things to do. If you wanted to be a singer, for example," Rin illustrated, "why would you sing to one thousand people here, when you could sing to ten thousand up in Libera? Or, if you wanted to make a company, why would you sell your stuff to ten people here, when you could sell it to hundreds in Cradle? I guess you haven't really noticed yet, because we haven't been to too many places around Libera," Rin said, "but, Dren's a small place in the middle of nowhere, really. There aren't too many options for people who want to make lives for themselves around here. Well, no" she sighed, "that's not fair. There are options, but... There are normally better ones, up north."

"I see," Xhez nodded. Indeed, the idea of moving away from home, spreading her wings, so to speak, was one she was very familiar with. However, from her perspective, she couldn't really see the differences between this place and Libera. Like Rin said, maybe she just needed more time in both locations before she could really understand.

Or, at worst, maybe it was a human thing, and she'd never get it, though she doubted that.

"So, anyway," Rin smiled at her, "how about we go watch a play?"

"A play?" Xhez asked, tilting her head. "What is that?"

"Uh, it's basically like this thing where some people in front of you act something out, and you have to, ehm, imagine the story they're trying to tell, in your head. Does that make sense?"

Xhez wasn't too sure about that.

"Maybe I will understand more when I see it," Xhez said.

"Yeah, maybe. Come on. By the Divine, it's been a while," Rin noted and the two of them made their way deeper into the city.

Rounding a few corners and earning weird looks from those who passed them by, eventually, they arrived at a building that definitely looked unique. It was tall and wide, with big red banners and a carved-out grey arch at its front, over two grand black doors.

A few people were filing in already, and there was a man dressed in a blue uniform outside, holding his hands behind his back, who watched them approach.

"Reservations?" He asked Rin.

"No," Rin shook her head.

"Extra fee then."

"Guess that hasn't changed," Rin mumbled as she took out twenty silver varols from her pockets. She handed them over to the man and he stepped aside, allowing them to enter.

The two of them did, and instantly, Xhez felt much colder. They walked through a dark hallway, and at the corners, Xhez saw blue torches perched up on sconces.

When they came out the other side, however, Xhez was at a loss for words.

A stage was placed down in the middle up ahead, surrounded by many rows of cushioned red seats. There was only one light in the room, and it was found at the ceiling, focusing squarely on that stage.

"Looks like not many people have shown up yet. Guess we're early," Rin noted.

The two of them moved up a set of nearby stairs and sat down at one of the rows to the back, with Rin letting the bag she had rest on the ground between her feet.

Xhez was shaking from how cold she was, and Rin noticed. A warm arm went around Xhez's back, and she looked up at the adventurer.

"What?" Rin asked with a smirk. "You're cold, aren't you?"

At that, Xhez smiled.

"Thank you," she said, snuggling closer to the human, though, for some reason, she felt a little embarrassed.

It took her a little to understand why, but then, she realized. It was because of the memory Rin had shown to her earlier.

At the end of that strange activity she and the woman had engaged in, the two had laid down and the woman had held Rin in a similar way. She could remember Rin's feelings from that instant as though they were her own, and this was how she'd felt.

[I would like to experience that for myself, one of these days,] Xhez noted, as she waited for this "play" to start.

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