MY MEMORY
“…Hmm?”
A tremor woke Tiona. She stared at a dark, stone ceiling, illuminated only by shafts of sunlight, streaming through the bars set in the stone walls and evenly spaced skylights overhead. The room was caked with blood and dirt, and the air was dank—far from hygienic.
Tiona lay flat on her back in the center of the room, alone. She could only smell rust and stone.
Books were strewn about, as if someone had been reading them all. Sitting up, she examined an open book that told a simple tale for children. An illustration depicted a brave hero facing a creature with a man’s body and an ox’s head. Perplexed, Tiona stared at it until the room shook again, and she heard voices—cheers from outside.
“Wake up. It’s your turn next.”
Tiona turned to see her big sister, looking much younger than she remembered.
“Tione? Why are you so small?”
“What nonsense are you spouting? Wake up, idiot. It’s filthy in here.”
Tione kicked a pile of books, scattering them everywhere. It was as if she had reverted to her younger self, terrible personality and all. Her usual, voluptuous figure was nowhere to be seen. Her childish body and the wild look in her sister’s eyes…The raised shouts of her fellow Amazons echoing through the walls…Finally, Tiona understood.
Oh, right. This is the arena.
The Hyrute twins had been dumped here as babies, before they were even old enough to know what was going on.
Still, Tiona couldn’t shake the feeling that she was missing something. She saw Tione chewing on a piece of dried meat in the corner and asked her a question.
“What did you fight today, Sis?”
“Orcs and hellhounds,” Tione replied between bites, not even glancing up. “They reeked of shit and piss. I hated every second of it.”
Then she jerked her chin, indicating the door she had come through. “Get moving. They said if we win today, that shitty goddess will grant us a reward.”
“Really?!”
Tiona’s ears perked up, and her face lit up. She sprang to her feet and sprinted from the waiting room down the hallway, undeterred by the distant roars of the arena.
What would it be today, she wondered? What triumphs awaited? What stories would be told? Thoughts of the promised reward filled her mind as she stepped through the gateless arch, into a world of light and cheering voices…
And then Tiona woke up.
“It was just a dream…”
Only the sounds of chirping birds could be heard now. Tiona sat up on her bed, looking down at the blanket she had kicked onto the floor in the night. There were no books here, only memories of the huge collection she once cherished as a child. Tiona let out a deep sigh.
“What are you going to do about your debt, Tiona?!”
That was the very first thing her big sister demanded after Tiona finished breakfast in the Twilight Manor dining hall.
“How much of that weapon do you still have to pay off?!”
“Um…About ninety million valis, I think.”
“You idiot!!”
It was the day after Aiz’s expedition to the twenty-fourth floor. When the Sword Princess had first reported what she encountered there, it caused quite a stir—but now all was relatively calm. Lefiya was still in bed recovering from Mind Down while Bete was up and making noise, and Aiz was nearby, so Tiona went about her normal routine while asking Aiz about her quest.
Then Tione burst in and ruined everything by getting on her case. Tiona glared at her.
“…What? What’s that look for?”
“Nothing,” Tiona said in a huff, opting to not comment on her sister’s completely different personality compared to her dream.
“You’ve got to stop racking up debts!” Tione went on. “I don’t care if you drag your own name through the mud, but think about how this reflects on the captain!”
“It’s fine! We’re all adventurers here, right, Aiz?”
“Um…”
Incidentally, Aiz was dressed in a maid outfit—Loki’s punishment for going to the twenty-fourth floor without the rest of the familia. Aiz had been forced to obey her goddess’s every whim while dodging her wandering hands, and now, the frilly costume drew the eyes of everyone else in the familia, making Aiz even more taciturn than usual.
“Come to think of it, Aiz, didn’t you find a jewel tree on the twenty-fourth floor? Tell me where it is, and I’ll go pick some treasure!”
The yield of each jewel tree varied, but finding one was a significant windfall. The green dragons that usually guarded them were no match for an adventurer of Tiona’s caliber, and if she was lucky enough to get a drop item while she was at it, she could easily be looking at a profit in the region of thirty million valis.
Even a hundred-million-valis debt wasn’t beyond Tiona’s ability to repay. For a first-tier adventurer and member of Loki Familia, it was only a matter of time.
But Tiona’s unrepentant attitude sent her elder sister into a rage.
“This idiot…!”
“So come on, Aiz, spill it already! Where was it?”
“Um…I think it was somewhere around—”
“Don’t tell her, Aiz!”
Bang! Tione slammed her fist on the table, startling Aiz.
“This is why you keep breaking your weapons—because you think it’s so easy to just buy a new one! You’re a disgrace to the familia!”
“Come on, Sis! We’re all adventurers here!”
“Quiet! I don’t want to hear it! You’re going to learn just how hard the rest of us work to make money, and we’ll see if that thick head of yours can learn something, muscle brain!”
“What? And don’t call me that!”
Tiona pleaded, but her sister wouldn’t relent. When she said, “Well, what about the jewel tree, then? We can’t just waste it,” Tione simply replied, “I’ll go handle it.”
And so while Aiz simmered in her awkwardness, Tiona had little choice but to do the homework her big sister had given her.
“Take these goods to market and don’t come back until every last thing is sold! Any money you make, you can keep.”
Tione handed Tiona a bulging backpack and sent her on her way with a grin. Together with Aiz in her maid outfit, the pair saw Tiona off at the front door. Tiona departed through the manor gates, glancing back with a bitter scowl.
“Grr, why don’t I get a say in this? And what’s all this secondhand stuff?!”
The backpack was filled with worn-out weapons, armor, old books, and discarded clothing of every size and shape. It looked like every piece of clutter in the manor was being put up for sale because nobody could think of what else to do with them. Tiona could just imagine her sister going around asking for donations just to take credit for clearing out the trash.
“I bet she’s gonna tell Finn it was her idea, too…”
Tiona thought back to the look of delight on her sister’s face and sighed. Adjusting her backpack, she endured the scorching sun as she trudged toward the market in district six, nestled between West Main Street and Southwest Main Street. Here, traders flooded the city via the southwest gate, coming via Port Meren and the brackish Lolog Lake that connected Orario to the sea. With all its trading houses and marketplaces, this commercial district was the cornerstone of Orario’s economy and what cemented it as the centerpiece of the modern world. Traders came by land and sea just for the chance to buy magic-stone items and other curios from the Dungeon’s depths.
Tiona made her way through Central Park and turned down Southwest Main Street. The commercial district was as busy as ever. A quick glance revealed exotic fruits, fresh seafood, beautiful fabrics, and weapons forged from Damascus steel. There were more goods and people than Tiona could count.
“This’d be a lot more fun if I was buying instead of selling…!” she whined.
The district boasted the most varied sights in Orario, thanks to the many exotic traders. People wore unusual clothes that wouldn’t be seen elsewhere in or around Orario, and many travelers came just to take in the sights.
Tiona found herself speculating on the background of everyone she passed in the street. That animal person…Are they from the islands? Did that human come from the desert? Her bulky baggage was awkward to carry, so she hoisted it above her head as she navigated the crowds. This feat of strength, akin to holding up a stocky dwarf with one hand, drew stares and murmurs from passersby.
Her destination was a specific area of the bustling commercial district. If she tried to peddle her familia’s used garments at respectable establishments catering to traders and foreign dignitaries, she’d be chased out. Tiona’s only option was the venue that served ordinary folks and adventurers—the flea market.
“All right, let’s give this a shot!”
On her sister’s advice, she picked an empty spot, laid out a cloak, and spread out the backpack’s contents on it. Then she copied other vendors, calling out half-heartedly to anyone passing by.
After a few minutes, she received her first customers.
“How much is this, ma’am?” one asked.
“Um…five hundred valis, I guess?”
“That’s too high! I can’t afford that! How about half?”
“Mmm…Oh, fine! Take it!”
The two human women clasped their hands and celebrated finding a bargain. Tiona didn’t really care what they sold for, and she steadily made more sales. Women’s clothes seemed to go faster.
Oh, there goes Leene’s stole…I think that brooch belonged to Rakuta…and isn’t that Lefiya’s dress? I guess it was getting a bit tight around her chest…She’s still growing…Grr…
The clothing sold like hotcakes, and Tiona began to think that maybe this wasn’t so difficult after all, but soon, the flow of customers slowed to a crawl, leaving Tiona little to do. The occasional adventurer would stop in front of her stall but most would beat a hasty retreat for some reason.
“Hey, Mord! Check out this broadsword—what a find!”
“Well, well, well. So you can still find this sorta thing at flea markets—wait, an Amazon? The Slasher?! Let’s get outta here!”
“What’s the big idea?” complained Tiona, pouting.
There was still unsold merchandise on the cloak and even more inside the backpack.
“Did I pick a bad spot?” she wondered aloud. “Or maybe I’m just not catching people’s eyes? This gear is squeaky clean; they oughtta be selling like hotcakes, too!”
Her stall in the shade of a building near the edge of the flea market couldn’t compete with the prime locations taken by more enterprising vendors. Tiona studied her rivals and quickly deduced that they went to great lengths to draw in customers or regularly changed the goods on display. She tried copying them, but it didn’t make much difference.
“Oh, what’s the point? I’m not cut out for this.”
Exhausted, Tiona collapsed onto her back, but as self-deprecating thoughts began creeping in, her sister’s grinning face appeared in her mind.
“See? I told you. Making money’s not so easy. Maybe next time you’ll listen to my advice.”
Determined not to let Tione have the last laugh, Tiona sprang up. Perhaps a change of location was needed. She stuffed her goods into the backpack and set off.
“There’s all sorts of things for sale around here,” she said to herself while scouting out places to set up. There were homemade preserves, paintings, handmade trinkets—she was even shocked to see swindlers passing off random bits of claw and bone as rare Dungeon drop items. Anyone could put anything up for sale around here. The only common point was that everything was much cheaper than the regular market.
Then, just as she passed by a plaza with a water fountain, she saw it.
“Books…”
Her eyes fell on a stall run by a young elf with spectacles. Several thick books were on display. There was everything from complex philosophical treatises to medicinal field guides with lots of illustrations, all wrapped in colorful bindings. Some were laid out to reveal the covers, while others were lined up with only their spines visible.
Tiona’s mind drifted back to her dream and the large collection of books she used to own as a child.
Oh, a hero story…
Her eyes were drawn to a book resting on a little easel, bearing a familiar crest. She recognized the title, written in gold letters across the leather binding: Arcadia.
Unable to resist, Tiona stepped over to the stall and bent down to reach for the book…when her hand brushed against another’s.
““Oh!”” both of them exclaimed at the same time. Tiona turned to see who it was. However, when she did, she got an even bigger surprise, for the person was bizarrely wearing a full helm that concealed their entire face.
This mysterious individual panicked and stood back up again.
“I-I’m sorry! You take it! I don’t have any money anyway…”
“Um…okay.”
The voice was that of a boy, slightly too high to be fully grown. Tiona hadn’t intended to purchase the book, either, but she was a bit too taken aback to manage a coherent response.
Tiona stood, noting that the boy was about her height and carried himself like an adventurer. The pitch-black helmet he wore covered everything apart from his mouth and almost made him seem like some warrior of darkness. Tiona couldn’t see his eyes or the color of his hair.
After scrutinizing him for a moment, she asked the boy a question.
“Isn’t it hot under there?”
Some adventurers were proud of their armor, loudly declaring it an extension of their body and wearing it wherever they went. But the only armor this boy wore was the helmet, and everything below the neck was just normal clothes. It didn’t make any sense at all.
As the sun’s harsh rays beat down, the boy stammered, “I…I can’t take it off,” he said meekly.
“…What?” replied Tiona, aghast.
In the plaza, away from the stalls, Tiona tried to piece together from the boy’s account what had happened.
“So you tried it on before buying, and it got stuck?”
“Y-yeah…”
After discovering it wouldn’t come off, the stall owner had forced the poor boy to pay through the teeth for the helmet, leaving him completely broke.
Without warning, Tiona grabbed the stuck helmet and pulled on it as hard as she could.
“Nnnnggrh!!”
“Owowowowowowowow!”
Despite her efforts, the helmet refused to budge, only causing the boy more pain.
If even a first-tier adventurer’s strength couldn’t remove it, there was only one explanation.
“It must be a cursed item!” Tiona cried, eyes wide with amazement.
“‘A cursed item’?!”
Among the many magic items crafted by mages, some bore particularly unhelpful effects—cursed items. Sometimes by accident, sometimes on purpose, and lately, the result of mischievous gods ordering their followers to create them.
One common curse made it impossible to remove a piece of equipment once it was equipped. Sheer bad luck had landed this boy in his current predicament.
“I haven’t seen one in a while,” Tiona murmured. “…I wonder if it has any other effects.”
“Um…actually,” the boy replied, “it makes it so anyone I see looks…different.”
“‘Different’?” asked Tiona, tilting her head. “Different how?”
“Different races, different faces, that sort of thing,” the boy replied. “I can’t see who anyone really is. Like…for example, the man running the book stall looked like an animal person to me. What were they really?”
Tiona’s eyes widened. The man at the stall had been an elf. The boy must have discovered this effect soon after donning the helmet; the stall vendor’s appearance must have immediately changed from his perspective.
“Hmm…Then what do I look like?”
“Um…An elf girl,” the boy replied.
“An elf? Me? Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!”
Tiona burst into laughter. Elves were like the polar opposite of Amazons, and she nearly split her sides.
Now it all made sense. The reason this boy hadn’t fled screaming, “Eek! Amazon the Slasher!” was because his helmet made it impossible to tell who she was.
Tiona wiped tears of laughter from her eyes while the boy stood awkwardly.
“H-how am I ever going to take this off?” he asked at last.
“Hmm…Normally, people use moly or get a mage or a healer to disenchant it…” Tiona mused aloud. She looked at the boy for a moment, then smiled. “One of my friends is a great healer! I’m sure she can break that annoying curse!”
“Y-you really mean it?!”
“However!” Tiona said, raising a finger. “First, you have to help me! I need to sell all these goods by the end of today!”
Though not exactly a lie, Tiona didn’t reveal the real reason for her bargain—she didn’t want to part ways with this strange boy so quickly. It was too funny that he saw her as an elf, and Tiona was secretly enjoying it. Plus, he hadn’t run away screaming, which was always nice.
Most of all, the heroic tale that had brought them together stirred memories of her childhood, and she wasn’t ready to let that feeling fade yet.
“How about it?” she asked, looking up at the boy. To her surprise, he immediately nodded.
“Okay,” he said. “If there’s anything I can do to help, then sure!”
“All right! Let’s do this!”
Tiona shook his hand vigorously with both of hers, making him bob up and down.
Together, Tiona and the boy walked around the marketplace to find a good spot for their stall.
“So you like hero stories as well?” she asked.
“Yeah. My grandpa always used to read them to me. That book was one I remembered, so I reached for it without thinking…” he added bashfully. Then he realized something. “Um…”
“Hm?”
“…What’s your name? I just realized I haven’t asked.”
Tiona hesitated—she usually didn’t mind giving her name, but for whatever reason, she wanted to keep the masquerade going a bit longer.
“Elna,” she said. “My name’s Elna.”
“Isn’t that…the same as in that book?”
“Ah-ha-ha! Figures you’d know!”
Elna was the name of a character in the novel Arcadia—the very book they had just seen. Though the boy likely suspected it was a lie, he still went along with it.
“So Ms. Elna, how did you get into hero tales?” he asked.
“I didn’t realize it at the time, but I had a pretty troubled childhood,” Tiona replied. “I didn’t enjoy much besides fighting. But one day, I picked up an old book someone left lying around—and I was hooked…”
That old book had been little more than a bundle of scrap paper. Back then, when the young girl’s life consisted of nothing but fighting monsters and other Amazons, the story contained in those pages offered a thrill she had never known. She could still remember that feeling like it was yesterday.
Realizing her words had stunned the boy into silence, Tiona hastily changed the subject.
“So anyway, you said I look like an elf, right? What kind?”
“U-um…right. Well, you’ve got, er…blond hair.”
“Yeah?”
“Long.”
“Ooh!”
“Your eyes are…”
This went on for a while. It turned out that even Tiona’s voice and clothing appeared differently to the boy. As far as he could tell, she was as modestly dressed as any elf in a dress and a cape and spoke in a soothing soprano.
Tiona couldn’t help but giggle. That sounds just like Lefiya! What a hoot!
After a short search, they found a decent spot and set up shop. While doing so, Tiona pressed the boy for more details. He explained that his supporter had recently gone missing. After checking everywhere without success, a friend brought him here, to the flea market, to take his mind off the matter. After his mishap with the helmet, he’d somehow gotten separated from this friend, which was how he ended up meeting Tiona.
When Tiona asked if he wasn’t worried about his missing supporter, he admitted he was, but he had a feeling she would show up again, like she always did.
Tiona sensed the bond of trust between them, and a smile spread across her face.
They finished setting up Tiona’s goods and continued chatting as they waited for customers.
After about an hour of no sales, Tiona yelled, “…Nobody’s buying anything at all!”
They’d tried calling out to customers, but anyone who recognized Tiona ran away. She was starting to think the issue wasn’t the quality of her wares but her reputation. She sighed as she looked at her stall standing in the shade of a building.
“Um…” said the boy. “Do you think maybe we should take the initiative and go find buyers?”
“How do you mean?”
“Well, it’s like trading magic stones. We could pay other stalls a visit.”
It wasn’t uncommon for vendors to buy merchandise from other stalls and resell it for a profit. While this sometimes annoyed the original sellers, it was seen as mostly their own fault for underestimating the value of their wares. By buying low and selling high, an enterprising individual could achieve an income comparable to an adventurer. They were the kinds of people who referred to the flea market as a treasure trove of bargains.
“Does that mean we’ll have to haggle?” Tiona asked. “I’m not really confident about that, but…Hmm…”
Bargaining was a standard tool for adventurers negotiating prices when they sold their Dungeon loot to merchants and commerce-focused familias. Given the number of stalls in the flea market, it wouldn’t be that hard to find some success. While Tiona couldn’t match Raul and her other peers in this field, she also couldn’t deny wanting to see the look on her sister’s face if she went home with a mountain of valis.
After a moment of thought, she decided, “Let’s give it a try! It can’t be any worse than sitting around here selling nothing!”
The best defense is a good offense—Tiona had lived by that motto her whole life. Stuffing her goods back into her bag, she set off with the boy to improve her flea-market career. Scanning the stalls, she picked one with a solid wooden structure that looked a bit more upscale and marched right up to it.
After presenting her goods to the Amazon behind the counter…
“Nothing too special. I’ll give you a thousand valis for the lot.”
“Whaaat?! That’s way too little!”
For twenty-odd articles of clothing, that was a miserable sum. Tiona figured she could practically give them away and earn more than that.
“Come on! Help a sister out! You can go higher than that, can’t you?”
“Sorry, but I’ve got bills to pay, just like everyone else!”
“But look at these battle clothes! They’re basically new!”
“I’m still not paying more than that for some old books and hand-me-downs!”
The stall owner’s name turned out to be Lulu, and she refused to budge on the price. She knew exactly how much power she held in this negotiation.
Lulu possessed rather babyish looks for an Amazon, with a sugary voice and voluptuous physique. Although she was about her sister’s height, Lulu was considerably better endowed, and to compare her assets to Tiona’s was simply cruel.
Tiona felt defeated in more ways than one. She simply didn’t have anything to bargain with, and her face was turning red with embarrassment.
Just then, the boy timidly suggested, “Um…what about if I add in this equipment?”
“Well, well…” Lulu had a very different look in her eyes now.
Tiona went, “Oh yeah, I forgot that,” when she saw what the boy had placed on the counter—a dully gleaming broadsword and a chipped shield. The owner had outgrown them. Still, they were perfectly serviceable, even if they probably wouldn’t survive one of Loki Familia’s expeditions. Lulu’s reaction made it clear they were still valuable.
“Could you raise the price a little if we threw these in…?”
Tiona later heard that the boy had recently bought a pair of potions: a cheap one and an expensive magic one. That experience had taught him that bundling unwanted items with a premium one could fetch a better price, and this was his first attempt at trying out that strategy for himself.
Tiona didn’t miss Lulu flinching when the boy made his suggestion. The equipment he had offered might even garner the interest of a deep-pocketed, high-street vendor, and Lulu seemed willing to go to great lengths to obtain them.
“H-hmm…Well, I suppose I could part with maybe thirty thousand…”
“Three hundred thousand!!” Tiona countered, recalling the time her sister sold the Cadmus Hide. Lulu’s eyes widened in shock, and even the boy’s helmet couldn’t hide his surprise.
“You must be joking! I’ll never pay that much!!”
“Then I guess I’ll take my business someplace else!”
Lulu gnashed her teeth in frustration, and Tiona was delighted—the shoe was on the other foot now. The two Amazons glared at each other while the boy struggled to recover from his shock.
“…Fine,” Lulu said. “I’ll pay.” She finally relented and dropped a bag of coins onto the counter. However, she was wearing a defiant grin. Tiona was momentarily confused, but then Lulu rose to her feet and declared, “On one condition! You’ll have to buy some of my goods, and the cost will come out of what I pay you!”
“…What? Why would we do that?”
Tiona wasn’t a fan of this idea, but Lulu’s smug grin said it all. She walked around to the front of the stall, and as she passed the helmeted boy, she took his hand and squeezed it. While Tiona and the boy exchanged confused shrieks, Lulu bent down, blushed, and in an even sweeter voice than before, asked, “Hey, little boy, won’t you give me a discount?”
With her eyes upturned, her body pressed against his, her cleavage right in the boy’s face, Lulu did everything she could to sway him.
“If you do what I want…then I’ll let you have some fun with me.”
What a horrible woman!!
Tiona was on the verge of violent eruption. This damn cougar was using her charms to get her way! It wasn’t fair!
Lulu was well aware that her body was her most effective weapon, and she was using it on the boy to great effect. She would get him to make a promise, let him brush a tit or something, and drive down the asking price!
It was scandalous! Disgraceful! And a blatant attack on Tiona’s assets!!
She’d just started to open her heart to the boy, and now he was being stolen right from under her nose. She felt so angry and defeated that she couldn’t stop the boy before he timidly opened his lips.
“…I’m…good,” he answered hoarsely. “I-I think I’ll pass…”
“…Huh?”
Lulu froze, clearly unprepared for a refusal. Tiona was momentarily speechless, too, but when she saw the boy slip out of Lulu’s grip and take a few steps back, she grinned triumphantly.
“Ha-hah! Your dirty tricks won’t work on us! Now hand over that money!!”
“Wh-why? Why aren’t you interested? Are you saying…I’m not good enough?!”
Lulu collapsed to her knees and began to sob, while Tiona snatched the sack of coins off the counter and stuck out her tongue. Then she grabbed the boy’s hand and ran off.
“Ah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! It feels good to come out on top!!”
“Ha…ha-ha-ha…”
After running a good distance, Tiona stopped, turned, and beamed at the boy.
“But I’m impressed,” she said. “How did you turn that Amazon down? Even I could tell she was super sexy.”
Tiona’s question seemed to throw the boy for a loop. After a long pause, he replied. “…She was an Amazon?”
“Oh, right,” Tiona said, remembering the cursed helmet prevented him from seeing people as they really were. “What did she look like, then? Don’t tell me she was a man!”
“Erm…no, she was a woman…” the boy replied, unsure how to proceed. He walked over to Tiona and whispered the remainder in her ear. “A really burly dwarf woman…”
At that stunning revelation, Tiona burst out laughing.
Once Tiona’s task was finished, it was time for her to hold up her end of the bargain. She roamed the flea market in search of a healer who could remove the helmet’s curse.
“Hm? Isn’t that…? Hey! Amid!!”
Tiona’s keen eyes picked out a head of silver hair among the crowd. She ran over, waving.
“Ms. Tiona?” Amid called, turning around.
“I didn’t know you were here at the flea market, too!”
When Tiona had mentioned she knew a great healer who could tackle curses, this was the person she had in mind.
“My patron god let me take a break, so I came here to relax…” Amid explained.
“Perfect!” replied Tiona, and she quickly explained the situation. By the time the boy caught up, Amid’s gaze turned to him. “I see,” she muttered. “In that case, please come to my store. I should be able to—”
“What are you doing to my customer, Amid?” a resentful voice interrupted.
Tiona spun around to see a chienthrope holding a large paper bag.
“…Nahza Ersuisu,” Amid said, recognizing the girl.
“Haven’t you stolen enough from us already?” Nahza asked flatly, peering out from behind the overflowing bag of medicinal ingredients in her arms. “This customer is mine.”
“M-Ms. Nahza?” the boy stammered. “How did you know it was me? And, huh, you’ve become an elf, too.”
“Yeah, I recognized your smell,” Nahza replied. “I don’t know what you mean about becoming an elf, though.”
Tiona realized that the mysterious person who had brought the boy to the flea market and then disappeared must have been Nahza. The chienthrope girl approached him and gave him a sniff. After Tiona explained the situation once more, Nahza took the boy by the hand and began to lead him away.
“Let’s go,” she said. “We don’t need to bother Dian Cecht with this. I’ll take care of this curse with my potions…It’ll cost you, though.”
“W-wait! Ms. Nahza!”
“…!”
Tiona’s arm shot out…then dropped weakly as she watched the boy turn and bob his head apologetically before being dragged away into the crowd, leaving her alone with Amid.
“Do you know that chienthrope girl?” Tiona asked.
“Yes, our paths have crossed a few times,” Amid replied. “I don’t think she likes me very much.”
It was strange to see the silver-haired healer so ambivalent about someone. She sighed, and Tiona sensed she didn’t want to talk about it.
Tiona was sad to see the boy go, but she understood that all good things had to come to an end. Then she realized something.
“Oh.”
“What’s wrong, Ms. Tiona?”
“I forgot to ask for his name…”
Spending an enjoyable afternoon together without ever knowing each other’s names—it was just like something out of a romance novel, and Tiona couldn’t help but chuckle. She felt like she’d gained another precious item for her collection.
Perhaps their paths would cross again someday. With that in mind, Tiona retraced her steps. “Amid, will you come do some shopping with me?”
“Very well, but what are you buying?” Amid replied. Tiona blushed and donned a broad smile as memories of her childhood came flooding back.
“An old book that turned into a memory,” she answered.
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