“Should we clear out?”
Sara was just about to stand when the lady from the restaurant called out to her.
“Wait! You’re fine, just stay put for a minute.”
Sara lowered herself back into her seat. Allen hadn’t even moved to get up in the first place.
“It gets busy at lunchtime, but not enough that people have to line up or anything. Here, this is from Allen. It’s bush strawberry juice.”
The lady brought them red juice that smelled sourly sweet on a platter.
“It’s not exactly new, I know,” said Allen.
He seemed embarrassed. Now that he mentioned it, he was always treating Sara to bush strawberry juice. There was something else on the platter too: a plate with a few slices of cake stuffed full with something.
“Oh!”
“And this is from me,” said the waitress. “You may not remember, but I was a bit rude to you last year. I’ve always wanted to apologize, but I never got an opportunity. Sorry for being such a busybody back then.”
“Oh, umm... It’s fine.”
So much was happening so suddenly that Sara didn’t know what to say, so she settled on what she figured was a safe reply.
“I shouldn’t have said what I did. My other customers got on my case about it after. I’m Allen’s landlord, so I guess I felt like I had to stick up for him.”
Allen didn’t seem to know about this, so she ended up explaining the situation to him as she apologized.
“They said I was the one treating Allen like a kid. Even if I were his mother, I shouldn’t have talked to a friend like that who was only visiting because she was worried. And since I’m just his landlord, it was even more rude.”
It seemed their fight had ended up causing trouble that Sara hadn’t even been aware of. Sara felt quite sorry for the woman and realized that the cold looks she’d felt from the room back then had all been in her imagination. She couldn’t come up with anything to say in response right away.
“All the Hunters coming to the restaurant back then were on your side. Ha ha ha.”
She was happy to hear that people were on her side, but she also felt extremely awkward to be such a topic of conversation.
“The cake’s made with chestnuts, picked in fall. Try it. I think you’ll like it.”
It seemed the woman wasn’t expecting any sort of words from Sara in response. Satisfied with her own apology, she left. She was probably the plainspoken type.
“Sounds like a lot happened.”
“It wasn’t a lot! I poked my head in here for just a second. Oh, the cake is good.”
The dense chestnut pound cake was perfect for washing down her awkward feelings.
“It’s all my fault. I’m really sorry about back then.”
“It’s fine, it’s fine. Why do you look so happy about it, though?”
While Sara was having to swallow all these complicated emotions, Allen just smiled his way through the whole conversation.
“Well, it’s only because we fought back then that we’re on a date now, isn’t it?”
“I can’t believe you...”
He was always looking on the bright side of things. Even their fight, which had been such a huge pain, was nothing more than a stepping stone on Allen’s path forward in his mind. Maybe he was the perfect match for someone so careful and hesitant about moving forward, like Sara.
“Well, now that we’re done eating, umm, next up...” Allen took a piece of paper out from his breast pocket. It had been folded a few times and was pretty big when he spread it open. “There’s a general store on South Street that’s popular with girls.”
“What’s that?”
“I asked everyone what their favorite places in Hydrangea were.”
Allen showed her the paper, which had recommendations on it written in several different handwritings.
“Since I’ve got this, we should check all these places out.”
“Okay!”
She felt a bit bad, but she had assumed Allen was only interested in dungeons. She was seeing him in a bit of a new light now.
“We won’t be able to go to all of them today, so we can save some for another day.”
“Sounds good.”
She was happy both that there would be a next time and that he’d spent so much time looking into all this.
At the end of their date, they bought some cookies from Marcia for the Wolveriés, and that was that.
The receptionist had been spot-on. The dungeon was no place for a date. But going into the dungeon and going on a date in town were both fun for Sara, as long as she was with Allen. That was how she genuinely felt.
“I’ll be tagging along today, if you don’t mind,” said Kuntz a few days later as he did stretches in front of the dungeon.
“You didn’t want to come with us last time,” Allen said, tapping Kuntz on the shoulder with his fist.
“Because you guys were going on a date in the dungeon—which is crazy, might I add.”
Kuntz seemed to share the receptionist’s feelings.
“But since you’re finally going on normal dates in town, I figured it should be fine for me to join you when you’re not doing that.”
“How does that make sense?”
Sara watched the two boys chatting pleasantly, thankful for Kuntz’s consideration. The dungeon was Allen and Kuntz’s workplace. He probably wanted to give them time alone, but he had to work too.
Kuntz hurried down into the dungeon, no longer in need of Sara’s barrier. He was always the type to stay aware of his surroundings, and now he had the shield he’d worked out from Sara’s barrier magic to protect himself from monsters. He could even defend himself on the dungeon’s lowest floor now, and the mountain wolves that had once thought he was easy prey had started to avoid him lately.
“Okay, I’m gonna gather plants.”
Lately, the three of them had been going down together and then splitting up to all do their own work. Of course, when Sara was with them, they made sure to hunt nearby enough to stay within earshot of her.
Sara had started coloring the top half of her barrier bright green like she was carrying around an umbrella, and she had yet to be attacked by a wyvern since she’d started doing so, which was allowing her to maintain her peace of mind.
“All right, that’s my supreme healing herb quota for the month!”
Now that she had finished picking the supreme healing herbs she’d be sending to the Apothecary’s Guild in the capital, Sara stood and stretched.
“Oh, they’re hunting pretty close by. Hmm?”
“Gyeee!”
The wyverns had stopped bothering Sara, but she saw one diving toward Allen and Kuntz. She always wondered why they screeched like that before they dove. Wouldn’t they have better luck hunting if they didn’t?
Sara had enough faith in Allen’s hunting prowess that she could ponder such things, but as she watched, she saw him taking several steps back as if to flee. In his place, Kuntz stepped forward, holding his hand up toward the sky.
With an air-shaking fwoom, a brown shield appeared above Kuntz, larger than his usual shields and farther away than he usually deployed them as well.
Wham!
The wyvern couldn’t avoid the shield that had appeared out of nowhere and fell to the ground in front of Kuntz.
“It’s not moving...”
If the same thing that happened when wyverns hit Sara’s barrier had happened with Kuntz’s shield, then the wyvern had probably broken its neck and died.
Sara ran over as Kuntz thrust his fists up in the air.
“I did it! I did it!” Kuntz repeated a few times.
“Congrats! But if you don’t put it away quickly, the wolves’ll get it.” Sara said what needed to be said.
“Oh, right.”
Kuntz calmed down and knelt to put away the wyvern.
Allen then came forward and announced, “Guess the next one’s mine.”
Either it was after Kuntz or the wyvern he’d taken down, but another wyvern was circling curiously in the sky above them.
“Ready any time!” Allen shouted spiritedly.
At the same time, a familiar voice came from somewhere nearby. “God of Thunder!”
After the unfamiliar incantation, there was a boom! and a bright light, after which the wyvern plummeted to the ground.
Crash!
It hit the ground with a sound that couldn’t even be compared to the last one.
“Sorry! Thought you might be going for it, but you took too long.”
They turned around at the high-and-mighty words and spotted a small young man with black hair, his arms crossed and his chest puffed out.
Allen sighed and jogged over to the young man, giving his shoulder a pound with his fist.
“I know you did that on purpose. Just say ‘Long time no see’ like normal, man.”
“Well, that wouldn’t be any fun.”
“You’re a pain as always.”
Allen looked happy despite calling the young man a pain. Kuntz ran over to them too.
“Long time no see, Haruto!”
“Been a while, Kuntz. When’d you get so strong you could take down wyverns? You had me nervous. I was wondering when I should step in.”
Haruto was a bit full of himself, but he was a good kid. How many years had it been since they’d seen him? It really had been a while. Sara had thought he was still on the Dark Mountain with another Invited, Bradley.
Sara had plenty to say to the Invited who was from the same place she was, but there was something she had to start with.
“Err...”
“Sara! What’s up? What are you doing way over there? C’mere!”
He spread his arms, but she wouldn’t say they were close enough to hug.
“Err, the wolves are getting your wyverns.”
“Huh?”
“Huh?”
Kuntz and Haruto both hurried to collect their wyverns.