“You really shouldn’t drink anymore…” says Fresh uneasily, rubbing the back of her head with her free hand, as she looks at the large coin in her other. “Ten in two days seems like a lot.”

“Huh?” The wizard in red waves her off and pushes the girl’s hand back against her chest, gesturing for her to keep the coin. “It’s fine!”

“Does the effect even stack?” asks Fresh nervously, trying to find something, anything, to ease her worries.

“No, but it resets the timer each time. Honestly, I just like the taste!” The red-wizard bends down to grab her potions and lifts the little bag up. It had cost an extra five Obols, bringing the total sales price of five minor soul-potions up from ninety-five to an even hundred Obols. “They taste like blue, you know?”

“Ah… do they?” laughs Fresh, realizing that she hadn’t actually ever tried drinking any of her own potions, since that first antidote. “Is your dungeoneering going well?”

“Yeah!” says the wizard in excitement, looking at the little bag. “I’m up to floor thirteen now,” she exclaims with pride in her eyes. “Thankfully I have magic. Ghosts, you know?” The wizard leaves, waving goodbye. The moment she steps outside, she uncorks the first of their soul-potions and begins chugging it on her way towards the dungeon.

Ghosts? Fresh fidgets uncomfortably at the idea. Jubilee walks by, carrying a load of fresh potions for the shelves. “Talk about a repeat customer.”

“Is it bad? To drink too many potions?” asks Fresh curiously, getting the images of floating specters out of her mind’s eye.

“Depends how they’re made. Medicine can have side-effects, you know?” says Jubilee, placing the batch from upstairs down onto the counter. “But we’re merchants. It’s our job to sell things. What people do with those things is none of our business.” They shrug, going to walk back up the stairs a second time. “If she wants to buy a barrel of it to drown herself in, that’s not our problem,” they explain, rather callously. “As long as she pays upfront.”

Fresh rubs her arm, not sure how she feels about that. Maybe it’s fine? The red-wizard is the only one who seems to have a particular taste for the potions. Maybe she just really does like the flavor? Fresh looks at one of the bottles down at her side and, tilting her head curiously, pops the top off and takes a sip.

+ Status Effect: [Minor soul-potion](Normal)

Her eyes shoot open wide and she holds the bottle back at arms length, inspecting it. “It really does taste like blue!”

“Stop wasting the product!" barks Jubilee back at her.

Fresh sticks out her blue tongue in protest. "Bleeeh~!"

Business is slow today again, though a tad faster than it was yesterday. But most of the time, Fresh just ends up twiddling her thumbs.

“If you want, you can go take a walk,” says a voice down from next to herself. Fresh looks at Jubilee. “It’s a slow day, you need to go order a mattress anyways. So go knock yourself out, I’ll take care of things here.”

“Are you sure?” asks Fresh, but Jubilee just waves her off. Smiling, the girl thanks her friend and grabs her heavy bag, filled with coins, lifting it over her shoulder. “Okay, I’ll be back in a bit!”

Jubilee tells her where exactly she has to go to find a mattress, though Fresh isn’t happy about the prospect as she hears it. But at least they apparently would deliver it. Fresh walks out of the door, stepping outside of the store and into the bright light of a new day.

The sun somehow seems to manage to find its way back into the forefront of the world once again, as if all the rain-clouds had been banished entirely from this plane of existence, leaving only a pristine blue sky behind. It’s a hot, spring day, but the damp air from the previous days seems to linger just a little, as there is a distinct lack of a breeze. Smiling, she takes a deep breath, rising to the tips of her toes to stretch. Something pops in her lower back and she winces, letting out a defeated sigh as she turns right towards the plaza. It really is time to get a new mattress. Her bag, heavy from all the coins filling it, jingles just a little as she makes her way towards the market-plaza, by the front gate.

Taking a deep breath to prepare herself, she enters into the somber building that is the adventurers’ guild, diving right into the sad atmosphere and does her best to not let the melancholic wail of the mourning song distract her, as she marches straight towards the counter.

The barkeeper, polishing a glass as always, looks up to her with an expression that seems just a little more familiar now. Fresh nods to her with a smile, opening her bag and laying down two large gold coins onto the wooden surface and sliding them over to the scarred elf. She picks them up, inspecting them and then looks at Fresh, nodding.

Eight-thousand left to go thinks Fresh with a smile.

Repaid - [{2000} Obols] !

-{ 7998 Obols Remain Due}-

Waving kindly, Fresh turns to leave. Apparently the silver Obols are worth a clean hundred each. The larger gold ones are worth a thousand each. There are other, even higher, denominations, but for most of the ‘lower class’, like they are, these are far, far out of their reach and hardly worth mentioning. The large gold coin with a skull on it, that the representative from the merchants’ guild had tried to scam them with, was worth ten-thousand Obols.

Exiting the guild, having deposited about half of her money, Fresh looks around the busy plaza and opts to go to the baker’s stall and makes small-talk with the baker, before buying a small loaf of a seed-cake to take back with her for her and Jubilee to share. Though she can’t help but notice that the broad-shouldered giant of a baker seems oddly… meek, in her presence today. His loud, jolly nature seems somewhat suppressed. The girl scratches her cheek, a curious expression on her eyes and leaves, wishing him a nice day.

“Maybe he isn’t feeling well?” she wonders, before turning towards the tailor that she had gotten her new robe from.

Gulping once, she steels her resolve and steps inside. A tiny bell jingles out as the door pushes it aside.

The sweet, smoky air of the heavily drab inside of the tailor’s shop surrounds her. Fresh stops in the doorway, as she feels twenty-four faces turned her way, all of them looking straight to the door, straight at her.

“H- hello…” says Fresh meekly to the mannequins. They say nothing in response and nervously, she walks towards the counter.

The strange, lanky man steps out from behind the curtain, taking a long draw of his pipe. “Hello. Back so soon?” he asks her curiously.

Fresh explains why she’s there, though she finds it rather odd that a tailor would make mattresses, but in a weird way it also makes sense to her. The tall man nods, writing everything down in his ledger. They discuss the material and firmness and Fresh explains how she's been having some back aches lately from all of her work. The man nods and continues to write, saying that he has just the thing.

“Uh… I don’t know what size it is exactly though…” says the girl, scratching her cheek.

The tall man slaps the book shut, taking the coins she slid over the counter.

Bought: 1 x [Single Mattress]

{Flower-Fiber and Harpy Feather Blend(Medium Softness)}(Normal)

for

[{400} Obols] !

“Don’t worry. We know what size your bed-frame is,” he says, nodding to her before waving goodbye, as he returns to the back-room. “It’ll be there before you get home.”

Nervously, Fresh looks around herself at the full room, opting it best to not think about either of these implications and she quietly backs out and away towards the door, certain that every time a mannequin leaves her field of vision, that it shifts ever so slightly, as if to watch her with the same wary eyes that she has for them. Fresh retreats back out and quickly closes the door behind herself in one sweeping motion.

She sighs a breath of relief once the rays of the sun come to touch her skin again. Now that it is so warm again, she actually kind of misses her old robe. It was embarrassing for her to have so much skin showing, but at least it felt nice when the sun warmed her body.

Still -

Fresh perks back up, having had three successful stops so far.

- She supposes that this had been everything that she wanted to do today and so, she begins walking back towards the store. It’s getting close to the afternoon-hours and that’s when business usually seems to pick back up a little again, so she shouldn’t leave Jubilee alone for too long. Besides, she's spent most of her money now, going down from over three-thousand Obols to 'only' roughly three-hundred-fifty’ish. Which in her eyes is still a fortune, but she needs to make more. A lot more.

Happy, with her bag considerably lighter, Fresh begins to walk back, having decided that it’s time to go home. She stops in her tracks, thinking about the word she just thought. ‘Home’. A finger taps her chin and she smiles. ‘Home’, huh?

Apparently.

Walking just a little faster now, with a little more spring in her step she hurries back, eager to see her home again.

But despite that, her eyes can’t help but wander as she passes the side-street. She stands at the start of the little passage that leads down past a few houses, the little road at which sits a single alchemist's shop on the far side. No light burns behind the dark windows.

The girl fidgets uncomfortably as she looks at Donata’s store. Her head turns left, to look back down the main road. But then it turns back right again to look towards the dead windows. She gulps and walks down the side-street, her curiosity getting the best of her once again as she heads towards the lifeless building.