Fresh holds her hands above the metal-bar and the piece of wood, puffing out her right cheek as she focuses on her crafting ability.

(Fresh) uses: [Craftsman: Hammer] [Hammer](Normal)

A small, iron-headed hammer with a stubby, wooden grip.

Weight: 0.45kg Durability: 50/50 Value: ???

Jubilee picks up the hammer and looks at it, swinging it once through the air. “Yeah, nice job,” says the figure, clad in bright blue, looking down at the tool in their hands. “We’re becoming all-rounders, so we really should try to carry a little of everything.”

“Mm!” nods Fresh, glad that Jubilee likes the hammer.

Jubilee rubs the chin of their mask as they think. “Maybe some nails too? We should start with really simple items like that.” They nod to her. “Hammers, nails, scissors, knives and little day-to-day things.” They look around the store. “We can fill the shelves with some less creepy shit, which will not only draw in more customers, but also keep the church’s eyes off of us a little more. Though…” They look behind the empty counter. “I think we’ve about settled that problem, honestly.”

“You think?” asks Fresh, curiously, following Jubilee’s gaze to the empty spot behind the counter, where Basil had been standing all day.

“Yeah, if they had any suspicions about us, I’d bet they’re buried and gone now. Maybe not under trust but -“ Jubilee sets the hammer down onto a shelf, leaning it against the back to display it. “- under a fuck-load of coins, at the very least. Turns out money really can buy everything.”

Fresh nods, not sure that she’s convinced. But if Jubilee feels that way, then she’ll place her faith in that and follow along. The girl scratches her cheek, thinking. “Jubilee~?”

“Yeah?” asks her friend, looking back at her.

“Do you want to make some backpacks too? Like you said?”

Jubilee nods. “Yeah, I think I do. I’ve made hundreds of those fucking tote-bags, so my tailoring's gotten a bit better.”

“Mm!”

“I can make the bags, if you can make me some fastenings and latches and things like that. I’ll sketch up what I need tomorrow.”

“Okay!” says Fresh, nodding excitedly, happy that Jubilee wants to make things too.

“Anyways, come on, it’s late. Let’s go to bed,” says Jubilee, yawning as they move towards the stairs.

“I’m gonna be awake a bit longer,” says Fresh. “I still want to make some more moonwater and maybe fix a wall or two.”

“Sure, knock yourself out. Night,” says Jubilee, dragging themselves upstairs.

“Good night!” calls Fresh, smiling as she gets up to set to work. She isn’t quite sure if she is trying to compensate for her secret breach of trust or if she is just eager to be productive. But what she tells herself is that, if Jubilee tried really hard today, then she is going to as well.

Going up the stairs, she grabs some wood from the pantry and heads back down to seal the rest of the front down-stairs wall. Literally every other wall in the store is old and decrepit looking in some fashion, save for this one. But that’s fine, she thinks to herself as she rips the next old boards out. Before winter sets, she wants to have every single one of them done and perfect, so that the stupid cold draft can’t get in here anymore. So that nothing can wash away the warmth that she promises herself to fill this place with.

Hours pass and Fresh, exhausted, falls back onto her bottom, her palms spread behind herself as she looks at the entirely restored wall with a large smile on her dusty face. The first of many completed. Placing her hand against the tightly sealed seams between the boards, she listens and feels for any inkling of cool night air creeping in.

Nothing.

With a smug, satisfied grin she gets up and brings the tools and materials away, back up into the pantry that she didn’t manage to finish today after all. Or even start. She sighs. Tomorrow then. There’s always so much work for her to do and there was more and more by the day. She can hardly keep up, even with Basil here now.

“It would be easier if we had a second witch,” she thinks quietly out loud, scratching her cheek. But she supposes that’s not likely to happen and even if it did, they probably wouldn’t have her unique crafting abilities. Fresh sighs and grabs an empty pot and heads back downstairs, wanting to make some more moonwater, as tonight there is a strong moon again.

Stepping outside and walking towards the fountain with the large pot in hand, she looks up towards the night sky. The moon is always so big here and the stars are always so bright. Her gaze transfixed upwards, she stares towards the heavens as she walks around the gate and stops in front of the familiar, babbling fountain.

Some metallic noise breaks the silence of the night and the girl blinks, waking up from her trance and looks across to the other side of the large fountain, where the giant man from the sect is. The large bone-sword is strapped to his back with some primitive sling, his head is also locked upwards as he stares towards the moon. His body heaves, as if the breath pushing out of his lungs were too strong for his form to restrain.

Feeling her gaze, he looks over to her and then turns away again, staring back up to the night sky. The girl does the same, wondering what it is, specifically, that he is looking at, as she finds her own eyes wandering over the bright blanket covering the world once again. Maybe he’s just staring at it all, just like she is? The water of the fountain babbles on behind them, the only sound in the midnight air, apart from the occasional cooing of a distant night-bird and the yowl of an agitated cat of some kind.

Metal clanks as the man turns to walk away, returning back around the gate to go back into the dungeon once again. Fresh notices the reflective shimmering of the man’s helmet, wet with water, as if he had stuck his entire head in the fountain to drink, rather than to take it off, even out here in the dark.

Fresh isn’t sure why, but she calls out. “Wait!”

The man looks over his shoulder, not turning his body around. She knows she shouldn’t talk to him. Jubilee had explicitly forbidden her from doing exactly this. But… if there’s anyone in the world who can tell her about her class. If there’s anyone in this city who can give her a different view on her own existence than any of the ‘normal’ people here, then it’s this man. The man from the sect. He doesn’t say anything, perhaps waiting for the usual series of degradations and threats that he likely receives in the dark hours as well as the light ones. But he stands there nonetheless, unbothered, unintimidated, waiting. The fountain trickles on, the water splashing with a strange candor, as if it is laughing at a joke that only it understands.

“Why do you…” Fresh fidgets, not sure how to start a conversation with the monstrous, wide eyes that shine out from beneath the overshadowed slits of his dark-cobalt helmet. His possessed gaze, as if shining with a haunting energy from inside that keeps burning with an inextinguishable fury, much like the heavy stars looming above, doesn't shift an inch as it shines out over the plaza. “Why are you… I mean… why do you…” Fresh rubs the back of her head, not sure how to talk about witches without talking about witches, in case anyone overhears her. “Why?” is all she manages to patch together. A single word.

The man stares at her from across the fountain, the zeal in his eyes never faltering as he turns away. “I keep the faith,” is all that he says, as he keeps on walking.

“Huh…?” Fresh stands there, watching the giant man disappear back around the other side of the gate, with the empty pot in her hands. As she stands there, her eyes wander towards the fountain and then down to the water just before her. The shimmering water, off of which reflects the pale, gentle moonlight, streaming down from above, washing over both her and her reflection. Down there, down in the water, she sees a single thing. A soft, pale face, tired, exhausted and filled with worry and doubt. If there is a smile on it, it’s simply painted over the frail body beneath it. Like a mask over a skeleton.

She tilts her head, looking at the girl in the water who looks back up towards her with worried eyes and she wonders why? Today was a good day. This week was a good week. Things are going well. Fresh looks back to the store, listening to the sound of metal boots clanking across the plaza as the giant walks away.

The store. A single, rickety building, filled with shadows and secrets. She looks over the worn down, night-painted wood that encompasses most of it. She understands immediately, as if the whispering of the water was letting her in on the gag. The material is rotting, weak and old. The bones are old and fragile. The warm feelings that she has been trying to trap inside of it are weak and fragile. The flame of a single candle against the screaming cold of the overpoweringly crushing presence of the night itself. The fountain laughs, the water trickling, as if it had known this all along and as if it had found great pleasure in her sudden realization of it.

Of the fragility of this all. Of this life.

She looks back down to the reflection in the water and it almost seems to reach up for her, to take her down into it, to stop her from running back around her side of the gate, sprinting as she hurries. Before he vanishes inside.

“Wait!” she calls out again to the man from the sect, nearly half-enveloped by the blue aura of the gate. He doesn’t turn to look at her this time, he simply stands there. Half of him inside of the fog, half of him inside the night of the outside world. “How do I become strong?” she asks, her fists clenching the empty pot tightly. “How do I stop being afraid?” Fresh asks the dark-cobalt armored giant with the bone-greatsword on his back. The sword that is already covered in notches and nicks from likely countless battles.

“You have to believe in something,” is all the man says with his final, heavy breath, as he vanishes inside of the dungeon once again, his crushing presence carried by nothing other than his own two feet.