“Shit!” I exclaimed in my intoxicated glory, almost tumbling right off my chair. “Shit shit shit!”

I was already over my limit. I drank way more than I should’ve. But you know what? It was all necessary, considering the fiasco that transpired beforehand.

After the whole ordeal with his subordinates, Henderson helped navigate me towards Mr. Borris’s place. Following a wholehearted farewell, I went into the smithy expecting things to turn out for the better. After all, my meeting with Henderson had to be some sort of sign. With all of the prior negatives, maybe the universe was compensating for it by creating an equilibrium. Nope. Absolutely not.

In short, my pay was docked. But it wasn’t just a simple pay dock. I was reduced to half of my earnings. For one day, perhaps? Nope! For a whole fucking month! Forget me being the problem to this whole scenario; it was the world that was out to get me.

Sure, Mr. Borris was understanding of the situation. I told him what had transpired and the troubles of getting the delivery to him. He didn’t get mad or anything. The problem was: the product in question happened to be a rare ore that was only found in the Kushinji kingdom up north. It was pretty damn expensive. Because the product was ruined, somebody had to pay for it. And guess who that someone happened to be?

“SHHHHIIIIT!” I bellowed, slamming my glass onto the worn-down table. A great number of patrons snickered from the other tables, enthralled by the show I was putting on. I was tempted to scream “Fuck you” right back at them, but I’ve had enough conflict for one day.

As a result of the unfortunate turn of events, I had to find a cheap place to get wasted. Lo and behold, here I was, in this run-down bar down near the slums, the only location that’d be affordable for the next month.

I exhaled and placed my forehead on the top of the table, eyeing the wooden floor in utter defeat. I spotted a multitude of cracks and breaches, which further demonstrated the shabbiness of this establishment. I feel you floor. You and I aren’t so different.

“Would you like another glass, sir?” Suddenly, a voice emerged from above my sulking presence.

I reached into my pocket and threw a five Lemrin coin onto the table, not even bothering to lift my head up. I heard the coin scrape off the table and footsteps gradually leaving the vicinity.

That was my last coin for the night. I’ve already spent everything. Even the rent money. I was going to regret it tomorrow, but right now, I could care less. I needed something to numb my misery.

After some quality sulking time, the waitress came back. “Your drink, sir,” the waitress said, placing a new glass on the table surface.

“Thanks,” I grumbled, finally elevating my head above the table surface while still facing downwards. In fact, I’ve been keeping my head down this entire time. It’s been me and the floor, staring each other down. I just didn’t have the confidence to face anyone at the moment. How pathetic. I started to feel miserable all over again. Abruptly, without a second’s thought, I followed up by asking, “Say, can you talk to me for a bit?”

A moment of silence ensued before the waitress asked right back, “Do you have some sort of business with me sir?”

“No…I just…just w-want to talk to someone. You see, I’ve been having quite the rough day and…and I would like to get that all out of…my…m-mind by talking to…s-someone…so…would you…please…kindly…” I droned on and on, no longer stringing my sentences properly. I was a mess. Any normal person would’ve declined my offer. However.

“You are a customer, so I will accommodate you.” Thereafter, I promptly saw her shadow move towards the other side of table. She pulled out a chair and took a seat. Finally, when she was all settled in, she asked, “So, what would you like to talk about?”

“Hahaha…where to begin.”

-----

“And then he took half of my fucking money! Can you believe this? For something I didn’t do! Don’t take your anger out on me you asshole!” Pausing, I took a large swig of my drink to quell my ferocious rambling. “Haha…and there’s that…today was a disaster…I must be the unluckiest person in the world…”

And so concluded my drunken rambling. Having been able to express every bit of my day onto another person felt relieving. In fact, it was quite satisfying. However, the thing that was extremely unsatisfying was the silence that came afterwards. Time passed by with no sort of development. Slightly annoyed by the lack of dialogue, I urged, “So, what did you think?”

“I sympathize for you sir,” the waitress flatly replied.

“…Huh, that’s it?”

“Your day has been quite unfortunate. I’m sorry for everything that has happened to you.”

“Oi, you serious? Have you even been listening to me?”

“Indeed sir, from your awakening all the way up until now.”

“…Then what’s with the tone of voice?” If she was truly listening to me, then certainly she must have felt some sort of genuine pity. However, all I’ve gotten out of the waitress were dull, uninterested responses.

“I apologize if I have offended you.”

Bullshit! You still have that same tone of voice.

“No, it’s quite alright. It’s just feels like this whole time you’ve been responding rather artificially. Come on, you can tell me your honest feelings.”

“Indeed sir, my honest feelings are that I sympathize for you and feel sorry for what had transpired today.” She continued to use that same tone of voice.

“Listen…there’s no need to lie.”

“But I am not lying sir.”

“Please…just stop with that,” I pleaded. My patience for this waitress was slowly dwindling the more she pestered on with her delusions.

“I apologize for my behavior.”

“No, you’re not sorry.”

“I apologize for making you feel that way.”

All I could get out of her were simple apologies. I was on my last straw.

“Listen, I don’t understand. You sit here this whole time, hearing me talk about everything that has been gnawing at me, and this is all you’re giving me? Do you even care?”

“Indeed sir I do.”

“No you don’t!”

“I apologize sir.”

And with that response, my drunken self couldn’t handle it anymore.

“Don’t you dare say you give a shit about me if you don’t even mean it! Do you even realize what I’ve gone through? How much I’ve suffered? So far, everything in my life has gone so perfectly. There’s never been a day where something went wrong. I was supposed to be getting wasted in my usual spot, but yet where do I end up? In this shitty bar that’s built upon scraps! Why did you even agree to listen to me if you’re not going to care at all?!”

“Because you requested it sir. And as a customer, I must accommodate your requests,” the waitress replied in that same monotonic voice.

“Then accommodate this! Tell me what you actually think!” I expected her to counteract by giving me some random apology, but to my surprise, the waitress actually fell silent. That’s not to say that this didn’t help my ever-growing irritation. “Hey! Did you hear me? What do you actually think?”

“…I think your concerns are trivial…”

“…Huh?”

“I think what you’ve gone through today is just a mere scrape on the knee.”

This time, I was the one to fall silent. Although her tone of voice was the same, her words seemed…genuine. However, who was she to say that my problems were trivial?

“How would you know? You weren’t actually there to experience anything.”

“Your descriptions alone are enough for me to come to this conclusion. Quite frankly, you’re a very lucky person.”

Lucky? Me? This waitress really must have not been paying attention to whatever I was talking about. How in the world was I lucky? “You really don’t seem to understand anything. Nothing was my fault. I didn’t deserve any of this. I was doing the same thing as I did every other day, and yet look what happened. How do you call that lucky?”

“Your perception on the matter is quite pessimistic,” the waitress asserted.

“…What do you mean by that?”

“For every unfortunate occurrence, a benefit of equal magnitude would also be present. It’s just a matter of how you view a scenario that ultimately matters. For example, your reduced payment. Because you’ve dropped your delivery, your salary suffered as a result. It was quite unfortunate for that to occur, considering the situation was out of your control, but do keep in mind. At least you still have a salary that allows for you to drink to your very desire.”

I still couldn’t agree with the waitress. “But there would’ve been no need for a reduction if I were able to avoid those two guards in the first place.”

“However, you didn’t. And perhaps it was your destiny to encounter those guards. Nonetheless, you still have a salary.”

“So what? Just because I have one “good” thing doesn’t necessarily invalidate the other negatives.”

For the first time, I heard her sigh. “Have you ever contemplated about the things you already have rather than don’t? You have a home to go back to, an income, hobbies, and overall, a peaceful life. A single day jeopardized your perfect world and suddenly you’re the one that’s suffering the most. You have yet to realize, sir, that some people live in jeopardy everyday.”

Yeah right. For most people, life was probably easy for them. So what if I complained about a single day? After all, there was something I didn’t have that basically everyone else had.

“Oh yeah, well I bet I’m the one suffering the most out of anyone, because I happen to have no affinity,” I announced, almost bragging. “Compared to everyone else, I’ve got the short end of the stick. They’re all able to cast magic, making their lives so much easier. And then you have me, groveling in the mud. Powerless. Practically at the bottom of society’s hierarchy. Do you truly know how that feels?”

“…I do truly know that you know nothing sir…Your thoughts have made it clear that you have no idea of the world you’re living in. I hope that one day you’ll realize the severity of your ignorance.”

Did she just call me ignorant? What was she going on about severity? Didn’t she literally hear that I was worse off than everyone else?

Before I could retort, I suddenly felt sluggish. My eyes became heavy, and I was blinking in slow fashion as my perception of the world became warped. My head swayed hypnotically, and the sweet essence of slumber was beginning to wash over me. I was trying my best to remain conscious, but the more I fought it, the more futile the attempts became.

“It seems another table requires my service. If you may excuse me sir.”

“Wait…” I tried calling out to her as she was getting up from the seat across the table. Finally, I mustered the strength to look up for the first time since entering the bar. My vision was blurry, but I managed to identify one distinguishable feature that really struck out to me.

Purple…eyes...how strange…

Those were my last thoughts before blacking out.

-----

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You…Will…Die…

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Die…Die…

YouWillDie…YouWillDie…

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