Raph planted his face on his hand, deep in thought. He was in his bedroom, sitting in front of a large mirror. The image in the mirror, however, was not a reflection of himself—it was his friend, Shubham, who was also frowning in concentration.

"What kind of scars are they?" Shubham asked.

"They look like scars from regular laceration wounds," Raph explained, his voice tense with stress and exhaustion. "There's no signs of venom, or magic, or spells, at least, not the ones I know of."

"So it sounds like they are most likely inflicted by physical objects."

Raph nodded. "She's a fighter, so that's what I'm assuming as well. She probably got it during training."

"Then those should be easy fixes."

"See, that's what I thought too, but I can't fix them for some reason." Raph rubbed his temple and let out an anxious sigh. "I can't believe I went through four years of medical school only to be stumped by some stupid scars."

"To be fair, those aren't your specialty." Shubham tried to console his friend. "Weren't you trying to get into internal medicine or something? I remember you hating emergency medicine, but that's basically what you do as a quester now."

"Yep. My job is basically on-demand emergency medicine, with a side of life-threatening monsters," Raph said with a blank, resigned stare. "Plus my team leader is always breathing down my neck to learn special spells as if I don't have enough to study already."

He shuddered as he remembered how he was forced to spend weeks learning an energy-boosting spell right before the high-level sea quest in Portland.

"Sorry dude. But that's how it is in independent teams, I guess. Why didn't you join a guild instead?"

"I did try to join Disciples, but I didn't get in."

"I mean smaller guilds, Raph, not the Big Three. Geez. A big guild like Disciples won't want someone who wasn't trained as a quester, no matter how much they needed healers." Shubham leaned back on his chair and gazed into the distance. "Although, if I were you, I would still apply for Dawn Avengers for the sake of it. Just to see if I can meet some of those famous questers, maybe even get an autograph..."

Raph rolled his eyes. "Let me tell you, Shubby, you don't want to work with people from Dawn Avengers. My team leader was from Dawn Avengers, so I'm speaking from experience here."

"Wait, really? You didn't tell me that!" Shubham sat up, looking as though he was about to dive into the mirror and shake Raph up. "Oh my God, tell me, what are they like? Are the stereotypes true?"

"Oh yes, they are. They're insane workaholics, with absolutely zero fear to the point of recklessness, and just... crazy, crazy levels of magic, it's... scary." Raph could feel his soul leaving his poor body just thinking about it. "It's stressful working with them, dude."

"That's why they're the number one guild in the world." Shubham appeared to not have understood a single word Raph had said, as he continued his dreamy, starstruck stare. "Man, you're lucky, Raph, I would kill to meet anybody from Dawn Avengers."

"If you kill me, you can take my spot."

Shubham laughed. "Why did you even join the team anyway?"

"Millie really wanted me to join her, so I did." Raph shrugged.

"Millie?" Shubham tilted his head. "Oh, you mean Millicent Martinez from middle school? She's in your questing team? I didn't even know she's a quester."

"Yeah, she is. She's always wanted to be a quester, actually."

Shubham raised his eyebrows. There was an amused glint in his eyes. "Anyway, I got to go, but I can send you some books on enhancer magic-induced injuries, maybe they'll be helpful."

"Right, thanks, man." Raph smiled. "I'll look into it."

"Take care, dude. Try not to die."

"I'll try my best."

With that, Shubham disappeared from the mirror. Raph was left staring at his own worried, restless face. His brown eyes drifted to the reflection of the bed behind him and he jumped up in shock.

Sure enough, he spun around to see his bed completely covered with shopping bags. How did it become like this? Half an hour ago there were only a few bags, but there was now a mountain of them.

He was still shell-shocked when Millie barged into his room.

"I can't wait to show you what I bought!" she squealed in delight. Ignoring Raph's exasperated stare, she rummaged through the bags and examined her haul.

Raph was used to Millie transporting her shopping trip spoils to his room using her conjurer magic, but there was a lot more stuff this time than usual. "Millie, come on. Who did you shop with this time? Who is this enabler of yours?"

Millie giggled. "It's Cydney. She's the best shopping buddy."

"Cydney? You've shopped with her before, didn't you? You didn't end up buying this much stuff last time."

"Well, the last time, Lyn tagged along, because, you know, Cydney." –That was a more than sufficient explanation.– "And when she tagged along, she's always trying to buy stuff for Cydney, or like, offering to buy the things that Cydney wants to buy, so Cydney just ended up not wanting to shop around that much, you know? But today, Lyn has some kind of a meeting to go to, so she didn't come along this time. So the two of us finally have the complete freedom to spend all our money."

"Is Cydney a big spender?"

"Oh yeah. For sure. She's a much crazier spender than me." Millie lifted a light, pastel sundress. "Hey, what do you think of this?"

"It looks cute," Raph admitted, "but I thought you didn't like how this type of dress fit your waist?"

"This one fits! Turn around, I'll show you right now."

Raph turned around, only to realize that there was a mirror right behind him. Flustered, he spun himself around a few more times until he found a proper orientation to stand at.

"How is it possible that Cydney spends more than you?" Raph continued the conversation with his back facing Millie. "You already spend so much that you don't even have savings."

"Oh, Cydney definitely doesn't have any savings either. She literally spends all her money like water. Sometimes she'll come to me at the end of the week saying that she had spent all her money and has no money left for food, so I had to buy her food to eat before some of our quests."

"That's... concerning." Raph furrowed his bushy eyebrows. "Have you... told Lyn about this?"

Millie chuckled behind him. "You want me to tell Lyn? Are you crazy? That woman will explode! Remember how that one time Cydney mentioned that she was cold, and Lyn almost stripped down to her underwear for her?"

"Please don't remind me about that." That memory sent yet another shiver down Raph's spine. He did not want to see his boss naked, that's for sure. "I couldn't believe her. She could've just gotten you to conjure some sweaters or something."

"I know! Oh, Lyn, she's so adorably stupid when it comes to Cydney." Millie laughed. "Hey, turn back, I'm done changing."

Raph turned around—and his breath caught at his throat. Millie was as stunning as usual, but the sundress gave her a refreshing aura that was just... breathtaking. As she grinned and twirled around, the flares of the dress flew up and landed on her curvy body elegantly.

"What do you think?" Millie asked. "Fits me well, right?"

Raph gulped and managed a nod. There was a reason why, no matter how concerned he was about Millie's poor financial management, he was still supportive of her shopping trips. Who wouldn't, if it made her look this beautiful?

"You look really good," he said sincerely.

"Thank you!" Millie beamed as she turned back to the bed to scavenge for more clothes. "Anyway, I think that's why Cyd doesn't tell Lyn about her money situation and comes to me instead. Lyn overreacts way too much."

Raph snorted. "Just be careful not to let Lyn find that out, or you'll feel the wrath of her jealousy."

Millie's chuckle was light and sunny. "Oh, Lyn. She's so in love that it's funny. And sweet too."

"Sweet? Isn't it kind of creepy? Cydney doesn't seem to reciprocate her feelings at all."

"I don't know. Maybe? As long as she doesn't go too far, I think it's kinda sweet." Millie stopped what she was doing and looked at Raph earnestly. "Like, I don't think Lyn cares if Cydney will like her back or not, you know? She's gonna love her regardless. It feels so... unconditional. I don't know."

There was a slight pause, before Raph added, "Would you like that for yourself? Someone loving you like that?"

"Of course! Who wouldn't?"

Raph stared at Millie, his heart skipping a beat at that proclamation. He wondered if Millie was saying this because she knew she had been in a situation like that for years. He wondered if Millie knew about his feelings for her.

He gulped and lowered his head. "Well, I'm glad you do."