The two men almost flinched when Elania ordered them to leave the girl. The girl responded as well, looking up from the ground for the first time to stare at Elania with widened eyes. A reddened splotch marred the side of the young girl’s face, and Elania felt her anger at the Rogue and Bruiser redouble.

The Bruiser recovered from his shock first, anger marring his face, “She’s only level 48 we can…”

“My master thought the same thing, but that didn’t make it any harder to pull his spine out of his back…” It was a lie. A bluff. Elania was grateful she’d taken that ‘All the World’s a Stage’ class as a Freshman. It hadn’t been required of a General Studies – Maybe a History Major, but she had been drawn to it from how fun the playacting activities were to do with her classmates.

She added a smile to the act, and suddenly wished she had terrifying teeth like Tessa did to add to the scene she had set.

The two men were frozen. Seconds ticked by Elania and felt like the bluff was eroding as the silence lengthened, that they might choose to fight instead. She did not want that, as it would almost certainly become a terrible mess in the alley that she'd have a hard time explaining, although she felt quite confident at being able to handle the two thugs. She should have thought of that before she had acted.

‘Stupid, reckless, Elania.’

She changed her mask from casually polite to annoyed anger.

“I’m peckish, you two can stay if you wish. I’ll be more hungry later.”

Doubt gnawed at Elania’s core; what if she had misjudged the situation? What if the men knew the girl, or if they cared for her, and Elania had misjudged everything. Their actions didn’t seem to suggest that, but…

Elania focused some of her ‘Power’ into her hand, a slight yellow glow surrounding it. That seemed to spur the Rogue, who seemed to be the ad-hoc leader of the duo.

“Magic-type.” He said before suddenly shoving the girl forward toward Elania. The girl immediately lost her footing and went sliding on the rough stone, and Elania bit back a curse. The Rogue grabbed his partner’s arm and dragged him away, though, and the two quickly moved into a sprint down toward the darker street that she had been considering earlier.

The girl burst into sobs, whether from being hurt or fear – or even both, Elania wasn’t sure. Moving forward, she kept an eye on the retreating thugs to make sure they kept moving away while kneeling to help the girl.

“Hey.”

As soon as she spoke, the crying intensified, and Elania bit her lip. Maybe the whole insinuation that Elania would eat her had been overblown, but at least it had sent the thugs packing. The girl had obviously been paying more attention during the exchange than Elania thought, as that threat translated into terror as the girl finally looked up to stare at her.

‘Basics, Elania, Basics, let’s not terrify her more.’

“Hi. What’s your name?”

As Elania looked the girl over, she realized the mop of hair that she had thought was a light brown was blonde, molted over with dirt and grime. Her cheek was red where she’d probably been hit by the thugs earlier, and now she had some scrapes on her hands where she had fallen. The added layer of dust from the road barely seemed worth mentioning because the girl was already coated in a thick coat of grime.

It took another moment for the girl to bring her sobs under control, but Elania remained patient. A passer-by gave them an odd look as they walked past, probably because they were both sitting on the side of the street, but he hurried away without comment as soon as he saw Elania look at him.

“T… Tina…”

“Hello, Tina. My name is Elania.”

“A…are you going to eat me?”

“No. I just wanted to scare those men away. Did you know them, were they taking care of you?”

Tina’s head immediately started doing a tilt to the left that had Elania thinking the girl was having a seizure, then the situation where Tanyan had her tilt her head while a Darkwalker caused the gesture to click for her.

‘Ok, so nodding isn’t universal. Everyone’s probably been thinking I’m a weird head-up-and-downer everytime I’ve done it. Oook. Left-tilt-no, Right-tilt-yes. Don't confuse your directions or get them backward because the person facing you is looking the other way. Fuck.’

The answer confirmed one thing to Elania though, those thugs were definitely the bastard-creeps she’d taken them for, and she didn’t need to feel bad about kidnapping someone.

“Ok. Do you know where your parents are?”

“They’re dead.”

‘Way-to-go-Elania.’

“I’m sorry. Who is taking care of you? Do you know where you live?”

Tina looked away, and the sudden refusal to answer hinted to Elania that the girl didn’t have anyone and was probably living on the street or something. That certainly would explain the coat of grime on her. Elania frowned, considering what to do. Maybe there were some orphanages that took in children? Did that kind of thing even exist in this fucked-up-world?

Tina’s stomach suddenly rumbled loudly, prompting Elania to ask, “Are you hungry?”

The rapid tilting of Tina’s head to the right had Elania bite her lip. Elania wanted to know exactly how head tilting had become a thing because just thinking about copying the gesture for very long made her neck hurt.

“I’m hungry too –“

Elania paused midsentence as she saw the fear crisscross Tina’s face again, before quickly resuming with a question.

“ – do you have any money?”

“N…No.”

“I don’t either. It costs money for food. Do you know your way around here? I haven’t been to Neftasu before and am a little lost.”

The girl blinked at her for a few seconds, but then Elania was greeted with the Eladu version of a nod.

“I… I know a little.”

“I’m looking for the Artificers, do you know where their street is?”

“The… the ones who sell to the nobles, or the ones who make things?”

God, even the little orphan girl, knew that much, and Elania was reminded of her earlier escapade and screw up going to the wrong shops. It also probably meant the girl knew a lot more about the city's locations and people than Elania did. An idea sprouted and took shape.

“Tina, if you help me find the Artificer I need, I’ll buy us some food.”

The hopeful look on Tina’s face made Elania smile.

“There is another thing. It will help me with trading with the artificer.”

Elania paused, suspecting the next ask would be a little troublesome, so she thought of a way to word it correctly.

“Do you know how red-eyed demons are scarier than blue-eyed demons?”

Tina hesitated as if her answer might offend Elania but ultimately tilted her head affirmatively.

“I need you to make a little contract with me. That way I won’t be so scary to people anymore.”

Before Elania even finished, Tina had a terrified look again.

“N... no! I don’t want to. Brucie says that is how demons eat people!”

Elania wasn’t sure who ‘Brucie’ was, but she didn’t have much to dispel that claim. Elania knew demons had a reputation for screwing people over with contracts… but the only way she could really disprove that was by offering one that the girl could hopefully understand was safe.

Elania quickly came up with as tame a contract as she could think up. There wasn’t really any need for penalties, so those went first. That made it relatively safe to leave the requirements open-ended. Either party could cancel at any time. Since Elania just needed the contract for the eye-color change, that seemed perfectly acceptable. She checked to make sure the Essence Upkeep was reasonable, not that she had much to go by that other than what Tanyan had accepted earlier. Still, it was a little less and seemed like a low amount.

“Please, Tina. Take a look yourself and decide if it is safe or not. I promise I’m not trying to trick you.”

[Contractor: Elania Reyes]

[Contractee: Tina]

[Duration: One Day]

[Essence Upkeep: Contractee 0.03/hr]

[Contractor Requirements]

Contractor will get Contractee some food after she has some money.

[Contractee Requirements]

Contractee will help Contractor find the places she needs to go.

[Contractor Penalty Clause]

There is no penalty for the Contractor upon failure or cancelation of this contract.

[Contractee Penalty Clause]

There is no penalty for the Contractee upon failure or cancelation of this contract.

Elania sent the contract, and to the girl’s credit, she stared at some air that Elania assumed was whatever form Tina’s system showed her. Elania stayed patiently quiet, although she was noticing more and more people walking by. None of them had said anything or paid them much heed, but the two of them were kneeling and sitting on the side of the road and that would probably draw attention to them sooner or later.

Attention was something Elania did not want, even if it kept happening.

Ding!

[You have gained a level in Contracting!]

[You have gained (1) additional Contract slot.]

The message and sound tore Elania’s attention back to Tina, who had accepted the contract.

“Ok… I’ll show you.”