Another deep talk? Can't I catch a break?!

After clarifying who this “Bellman” guy was (who knew Mr Greedy Nobleman had a nickname like that?), the Masked Lady disappeared into thin air again. I am so gonna have to get her to teach me that at some point.

I went back to the barracks, hoping we were gonna get straight to planning our takedown of those crooks, but the old guy insisted we’d have to do a proper debrief tomorrow when everyone’s around. And since it was starting to get late, they put me and Misty up for the night. I was grateful for a place to rest, but it didn’t miss my notice that they specifically picked the one room with no exposed wood and solely stone walls.

I’m not gonna burn down a room I’m literally sleeping in, you assholes!

Well, whatever. At least if the walls were thick Misty and I wouldn’t have to put up with noise. Do you know how loud it is to camp outside at night? Insects and beasties just do not have any consideration for us humans and our sleep patterns.

Speaking of Misty, she was sat on her bed diligently brushing her long black hair. I honestly never saw any point in all the crap, when you’re travelling it always ends up knotty and tangled again anyway, but Mist always tried to keep hers nice and pretty. I suppose it did make her look good, so I kind of understood why she did it, but when you’re on long journeys with lots of walking and limited resources, looks are the last thing on your mind.

Anyway, instead of sitting there and watching Misty like a weirdo, I decided to use the rare down time to do something I hadn’t had a chance for in a good while.

I grabbed the bag sat off to the side of the bed and rifled through, until I found the thing I was looking for. A thick book with a nice leather cover, and an image on the front of a party of dashing adventurers. I excitedly opened up to where I had bookmarked and started weighing up my choices.

There is a great red dragon sleeping inside the cave. You need to get to the other side, and your party thinks the safe thing is to try sneaking past, but you’ve heard that slaying a dragon can give you an abundance of both wealth and knowledge. Turn to page 127 to sneak past quietly, or turn back to page 38 to fight the dragon with your party.

Honestly I really couldn’t care less about the money or knowledge or whatever. Personally I believed that dragons were too gorgeous and noble to besmirch by selling their bodies like common livestock. But I would also never turn down a chance to fight one. There was no greater joy in my life than the time I fought a real conflagration dragon, and I wouldn’t want to deny my party the chance for that same experience. So page 38 it is!

I flipped all the way back to page 38, and was met with a drawing of my party stood in front of the dragon. It looked like my wind mage was the one making the first move.

Your party attempts to use wind magic to starve the dragon of air and make it as… aspix… what?

“Hey, Mist? You can read, right?”

“Hmm? I can, but I’m not the best…”

“Reckon you can read this word for me?”

Misty looked over at the book on my lap, put down her hairbrush and moved over to my bed, sitting shoulder to shoulder with me. She must have had a bath or something while I was putting up with Mr Greedy Nobleman. Would it have been weird if I had taken a sniff? Like I kinda wanted to know what soap they had here and I could already kinda smell it on her hair but like not enough to be totally sure what it was? So like would it be weird? She did smell really nice…

“Oh, this word? It’s ‘asphyxiate.’ Y’know, like suffocation?”

Huh? What? Suffocation?

Oh. Right. That’s why I had called her over.

“Ohhhh, so it’s like the wind guy is trying to keep all the air out of the dragon’s lungs? I didn’t even know you could do that. Man, magic is so cool, isn’t it? So awesome. Yeah.” I really hoped she didn’t notice that I was rambling because I had just been deep in thought about sniffing her hair.

She has a faraway look on her face. Oh no. Did I freak her out? Did she realise? Was I really being that weird? Did if seem like I had called her over just so I could smell her?

“…hey, Bakuchan?”

“No!”

“Eh-huh?”

“I mean- sorry, go on!” Perfect recovery!

“I- uh-“ she seemed really confused. That may have been my fault. “I was gonna ask… why do you like these choose your own adventure books so much? You seem almost as happy when you talk about them as when you talk about fire magic.”

Man, was that what my reputation had become? Crazy explosion lady who only talks about children’s books and setting things on fire? I suddenly felt weirdly embarrassed. But hey, she asked a question in earnest, I supposed I should at least give her an actual answer.

“I’ve told you that most of my childhood was spent just surviving alone in the woods, right?” I asked.

“Yes, you said you didn’t even learn language until a few years ago, didn’t you?”

“That’s right. Thing is, when you grow up as a survivalist, never knowing if you’re gonna see the next daybreak, you don’t really get ‘choices.’ Your options are pretty much ‘hunt and forage whenever you can’ or ‘starve.’ I didn’t even really know what a choice was until I was at least ten or eleven. So when I started reading about all these adventurers, making decisions that could change their lives and the lives of so many other people, it was like discovering a whole new world to me. I love reading these books because they remind me that you’re never stuck on your path for good, you can always make a choice.”

Misty seemed surprised. Like, I get it, I normally don’t really say much that’s emotionally deep or whatever, but do you have to be that obvious about your shock? At least pretend you believed in me!

At some point, though, she broke eye contact and started looking down at her lap, fidgeting with her hands as if she really wanted to ask something. I wasn’t gonna force it out of her though. If she wanted to speak she could speak when she wants.

I read my book in silence for a moment while she sat there debating with herself. I thought the fidgeting would get annoying but having her next to me was weirdly calming.

Finally, she seemed to decide it was time to speak.

“Bakuchan… did I make the right choice?” She muttered.

“Hmm? What, to try and save those girls?”

“Well, yes, that one, but also to leave my home, and to keep travelling after what happened…” she sighed pretty loudly, getting all down on herself for some reason. “I… keep putting people in danger.”

“Oh, well there’s your problem,” I said. “You’re still thinking that any decision that puts people in danger is a bad one.”

“Is… is it not?”

“In this line of work? Every decision puts someone in danger. You wanna save someone from beasties? You gotta put yourself and your teammates in danger. You wanna stop a criminal running through a busy market? You gotta put passersby in danger. The problem isn’t the danger. It’s when the danger outweighs the goal.”

“But… how do you know? If the goal is worth the danger?”

“You don’t.”

“Huh?”

“You just gotta judge for yourself.” I took my left hand off the book and held her right one. “But if it makes you feel any better, I think stopping those crooks and saving those girls is worth every bit of danger it comes with.”

She sat with the thought for a bit. I could get why she was so conflicted. During the flood, she caused danger by indecision. Now she was making a decision, and it was just as dangerous as before. But when it’s your decision that puts people in danger, it feels like that weight is more on your shoulders than if you just did nothing. Pretty cruel, right? But that’s just what you deal with as an adventurer. If you can’t accept that, well, maybe it’s not the line of work for you.

After sitting with it for a good while, Misty breathed out and leaned her head on my shoulder, closing her hand around mine.

“Thank you, Bakuchan.”

“Don’t mention it,” I replied, leaning my head against hers.