With dinner gone and Anshur retrieving my plate and silverware back to the kitchen… Thankfully not stabbing me with them, it was bed time again.

How could this day go any worse, I thought?

So… After three hours of laying still, going to the bathroom, then back to laying still, scrolling on my phone, reading forum posts, doing pushups with just my face… I finally got my mental prepared and could log back into Darkmoon Adventure VR… When the moon reached its peak.

Time to drink all my problems away, and kill anyone who has the bewitching eyes of hers.

New Destiny's hideout tavern was half-dead at this hour. No music and chatters, way less laughter rattling from the rafters. Just empty tables and lazy candlelight, and some players just having an orgy date or something… If I were to assume. It was the kind of silence that makes the night so young and worth it.

Quite perfect, it was.

There was a bartender tonight, surprisingly so. Not the boring guy from when I first came, but a strange girl.

"Coke and Rum, cutey." I flirted hazardously.

She was a young one, twin tails brown hair falling unevenly on either side of her cranium, green eyes that was bright and shine, thin arms and visible sweat glance, which was probably not FDA approved.

"Is coming right up!"

"Now an Margarita, then start up an Old Fashion, I'll be burning through them quick… Hell, prepare a Whiskey Sour while you're add it. Before that though, another Rum and Coke."

"Okey madam."

She mixed drinks like she was fighting the devils, she didn't complain, but her arms were definitely shaking and her breath was getting shorter, clear signs of an extreme amatuer.

Every glass she handed me came out slow, cautious, wobbly, like she was convinced she was doing it wrong. Hell, I tried rising up a conversation but she didn't seems like she even understand half the English word I was saying.

This was in the middle of the night where I live, after all, and the people that would be online right now were either the unemployed (yours truly), or the foreigners whose playing during their break.

The New Destiny's hideout were empty because most of the activity were in the day, while there should be guilds who are operating right now

Well, this bartender's no fun, but… Yeah, she got better skills than I do anyways.

And best of all, free drinks were free drinks, the guild paid for them by the guild's fund thingy that Pearl talked about, god I love communism.

Besides, this girl's labor was free so I couldn't complain, there's no incentive to serve people, they are encouraged to do it themselves… No, I was mistaken, there is an incentive… Practice.

People'd be baking, smithing, interior design, and bartending in game for practice. Maybe one day she'd be shaking cocktails in some real-world dive, remembering how clumsy she'd been here, and perhaps, for some people, learning how to mix in game is wayyyyyyyy cheaper than mixing in real life, I heard those sets of tools and the alcohols cost a fortune, not even ensuring that you land a job after you finish learning them all.

I would know, I looked up a circular ice cube maker and boy lemme tell ya, I ain't ever touching that shit no more.

… God, anything to clear my mind these days, ain't it.

I laughed at myself, bitter laughter, I chuckled through my nose, with a sniffle stuck in my throat. My nails scraped against the wood of the counter while my boots thumped against the stool legs.

Drink after drink, shots after glasses. The liquor went down smooth, sweet, clean, but it didn't really do justice for me… No matter how drunk I got, I could never escape the sensation of unthinkable dread and lust today had brought me.

The storm in my chest wouldn't quit.

Do I hate Anshur?

Am I afraid of her?

Or… So help me gods and goddesses, am I entangled in something worse? That whip snapping in the air, the wax on my skin, the knife grazing close enough to taste the metal in the air… and her smile. The smile Eirlys couldn't see, the one that made my stomach flip, in the arousal sense, of course.

I clawed at my thighs just thinking about it. My whole body twitched under the thought of my own filth.

Do I tell Hailie? Beg Eirlys to see the truth? Or should I just run? Go back to my shitty apartment, living day to day, forget the mansion, forget the kindness, forget that part of me that almost liked what she did?

I wanted to scream, to vomit… To just, fucking, sit down and cry until the tavern drowned in it.

Instead, I lifted the mug again and found it empty.

"Now get me a Blue Lagoon, will ya?" I told the bartender.

But before she could grasp what that word meant in her language, whatever the fuck that is, probably Chinese, that was when I heard it.

A voice came behind me, deep, gruff, the kind of fake-friendly that makes your skin itch.

"Can I buy you a drink, beautiful?"

A bastard is trying to hit on me… God, perfect to get my blood running boil.

I didn't even turn to look at him, just leaned back, throat and face in the air. I opened my mouth, and—

"buuuuuuuuuuuurp"

—burped so loud it echoed, followed it up with my slurred fake English accent, the one I always slipped into when drunk.

"Piss off, ya blimey wanka, before I tore ya tits down on your head."

I slammed the mug down, winced at the bang, expecting him to run off already, or try something stupid that justify me killing him.

But, he stayed,

"Are you sure, son?"

Then I spun around, ready to scorch whoever thought I was in the mood to suck his dick and tried to hit on me like there's no consequences, even though I'm brandishing a sword resting right against my legs.

But I froze when I saw him.

He was short, stocky, hair all over his face—neck, behind the ear, near the eyes—and large beard like it had been carved with a hammer instead of a comb. Dented armor, scarred leather, his smile stretched so wide his whole face folded into it.

For a second, my brain didn't process who the fuck this dwarf was.

Then it hit me all at once, I blinked and trembled.

"Oh my fucking god." I whispered, then my eyes lit up in fireworks as I yelled out, "UNCLE GIMSEN!!"

The scream tore out of my chest before I knew what I was doing. My stool scraped back, almost toppled, and I threw myself at him, arms around his barrel of a body, squeezing like I was trying to break him in half. My laugh came out broken with half a sob and half a shriek as I gave him a kiss on his forehead.

And for the first time all night, the tavern wasn't quiet anymore.

"You, girl!" I yelled at the bartender, "Get this man two mugs of fresh beer right now!"

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