Dungeons and Dalliances

7.29 – Assignment Anticipation

She and Vanetta spent the three hours before the next reset checking out the various stores of the city. There were all manner of goods, not just weapons, armor, and trinkets, but potions and even raw resources—whatever a person wanted to grind out Tokens for, they could.

Naturally, foot-traffic was heaviest in the armor and weapon shops, but she and Vanetta still spent some time looking at the others. While much of the items had a lewd bent to them, there were plenty of regular items too. Extremely high quality healing potions, for one, which Natalie made a note of. And some more interesting potions too, though she put those out of her thoughts, for now. She had other things to focus on.

Before she knew it, an enormous bell was echoing through the city, announcing the new wave of assignments. In the city of eternal twilight, that was the only means of easy time keeping. The bell rang from some distant clock tower twice per day, once every twelve hours. Acacia had informed them that this one was the 'midday' bell, and the next one would be the 'midnight' bell—simply an agreed-upon standard for the city folk to standardize schedules. Though people bustled about at any hour, there was more activity after the midday bell, and the midnight bell was when most people retired to their rooms to sleep—after checking to see what their morning assignment would be come morning, of course.

"Looks like it's time," Vanetta said, walking up to Natalie, who'd been inspecting a pair of boots.

"Looks like it is," she agreed.

They walked out into the streets, and the various Cityfolk had emerged from the many stores like rats out of the woodwork. They streamed in the direction of the palace, a mixture of expressions on their faces: curiosity, apprehension, nervousness, and in some cases, excitement. Everyone wanted to know what this cycle's assignment would be, though they had varying levels of enthusiasm.

It still felt surreal to see so many delvers walking about. They were in the dungeon. What the hell.

"We should talk," Vanetta said. "The board is going to be swarmed, anyway. I'm not sure if I want to elbow my way to the front."

The boards were broken up by name, and spread out, so while there would be a crowd, it probably wouldn't be as bad as Vanetta implied. But Natalie stopped walking and turned to her partner.

"Talk about what?"

Vanetta seemed vaguely nervous, chewing on her bottom lip. The girl had opened up in their time together, or maybe Natalie could read her better. Going through bizarre experiences tended to break the ice. Still, she was reserved by nature, so she studied Natalie quietly before replying.

"Acacia said the City's assignments aren't random, and teammates are often paired together, if there's … chemistry … between them. I wanted to talk about how that might affect the team before it happens."

A mature approach. She grimaced. It was obvious who Vanetta was referencing. Suddenly irritated, Natalie glanced away, "Elida and I will deal with that when we get there. Even if we hate each other's guts, and things become worse because of the City meddling, we can still be on a team together." She was certain of that.

"Okay," Vanetta said. "But that's not … entirely what I meant. Is there anyone else on the team that might get dragged into an assignment with you?"

Natalie blinked.

"Who's in the city right now, for example," Vanetta said flatly, unamused she hadn't understood right away.

"Are you asking if I want to fuck you?" Natalie asked in surprise.

She hadn't meant to be so blunt; she'd just been caught off guard.

And, as Natalie already knew, the shorter girl clearly wasn't used to addressing such topics so directly. Her face closed off, the forcible smooth composure of someone hiding their real reaction. Natalie could still read her posture easy enough though: the suddenly rigid spine. She was annoyed or angry, and … embarrassed?

"I think it's better if we talked about it beforehand, as I said. We're still in the dungeon. We need to be professionals."

"Right," Natalie said. She scrambled for what to say. "And … you want … honesty?"

Vanetta's posture became even more rigid. She abruptly spun away and began to walk. "Never mind," she said tightly. "It was a stupid question. The answer is obvious." Her shoulders hunched forward and she stalked in the direction of the Palace.

Natalie hadn't expected any part of this interaction; she hurried to catch up. She could sometimes be clueless to the undercurrent of a conversation, but she wasn't horrible with people, and in fact, when she wasn't blinded by other factors, she was even good with them—especially in these matters. To be fair, it was obvious what was happening.

Vanetta wanted to know if she might get dragged into something with Natalie, but on Natalie's reaction, had instantly assumed there wasn't any interest. Which was wrong, but she'd assumed it so quickly and with such misinterpretation that something became instantly clear:

She was … insecure?

It was absurd for someone who might actually be the most competent student of their year, possibly without even a Patron Goddess helping her along, and also a girl who was very much attractive, but Natalie knew it was the truth. And she knew why, or at least suspected why.

A girl who had grown up with so many scars on her face?

The scars weren't pretty, Natalie wouldn't lie and say that. They were pretty in the sense that Vanetta was pretty, and that the scars belonged to her, and that Natalie even liked scars, but … there were a lot of them. Clean, straight white lines of various length and thickness that crisscrossed her face, more than a dozen, maybe more than two dozen. It was the first thing a person would notice when meeting Vanetta, and that was simply the truth. She was scarred. Heavily.

And intentionally. Those weren't scars from monster attacks. They had been inflicted by a blade. Natalie still wondered the what, the why, behind them, but obviously that wasn't the kind of thing she could just ask about.

And even on someone like Vanetta, they'd left their mark. She'd instantly assumed Natalie wasn't interested.

Which was. Well. Ridiculous. But that kind of deep-rooted insecurity wasn't the kind of thing she would laugh at and dismiss, even if a part of her wanted to.

How should she clear the air, then? As much for warning Vanetta for the sake of practicality as because she wanted the girl to know that she was attractive. Scarred or not, Vanetta had a stunning face: sharp features with hard gray eyes with flecks of blue that entirely captured her attention whenever their gazes met. Even if she hadn't been pretty, physically speaking, Natalie would've been interested in her. There were few traits Natalie found more of a turn on than determination and competence.

All of those thoughts ran through her head in a few moments, Natalie deciding how to handle the situation.

"I guess it is kind of obvious," Natalie said. "Sorry, I don't want to make you uncomfortable, but you're right, better to have it out in the open. It's pretty likely we'll be thrown into something together. Maybe more likely than Elida, even."

Because Natalie's interest in Vanetta came without one-tenth the compunctions it did with Elida. And the dungeon had already split them up to give her one-on-one time with Vanetta. It—or maybe Lust herself—knew Natalie's preferences well. She hadn't been hitting on Vanetta, obviously, throughout their trip. The dungeon wasn't the time or place for that. But yes, her interest had very much been sparked in the past few hours. Maybe well before that.

Vanetta almost stumbled at Natalie's words. She glanced sideways at her, eyes widening slightly in surprise, having expected the opposite response, but Natalie didn't comment on her reaction.

"Oh," Vanetta said.

A short silence passed between them. Vanetta cleared her throat.

"I just wanted to know," she said. "In advance. Thank you for telling me."

Unfortunately, Natalie couldn't tell if Vanetta returned the interest. And she didn't offer any illumination onto the topic, which kind of went against the pretense of 'wanting to know for practicality's sake'. She should've told Natalie whether she was or wasn't, so they could know if the City was more likely to meddle.

But Natalie didn't press.

At a very minimum, Vanetta was suddenly walking with a bit more energy to her step. Though maybe Natalie just imagined it.