Mayu’s brow dipped by a fraction.

"...Stalking you?"

Yuto nodded.

"I am not stalking you," she said. "If anything, you are the one stalking me. You appeared in front of me. I did not appear in front of you."

She said it completely without heat. Not defensive, not annoyed — just correcting a factual error, the way someone might point out that north was actually the other direction.

Yuto opened his mouth.

Then closed it.

He raised his hand and rubbed the back of his head sheepishly.

"I was kidding."

Mayu looked at him again. Two seconds. Maybe three. The same careful, unhurried look she’d given him the first time they crossed paths, like she was cataloguing him under a category she hadn’t fully named yet.

"Oh," she said. "So it was a joke."

"Yeah."

"I see."

A beat of silence. Around them, the road outside the forest gate was starting to fill up — ethereals coming out from their hunts.

Shiny remained motionless. Which was somehow the loudest thing in the immediate vicinity.

Yuto, for lack of anywhere better to look, let his gaze settle on Mayu’s outfit. She’d changed since the first time he’d seen her. She was in leather armor now, dark and close-fitted, reinforced at the shoulders and forearms with overlapping panels that had clearly been chosen for function rather than comfort. She looked like someone who had made a series of practical decisions and was currently experiencing the consequences of all of them simultaneously.

"You changed your clothes," he said, pointing at the leather armor.

Mayu glanced down at herself. Then back at him.

"Yes. More optimal for battle." She tugged at the sleeve. "Though quite uncomfortable."

Yuto nodded slowly.

He wanted to keep talking. That was the thing — he actually wanted to, which was unusual, because most conversations he had were either necessary or unavoidable, and this one was neither. There was something about the way she said things that made him want to hear what she’d say next. Like each sentence was a small, locked box and he was genuinely curious what was inside the next one.

The problem was that he had no idea what to say.

He stood there for approximately two full seconds, rapidly auditing every possible conversational direction and rejecting all of them. How are you enjoying the eagle — no, strange. Where are you from — too personal. Do you want to—absolutely not, he wasn’t even going to finish that sentence internally.

The only thing standing between him and saying something irretrievably stupid was the fact that he recognized, with rare and uncomfortable clarity, that he was about to say something irretrievably stupid.

"Well," he said.

Mayu looked at him.

"Bye."

He turned and walked away at a pace that was completely normal and definitely not a retreat.

Shiny drifted after him. As they passed the outer stalls and turned onto the wider lane leading back toward the market district, the little spirit floated a few inches closer, with the quiet purposefulness of someone preparing to say something they’d been sitting on for a while.

"Master’s anger has disappeared."

Yuto kept walking.

"It was quite noticeable earlier," Shiny continued, in the calm tone of a person who was absolutely going to finish this observation regardless of reception. "Sharp and sour. Not pleasant. Now it is simply... gone. This occurred after the conversation with the young woman." 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺

Yuto said nothing.

"Is she a good friend? Or perhaps family?"

Yuto stopped.

He stood there on the road, a sack of cores over one shoulder and dried blood on his knuckles from the fourth hunt of the week, and actually thought about it — and the more he thought about it, the more he realized that Shiny was right. Completely, annoyingly, precisely right.

The tight coil that had been sitting in his chest since early morning — since Teki Masaru had stood in their doorway looking like everything Yuto would never be, saying things with that easy, careless certainty that only people who’d never needed to fight for anything ever managed — was gone. Not dulled. Not pushed down. Just gone, without him noticing the moment it left.

Three minutes of awkward conversation with a blank-faced girl in leather armor, and somehow that was what had done it.

He was mortified.

"Since when," he said flatly, "are you this observant."

Shiny did not answer, which was its own kind of answer.

Yuto made a sound that was somewhere between a grumble and a sigh and kept walking.

The selling went smoothly.

Twenty-one cores and twenty-one full carcasses alongside them, and the guild appraiser at the N gate exchange didn’t blink. She counted, weighed, logged, and slid the payment across the counter with the efficiency of someone who’d handled far stranger hauls from far stranger hunters.

Yuto collected the coins, did the arithmetic in his head twice, and arrived at a number that made him stand outside the exchange office for a moment just to appreciate it properly.

Then he went shopping.

Armor first. He’d been putting it off for two hunts, reasoning that cloth layers and quick movement were a viable alternative to actual protection. They were not, strictly speaking, a viable alternative to actual protection. He’d known this for some time. The set he ended up choosing was lightweight for its tier, with articulated joints and a dull matte finish that absorbed light rather than catching it. Practical. Well-made. He approved of it in the quiet way he approved of things that simply did their job without requiring appreciation.

Then a new belt, because his old one had developed a crack near the second buckle hole that was one bad day away from snapping entirely. He picked one in dark leather with solid brass hardware and told himself firmly that this was a necessity, not an indulgence.

The bag after that — properly constructed, reinforced straps, multiple interior compartments that actually latched. Then he stood at the stall adjacent and considered a second bag, slightly smaller, in softer leather with a decorative clasp that caught the late afternoon light nicely.

He bought it.

Then new sandals — a good pair, the kind where the sole would still be intact in six months.

Then he stood in front of a premium cuts stall and looked at the selection for thirty seconds, doing the mental arithmetic one more time, and bought a portion of real meat — genuine, plant-raised, not the reconstituted variety that the lower market stalls sold in gray blocks — that cost more than the belt had.

He did not feel bad about this.

By the time he turned toward home, the sun was going amber behind the rooftops and he was carrying considerably more than he’d started the day with, and considerably more money was gone. Both of these facts were correct. Both were acceptable.

"Shiny," he said, shifting the bags to his other arm, "this gift is incredible. Gina is going to love it."

Shiny made a sound of agreement.

"I mean — look at this." He lifted the smaller bag slightly, tilting it so the clasp caught the last of the light. "Quality material. That clasp alone. The sandals are practical and they happen to match. And the meat." He shook his head slowly, with the quiet satisfaction of a man who has made several excellent decisions in a row and is fully aware of each one. "The meat is frankly exceptional. I am, without question, the most thoughtful gifter in all eighteen villages."

There was a short pause.

Then Shiny straightened up — and did so with enthusiasm.

"Master is the most thoughtful gifter in the entire world," Shiny announced, with the gravity of someone delivering a verdict they had prepared in advance. "He has procured magnificent presents for his girlfriend, and she will surely reward him generously. Perhaps with a kiss. Perhaps two."

The back of Yuto’s neck went hot.

"Gina," he said, "is not my girlfriend. She is a friend."

Shiny looked at him.

It was not a long look. But it had a quality to it — patient, unconvinced, the expression of someone who had filed the information away under a category they’d already decided on.

"Of course, Master."

Yuto sighed