Lzrds At Work

Tolbana has become a very busy place the last couple of weeks. Amongst the ongoing projects was the repair and expansion of one of the buildings to place a tavern inside and provide room for brewery equipment and storage. This in itself was a small boon to the town, as it gave several of the refugees from Ezzo with woodworking or construction skills a job they could get paid for. Plus Spriggans and nimble-footed Cait Sith had an easier time getting into the high places to work.

Vertina herself tended to drift from one effort to another as needed. Sometimes she was helping with the manual labor. Sometimes she did as she was now, having set up a small work area off to the side where she could make potions and fruit drinks with her skills to help keep the workers energetic and alert.

    Atif has been seen in Tolbana a bit lately too, most likely! On account of the entire construction project of the tavern. He did, afterall, promise to help Vertina along with it. Mostly with manual labour, though occasionally he'd join Vertina with the drinks. He doesn't really have any experience whatsoever with that kind of thing outside of potions, but he's evidently interested!

    He's been gone today, though. And when he does come along over to the construction site, to look over things (and maybe check on Vertina), he... smells suspiciously strongly of soap. For. Some reason.

You ever wonder why scented soaps ever became a thing in the real world? Well now you know. Because that soap smells strong but it is very... generic. Which isn't necessarily a good thing, because it's very obviously soap in aroma.

Vertina pauses, scruching her nose for a moment as she turns to look. Then seeing who it is, smirks faintly. "You know Atif, usually people bath like that -after- they've put in a hard day's work, not before."

    Atif ends up hearing Vertina's voice before he actually spots her! And when he turns to her, he looks visibly embarrassed. "I mean..." He lets out, rubbing one hand along the back of his neck. "I was doing work, to be fair! Just, um... Different. Kind of work. And some... stuff happened."

Vertina leans against the side of her station on one arm. "What, did you fight a posessed outhouse or something?" Followed by a laugh, because that's pretty absurd sounding.

    ".... That's... not entirely far from the truth, actually..." Admits Atif sheepishly, and he comes padding a bit closer over now. Even if he's probably going to keep a bit of distance to Vertina either way, for the sake of the other Salamander's nose.

    "THere was a giant flan... in the sewers. Uh..." He looks off towards a particularly interesting spot on a nearby wall with that. Yes, that is, indeed, an incredibly interesting wall, that. "It was... filthy."

Vertina stops laughing. ".. Huh." Taps a fingertip to her chin. "I didn't know the smaller towns even had sewers... Flan?" Then makes another face. "I'm going to assume you mean the monster, and not the food item, though even that would be pretty gross if found in a sewer."

Followed by another thoughtful pause. "... I wonder if alchemy can be used to give mediveal soap a better scent...."

    "Yes, the monster," Atif confirms with a slow nod and a bit of a shiver. "Slime-adjacent. And... Extremely gross, yes. It, um..." Pause. "... It kinda sort of ate me for a moment.

    With her having brought up the subject of the soap, he crosses his arms together over his chest, and frowns thoughtfully. "... You know, I don't see why not. Maybe I should experiment with that..."

"Well that bites... Good thing it didn't!" Ouch, that's a painful one. Though Vertina laughs anyways because it's her own terrible joke and she's allowed to. "Seriously though, sounds like you could use a drink." She moves over to a small firepit at the end of her working spot and picks the kettle off of it. "And while there is no tavern yet, I do have some tea I've been keeping warm for people."

    He follows after her... and actually gets close enough quick enough before she's reached the fireplace so he can give a poke to her shoulder over that particular pun. "That was baaaaaaad."

    He leans over to peer at the kettle, though, with bright sparks in his eyes! "Oooh! Oh! I haven't had tea with actual taste in what feels like ages!"

"Well you are in luck then my friend." Vertina doesn't worry about the kettle being too hot since their race has a reasonable level of 'heatproof' to them. "I had to relearn how to make tea without modern conveniences myself." She pours it out into a couple of cups, then sets it back over the firepit. "But it's good to have something available for the people who come for the social atmosphere rather than the alcohol."

    The other cup is taken into Atif's scaled hands, though he doesn't qutie sip at the tea itself yet. They might be heatproof to an extent, but hot liquid on tongue is still baaaaad. "Not that I mind the alcohol," he claims, despite... well, the bit of a difficult start he had with alcohol before, as she may remember. "You know... Once this place is all finished up... You want me to help with working things?"

Vertina picks up her cup, and gives his side a nudge with her elbow. "You don't mind the alcohol, just not the quantity eh?" She chuckles and takes a sip. "You know you're always welcome, helping or otherwise. This may be in part a Scale Emblem project, but I have no intent of denying access to anyone else. That would be bad business, amongst other things. The climb is only going to get longer and tougher, everyone is going to need a place to relax from time to time... Or sooth their emotional wounds after getting the physical ones patched up at the clinic."

    "L-look it's just gonna take time," Atif protests with a brief flush over his tanned cheeks. "... You'd think the game would do something about that whole alcohol tolerance thing though, right..." He takes a small sip of the tea while Vertina speaks, and then nods slowly. "Yeah... I mean, I don't really care much about alliance lines or whatever. At least not like... some people seem to. I just want to help."

"I know some people don't think the Tower is the answer, when weird crap happens every time we beat a Boss... and even some of us think we were made to push Four a little too fast. But we won't know for sure until we get up there." Vertina pauses for a longer sip of her tea, and to think for a moment before continuing. "In the end, we're only going to survive if we can work together, even if the groups don't share all the same ideals. No team is made up of one player."

    "I mean... I admit I have my doubts too," Atif rumbles, while he moves on over to find someplace to sit at for the time being. Too much walking today. "But you're right. We can't know for sure otherwise, and... You know how I feel about it otherwise already." A vaguely rueful smile is given to her with that. "We'll figure it out eventually though. I can't imagine there's any other healthy assumption to make, right now."

Vertina nods her head. "The only way to go is to keep moving forward... But they need to pace the climb better. Give the people that are dealing with the Waves more time to be ready. We can't stop but we shouldn't ignore the effect it's having on the rest of the world." She finishes her tea and sets the cup back on the workstation she's piecemealed together.

"In better news, the building itself is in good shape," she remarks, giving a nod towards the structure. "But the interior needs to be altered to suit the new purpose. The expansion is for the brewery, so that equipment doesn't interfer with the tavern itself. I've tried to avoid doing as much new construction as possible so we don't spread our resources any thinner."

    "...I could swear resources around the world are getting way sparser than they used to be before the Apocalypse too," Atif rumbles at this with a wrinkle of his nose, even while he's sweeping his gaze over the building... or the current state of it, anyway.

    "...Hey, completely theoretical question, but... What would you do, if climbing the tower forces everyone out?"

"There is something going on out there that's buying them up... but there's also the fact that before this people weren't -here- needing such supplies 24-7, so it may not be as huge of a conspiracy as some people thing. Definately something shady making the situation more complicated, though."

At the question she raises a nobby brow a bit. Followed by a moment of contemplation, and then a shake of her head. "There's still too many unknowns to say Atif. Would they fix people able to log in as normal? Or will people be allowed to stay? Not like I can do much 'out there' either way."

Jabs a thumb over her shoulder towards the tavern building in the works. "And I wouldn't be investing in this if I planned on just up and leaving it one day, now would I?"

    "It does kind of feel like someone's deliberately trying to drive tensions, at least," Atif agrees, with a low grunt. "...At least most people I've talked to have been thinking the same thing too. I just... hope not too many people end up buying into it regardless."

    He watches her while she considers his question, tail idly swishing from one side to the other in the meantime. And he shrugs, then. "I dunno... I mean, I guess theres a chance that the government or whatever would demand shutting the game down after... this happening. But we can hope, at least..."

    He lets his gaze wander along the under-construction building, for a moment, though theres the briefest sidelong peek sent to the other Salamander. "Otherwise I will have to find you 'out there'."

Vertina laughs. "Good, because I probably wouldn't be able to look for you." A gesture down. "I mean, with the bum legs making long distance travel a little awkward."

t    The smile that Atif gives her is a bit on the sad side, then-- even if he does edge over closer to her, so he can reach over and give her hand a squeeze. "I would," he murmurs, voice a bit lower. "Even if I worry you wouldn't like me... out there."

"Worries are like fears," Vertina replies as she slips her arm around Atif in return. "They're meant to be faced and conquered, not hold us back." Then it's followed by a short but bemused laugh. "I'd be more worried about all the teasing my sisters would give both of us for making online dating work! Ichika and Sakura are a bit more.. pragmatic than me, heh."

    This, in turn, comes with Atif tilting his head over, and lightly bumping his forehead against Vertina's shoulder, in a brief nuzzle-like gesture. "It's a whole new world that lets that kind of thing work, isn't it..." He rumbles quietly. "Though I mean... I didn't exactly do a body scan like a lot of folks did, so... you know."

"I did, since VR was originally for my physical therapy. What would be the point to practice if it wasn't my body?" Vertina shakes her head with a snicker. "Thankfully ETO allowed it without having to stick to Human as a race. So it all works out in the en--"

She's interrupted by the kettle whistling loud and madly, yelping and scrambling from her spot to grab it off the firepit before it overheats and explodes or something. This time hissing and fumbling a bit as it's hotter than she anticipated before finally getting it on the table. "Dang. Didn't think it would reheat so fast."

    Atif's initial comments are delayed by the whistling of the kettle, and Vertina thus seperating from him. His eyes widen briefly from sheer surprise of the loud whistle alone, and he looks on after the blonde salamander while she scrambles to prevent disaster.

    "...It's not quite like a stovepot, huh?" He rumbles from where he sits.

    With her over there, he slowly draws his eyes over her -- and then lets out a low, sheepish laugh. "...You know, you're actually taller than I am over on the Other Side." Whereas they're roughly the same height here.

Vertina blows on her hand. "That stung a little." But the scaley skin saved her from being severely burned. "And not the first time I've had to grab something to keep it from boiling over, since I started practicing using my skills outside the menu."

She walks back over to resume sitting next to Atif, chuckling a little. "Yeah. I'm unusually tall for a Japanese woman. People find it weird, sure, but who cares if I like who I am, right?"

    Atif makes a little beckoning gesture with his fingers to Vertina. "Let me see?" He asks, already reaching to take her hand to be held in his own. Not that the game probably renders burn wounds, really -- but he *does* still have the doctor profession, so he's contractually obligated to check! Or something.

    He peeks briefly to her face in the meantime. "There's nothing weird about you being who you are," he insists, before flashing a smile that's more on the wry smile. "Besides... I like it."

"And that is what I like about you." Though a few moments after that Vertina's expression scrunches up in an unintentionally cute manner. "Ugh, that sounded so sappy even if it is true."

    Atif does end up giving an amused smile over her reaction alone. "So waht if it does?" He gives a little nudge to her shoulder with that, before he leans in close enough to rub his cheek lightly against hers. Apparently not all that caring anymore if someone else happens to see right now. "You said being sincere is good, didn't you?"

Vertina chuckles and scaley nuzzles back. "True, true. As long as we don't start sounding like some sort of after school special about acceptance and what not. Some of those shows are harder to accept than being stuck living instead a virtual game world!"

    "Or some sappy romance novel?" Atif adds in with a low rumble of laughter, before he pulls away from that nuzzling of scaley cheeks. "I don't think we're really as bad as either of those. For now."

Vertina says "Always struck me as funny how adults are more facinated with those than kids are."

    ". . . Are we talking about romance novels or the afterschool specials?" Asks Atif. "Because obviously neither of those has enough big robots for kids to keep their attention, you know?"

Vertina laughs at Atif's response. "Probably both by this point! Because that's definately true." She gives him another squeeze with her arm before hopping to her feet. "I suppose I should go check on the labor work. It's getting late and they should all get some rest for the night."

    Once she rises up, so does Atif, giving an understanding nod in turn. "Yeah... I should probably see about some rest too, tell you the truth. And, uh... Hopefully not dream about filth-flans..."

Vertina gives his nose a light boop with her finger before walking away. "Better to not keep mentioning it then," she teases. "Goodnight Atif."