“It’s not just the clothes. This whole plan is stupid and convoluted! What we should be doing is skipping all this crap, going straight to Yuna, and beating the tar out of her until she talks!” Natsuko said, pacing the street outside the silk store.

Her pacing created a small bubble of space in the crowd of Non-Heroes moving to get out of her way. Shuixing had to jog to keep pace with Natsuko’s hardcore circling.

“You know we can’t do that. Daisy is the only one who’s even close to Yuna’s power level. Even if we could cut our way through her army of bodyguards, she could still kill all of us with a flick of her sword,” Shuixing said. “I-I’m sorry, but I think listening to Sofiane really might be our best bet.”

“But there are so many other ways to go about it that don’t entail letting ourselves be dressed up like freaking dolls! I don’t see why my default outfit isn’t good enough to—”

“Natsuko!” Sofiane said, stomping out of the store.

“What?” she said, turning her nose up at him, which worked only because she was the only one taller than him in their party.

“You’re going to wear the outfit Master Sima makes for you to the opening ceremony,” Sofiane said.

“Oh yeah? Would love to hear how you intend to convince me.”

“Because it cost us 100,000 Ying to buy.”

Natsuko snorted. “Wow. Bummer. Wanna explain how that’s my problem?”

“If you wear it to the card game tournament I’ll let you pawn it afterwards.”

“Alright I’ll wear it.”

Shuixing shook her head in disbelief. “That was all it took?”

“I like money,” Natsuko explained.

“There’s a catch,” Sofiane said.

“What do you mean there’s a catch? Me agreeing to wear it is the catch!”

“Okay, fine, there’s two catches. The other is that I’m going to do some behavior training with you, Shui, and Pech after we get back to the hotel so that you can actually work the outfits and not look like three goobers with a good tailor.”

“Behavior training? What are we, dogs!?”

“Say woof right now if you want to pawn your outfit,” Sofiane said.

“Woof.”

“Fantastique. You all can head back to the hotel now. I’ve got to talk with Sima a little more, then I need to prepare a few things for tomorrow evening. Be back around eight.”

Sofiane spun on his heels and went back into the silk shop, pushing Pechorin out the door a moment later. The three of them started back for the Yongfu Hotel.

“I’m surprised how quickly you changed your tune,” Shuixing said.

“Do you know how much whiskey I can buy with 100,000 Ying, Shui? I don’t have to be sober until at least Spring if I don’t want to. Heck, I could even maybe move out of the lab closet if I have some money left over!”

There was something about the quickness of Natsuko’s capitulation that was deeply unnerving to Shuixing. Maybe it was the reminder that her friend’s jokes about being desperate for money weren’t entirely jokes. Part of getting by in their sad circumstances was a mutual, unspoken agreement to understate or ignore how bad things really were. Natsuko’s admission of being willing to drop her principles for a small—relative to what other Heroes had—sum of money was a breach of that agreement.

Not that Shuixing thought there was much to complain about to begin with. Nothing Master Sima had described sounded particularly humiliating or degrading other than drawing a lot more attention than Shuixing was comfortable with. But that was, after all, the goal.

Here again, she felt the sting of Natsuko dredging buried issues up. Or Master Sima. Or someone. She wasn’t quite sure who was culpable for this, but either way, it made for an awkward walk back to the hotel that did nothing to settle her mounting nerves as the prospect of making their grand entrance crested the horizon.

The mood—or her mood, Shui couldn’t tell how much of it was shared—compelled her to take actions she would not otherwise have done.

Once they were back in the room, Shuixing said, “Could you make me a— a drink, Natsuko?”

Her friend did a double-take. “What? Like, milk?”

“N-No, alcoholic, I mean.”

“You mean, like, with alcohol in it?”

Shuixing gulped and nodded. Natsuko grinned wickedly and rubbed her hands together. “Oh-ho! We’ve got some options. What are you feeling?”

“Something, um, sweet?”

“Sweet, huh? Hehehe, I can do sweet.”

“And light,” Shuixing said.

“Tch. What’s even the point then? But sure, I’ll whip you up an extra sweet version of my cinnamon whiskey,” Natsuko said.

Pechorin stared as though he wanted to ask for one himself, but realized that “extra sweet” was not badass or mysterious, so he was forced to pour himself a double shot of grain liquor instead.

After a more intense measuring and balancing of chemicals than Shuixing had even seen from professors, Natsuko handed her a snifter half full of golden liquid with cloudy particles of ground cinnamon floating in it. She took a sip and decided it was very, very good. Dangerously good.

Stolen story; please report.

“I… don’t know if I can trust myself with this,” Shuixing said, setting the glass down before coughing from the inhaled vapors.

“So trust me to trust you with it. Come on, life sucks, so get drunk!” Natsuko said.

Again came the deep pang of wrongness. But Shui couldn’t force herself to do anything with it, so down the next sip went. After a few more sips, the pang of wrongness was smoothed out into a nice, rounded fluffiness.

“Hmm, I do believe I see the appeal now,” Shuixing said, sinking into the sofa cushions.

Before Natsuko could enthusiastically concur, Sofiane threw the door open with Daisy on his heels. He threw a couple bags of something on a chair in the foyer.

“Hop to, losers. You’re gonna learn how to walk today!” he said.

Natsuko grumbled and got to her feet.

“What’s in the bags?” Pechorin asked.

“Shoes. Doesn’t much help to train you how to sashay in combat boots, does it?” Sofiane replied.

“Sashay?” Shuixing asked. She wasn’t sure if she was supposed to know that word or not.

“Strutting. Swaggering. Working it, you know. Like…” Sofiane demonstrated what he meant. It was something like a stalking lion about to steal a kill, complete with hip wiggle. A little bit of stomp, face full of haughty disinterest and a whole lot of chin. His head turned to look at Shuixing and she was struck with awe like she was looking at the face of a Yishang.

Natsuko burst out laughing at Sofiane. “You look so stupid!”

“No,” Sofiane said. “You are going to look stupid if you scamper in there like a mouse. They’ll eat you alive. Don’t believe me? Daisy, you tell her.”

Daisy startled at the mention of her name, pulled back from wherever her mind had wandered. “Hmm? Oh, uh, yeah, sorry Natsu, I know it’s uncomfortable for ya… but he’s not wrong. Maybe another example will help?”

All it took was for Daisy to do it and Natsuko realized what the difference was. It was hard to take Sofiane seriously since she’d spent so much time seeing him go to pieces over losing a bit of experience. There was no way for him not to look like a poser.

Daisy was the real deal.

The haughtiness was toned down. Her face was true, not feigned indifference. But the second she switched the sashay on, she felt like royalty. No, divinity. Like she was going to walk into the card tournament and spawn three competing cults to her likeness. The furniture, walls, and ceiling hushed to hear the ticking clock that was her heeled boots striking lacquered floor while her blonde ringlets bounced in concert with the tempo.

“Holy shit,” Natsuko said.

Sofiane pointed at Daisy. “That! I need you to do that! Well, not quite that, because your performance is going to be inflected with radical post-ironic insouciance. You are going to be so in on the joke that the joke becomes that you are making it work despite you and everyone else knowing it doesn’t, because you’re that good. Understand?”

“Uh, no,” Natsuko said. “Just teach me how to do what she did.”

Sofiane pinched the bridge of his nose. “By the gods and the Yishang, I will try.”

He waved for Pechorin and Shuixing, the latter of whom would have teetered over if not for Pechorin’s arm forming a guardrail behind her.

“Did Natsuko get you drinking?” Sofiane said in genuine bafflement.

“Excuse me! She got herself drinking, I was just the enabler,” Natsuko said.

“Are you going to be able to walk at all, Madame Shuixing?”

Once Shuixing steadied herself she took a few steps forward, acclimating her spatial orientation to new baseline parameters.

“N-No, wait, I mean yes, I can do it. Worst comes to worst, I can listen to the theory and worry about the praxis tomorrow morning,” she said.

“Uhh… Let’s hope the worst does not come to worst. Now—” he clapped his hands together “—let’s see all of you try what Daisy just did once you have your shoes on. The full outfits we pick up tomorrow might make it a bit more tricky, but it’s really the shoes you need to get comfortable with.”

Pechorin had no trouble putting on his new coal-black wingtips, but Shuixing was struggling with heeled boots that laced to her knee. This was a change for her, since her shoes had never taken her more than an inch or two off the floor before. Natsuko was staring at hers with flat irritation.

“Was this your doing?”

“No, it was Master Sima’s,” Sofiane said.

They were a pair of wooden okobo sandals colored crimson with designs of fireworks bursting on them. They were also about six inches tall and sloped backwards at the front like the prow of a ship, making her feel like she was about to pitch forward onto her face, which she did a moment later. Daisy launched into one of her full-body snort-laughs and Sofiane cracked up.

“Aren’t you supposed to be a functioning alcoholic?” he asked.

“Still functioning well enough to stomp your teeth out,” she said.

It did not get any easier when she found out that they also came with a pair of black calf socks laced up with red ropes that made her slide around even more.

While Natsuko struggled to even put one foot in front of the other without faceplanting, Pechorin and Shuixing both made an attempt to copy Daisy’s sashay. Shuixing’s arms flailed about just trying to keep herself standing. Pechorin, however…

“Pech, what the hell?”

Pechorin swaggered like he was walking through the middle of a gunfight with a guardian angel telling him every bullet was going to miss. On his face was an expression of such raw, unadulterated neutrality that it could make a pack of feral hogs domesticate itself out of sheer politeness. His steps had the same magnetizing click-clack, but with a baritone gravitas like the hum of a coal engine.

“Hmm? Did I do it correctly?” Pechorin asked as Daisy clapped excitedly.

“There’s no way you haven’t practiced before, I don’t believe it,” Sofiane said.

Pechorin shrugged. “I’m not doing anything I don’t usually do other than move side-to-side a bit more.”

“I’ll be damned. Alright, Shui, Natsu, let’s catch you both up.”

They tried for about half an hour and by the end could at least walk in their new footwear without falling over, but as far as making a statement, they were mutes. Sofiane demonstrated correct technique several more times, but it wasn’t sticking. Shuixing in particular was struggling to figure out what motion she was failing to mimic correctly.

“It’s a state of mind more than it is a motion,” Pechorin said.

“I’m not sure that helps…” Shuixing said. Her brain was made for science, not strutting.

“No, hold on, let him cook,” Sofiane said.

“That didn’t work out very well last time,” Natsuko said.

At the very least, Shuixing could tell when Natsuko was doing something wrong. This time it was a ramrod posture that made her movement awkward and stilted.

“Loosen your back up, Natsu, it’s a little more fluid than that. Just think how loosey-goosey the word sashay is. It’s like it’s gonna melt out of your mouth,” Shuixing said, not having any idea what she was going on about.

Shuixing modeled it and was transformed into a headmistress whose very gaze was a knuckle-smacking ruler. Anyone caught sleeping or slouching when she slunk by would be knocked awake for remedial lessons in the physics of arm-swinging and hip-swaying. Detention for anyone who even thought about getting in her way.

Sofiane stabbed his finger at her. “There! Just pretend the audience tomorrow needs a lesson in how to sashay.”

“O-Oh, I-I can try, I guess,” Shuixing said, immediately losing her teacher's voice.

There was a couple seconds between Shuixing getting it and everyone’s attention shifting to the only member of their party who hadn’t figured it out yet.

“So. How do we fix you?” Sofiane said.

“You don’t. I’m done,” Natsuko said, untying the red cords from around her ankles and kicking the sandals off before stomping to her room and slamming the door.

Sofiane shrugged. “Eh, 75% is still a C. Not the end of Po-Lin if one of our entourage walks like a Non-Hero dork.”