"Well, look who decided to come back."

The innkeeper smacked me in the back of the head.

"That is no way to greet someone who planned a whole event for you."

She looked at me wistfully, it seemed like she expected me to be here. Maybe she wanted to continue from where we left off earlier, or maybe she wanted to apologize. I certainly just gave her a great reason to choose the former.

"Don't bother, it's alright."

She sat down at the table right across from me. That's where she always was, right in front of me. Everyone else could be raging about, whether they were drunk or involved in an argument. We'd take solace in the little connection between us, always leaning in until the chairs whined for mercy just so we could hear each other. However talkative we were, it didn't matter now. The air was so tense you'd think we had been at odds for ages and we'd just been brought together through friends of friends. I feared that if I tried to speak my lungs would close in on themselves and I'd suffocate just trying to say hello. I considered myself blessed when she was the one to initiate some conversation between us.

"How does it feel to finally be retired?

She smirked at me while asking me this. For the longest time, I had hoped that we'd only stop taking on quests when our bones had long decayed and we couldn't think straight, but of course, this wouldn't come to pass. She was poking fun at me but at the same time, she felt pity for me. Maybe she planned this party to make me as happy as she possibly could before forcing me to accept that my dreams had come to an end. Was she always kind like this? I let out a sigh and decided I'd be better off responding.

"That word makes me feel so old. Next thing you know I'll become the innkeeper of this place. Some shrewd old man with far too many stories to tell."

"Somebody needs to take that role. I don't think we have enough old men with stories in our time."

She grinned at me as if she'd just made some amazing joke.

"I don't think I'd like to become an old man. I don't intend any disrespect to you innkeeper, everyone can choose the life that fits them best, but your life simply isn't for me."

"I do not believe you could live my life, patron. You are someone who chases excitement, perhaps even someone who needs it. The quiet life does not suit you at all."

"Everyone knows that he can't live without excitement. That's why he can't handle retiring, he feels like he'll wake up the next morning and become some husk of who he was the day before."

"Hey, that's not true. I'd be bored out of my mind, sure, but I'm certain I'll find a way forward. The end of this party just means that the world is telling me to pursue a different future, maybe I'll venture out into the world by myself, or insert myself into kingdom politics."

"Look who's getting all sentimental. I didn't realize this party meant so much to you and your future."

"Of course it meant something to me. Back when we first created this party I thought I had found the people who I would spend the rest of my life with. That first mission of ours made me believe that we'd become inseparable."

She signaled to the innkeeper for more alcohol.

"I think we were inseparable. Even now that everything appears to be over I bet that if we went around and asked all of them whether they enjoyed the time we spent together they would undoubtedly say yes. I still think that if we all met on neutral ground we could be close again."

"Always the optimist."

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"That was once your role. Even when we got tired, maybe we had doubts about continuing to follow you we all saw how happy you were just to be around us and it reminded us of why we joined to begin with."

"Well I'd say I'm still the same jovial man I was back then, so I guess something else must have changed."

"Come on. It's our last day and you're going to spend the end of it sulking about how we fell apart? If you want to reminisce at least do so with good memories in mind."

"Well, that's what the alcohol is for."

The next two hours were spent getting drunk out of our minds and recounting all the feats that we had accumulated over thirteen years of being together. We had both long acquired a fair resistance to alcohol, so it was more like we were acting like drunkards because of the context rather than the drinks themselves. An inescapable blush tainted both of our faces, occasionally taken over by a pale green when we puked. Eventually, the innkeeper just placed buckets by our seats as he had gotten tired of bringing them over whenever we showed signs of throwing up. I hadn't noticed, but she had been slowly creeping her way across the table closer to me. Seat by seat we spoke more quietly as she inched further towards me. By the time I realized she was doing this, we were already right next to each other, with our heads on the table supported by our left or right arms.

"I still remember when Reindt and Alice were in the early stages of their relationship and we went on that mission with the Chidle cave. He wanted to manufacture some moment straight out of a fairy tale where he saved the damsel in distress, and so he'd constantly be throwing himself in front of her and get thrown around by the Chidles. We all thought he was a bumbling fool and I got rammed into myself because I was too busy laughing so hard I nearly choked."

"What I remember from that is Alice actually thinking it was extremely romantic. She would pull me to the side and obsess over his every step. She told me that she eventually started purposefully freezing in front of the beasts so he would be near her, even if just for a second."

"Look at you, you were a confidant for their relationship. So you can be a good person."

"They were both my friends and so clearly in love, I couldn't escape helping even if I tried."

I took another sip from my tankard and laid my head down on my arm once more. She smirked at me again, at least that's what I thought until I got the chance to see her face for longer. She displayed a gentle smile, her eyes closing slightly as she looked at me, as if she wasn't just happy to say something to me, to make some snide remark but rather that she genuinely enjoyed being there, it seemed as though she actually wanted to be here rather than showing up out of some moral obligation to do so. It had been so long since I had just looked into her eyes like this, I had nearly forgotten how she looked. Her entire outfit matched her hair, a strong dark red that she always liked to call "maroon," which was in stark contrast to her excessively pale skin. Her hair was somehow messy and straight at the same time. It looked as though she was constantly running her hands through it but you could take a needle and it would pass through her hair without obstruction. It was quite long too, stretching across her back. I once asked her how she never cut it a bit shorter, being someone who considers themselves well-versed in combat and she said that she was someone who was constantly moving forward, and so her hair was always behind her. Her outfit itself was comprised of what we all liked to call "misleading cloth," as it appeared to be a set of clothes you could wear to a ball and still be considered well-dressed, and yet every part of it was optimized for any ensuing fight. She once told us that the clothes were part of a keepsake given to her by her absent parents, in the form of a promise given by a long-departed armorer who was once considered the best across every kingdom. She wore a heavily padded blouse that had been imbued with an enchantment to remove all of its weight, along with braes that were held to her figure through a drawstring that doubles as some sort of multitool. All this was covered by a large cloak that stuck tightly to her torso but flew with the wind everywhere else. If I had to go on about every part of her outfit and how it shaped her abilities I'd be stuck in thought until the sun had risen again the next day.

The unfortunate fact was that this combat-focused ally of mine was so beautiful that I was intoxicated in two ways. Nobles would often approach me offering riches beyond compare just for the chance to converse with her, and here I was spending an entire night next to her simply talking about our past. I don't think I am conflicted about whether I can return her feelings, certainly I can. Maybe the future I was talking about was one spent with her. Maybe the quiet life I thought I would find boring could yield interest if I woke up next to her. The only way I could get to such a future, however,

"Hey Alena,"

"We're using names now? What is it?"

I took a deep breath before the most pivotal moment of my life, and yet,

"I lo-"

I had choked on my word just as I was prepared to confess. In that brief moment when I was allowed to think on my planned actions my blissful ignorance escaped me, and I was returned to the plight of thinking with my head and not my heart.