I wasn’t sure what I was looking at. Well, I’ve seen enough External System Windows in the past months to be able to recognise one anywhere, but I wasn’t sure which of his stats, or skills, Etienne was so anxious to show me.

Sure, his stats were much higher than my own, but that didn’t come as a surprise. He was hotter, smarter, and in overall better physical shape. His assassin class was an uncommon one, like mine, meaning that on average three in 10000 people had it. His sub-class was one that I hadn’t heard of before, but that was pretty standard too, as sub-classes were extremely personalised. And I could more or less figure out what his main skills did, based on our conversations and the few fights we’d had the misfortune of being stuck in together.

“Etienne, I have no idea what I’m looking at.” I eventually admitted.

Judging by his expression, that was not the reaction he’d hoped for. He seemed to be as fidgety as before as he spoke:

“My class. I’ve specifically erased it from my ESW because I didn’t want people to … make assumptions. But,”

“Considering what I’ve told you, you decided to show it to me?”

He nodded.

“Shame I’m not an oracle, otherwise I would be able to see what you’re thinking now.” He winked, attempting a joke that did not land.

“Etienne,” I ran a hand through my hair, my bad arm resting on my sword, “I don’t really care about your class?” It came off as a question rather than a statement, as I met his gaze.

His ESW finally vanished, and he looked at me, perplexed.

“But, going back to what happened the other day, with the twins, didn’t you say that you felt threatened because of their class?”

“No, because I knew them from the book. I would have reacted the same way to any of the main cast,” I fiddled with the handle of my sword, “What I’m more concerned about is you. Why were you so worried about showing your class to me? I mean, I’m a courier, that’s as useless as it gets, but I’m not letting it define me,” I trailed off as something clicked in my mind.

“Don’t say that, no class is useless,” Etienne took my hand in his, his usual soft smiled settling on his lips. But I pulled my hand away.

The thing was, I was the exception. Oracles worked in management positions, elementalists worked for the city, building apartment blocks and clearing roads; herbalists and sorcerers were the backbone of modern pharmaceutical companies, and salvagers and their rare counterparts, saints, were behind most of food and water production.

People worked with their class, not in spite of it, and that became more and more applicable with each rank. Sure, a D-rank archer could deliver mail or patch up teleportation circles, but you wouldn’t catch an A-ranker of that same class at either of those jobs.

“Don’t tell me you were actually working as an assassin before,” This time I’d meant it as a question, but it had come off as a statement.

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Etienne’s mouth twitched and he almost shook his head, seemingly catching himself and stopping the movement. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to hear him say it, as his reaction had been enough of an answer.

“But why? And what were you doing at Manon’s?”

“Same thing as you, laying low.” He dodged the first question. “But, well, do you remember that 50€ bill? The hooker money.”

“I – did you just show me your class so I wouldn’t think you were a hooker?” There were more than a few conflicting emotions inside me right now.

Part of me wished he’d never showed me his class, because that had opened a whole can of worms I was not ready to eat. He was a good person, or at least he’d been a good person around me. But, he’d lived by the rules of this world, and considering his rank and background, on paper he was comparable to the likes of Nam Hyeonmin and other secondary book characters. He could be just as lethal as them, and I wished the sword I was desperately clenching in fear wouldn’t be as cold.

“No, of course not! You know me, never closing any doors when it comes to work…” He trailed off, realising how his attempted joke had come off.

I quietly got up and took a few steps away from the rock. The wet sound of my footsteps echoed in the empty and dim cavern. With my back turned to him, I kicked a pebble through the water. Then another.

“You killed people.” I eventually stated. “You.” I insisted, still hoping that the words coming out of my mouth weren’t true.

I heard him sigh and shuffle around on the rock.

“I know you want to hear me say it, so I will,” He eventually spoke, “I won’t ever hurt you. I care about you, a lot.”

There was another long and heavy silence. I wanted to believe him because I understood that the value of human lives was different here. That understanding didn’t only come from the book, but also from my own experience with death in this world. It was a commodity, a tool, and more often than not the difference between taking a human and a monster's life was paperwork and a hefty fine. But just because I understood it, didn’t mean I accepted it.

Yet, I couldn’t hold such fundamental ethics differences against him.

“Anyway,” I turned around to finally face him, “How come you’ve decided to tell me this now?”

“You’re not angry?” His eyes lit up.

“I am feeling many things right now, the top two of which are drained and resigned, but angry isn’t one of them,” I replied, attempting a smile. “Just- if it’s about money-”

“Oh, here goes,” Etienne muttered, almost jumping off the rock and walking a steps away from me. “What else would it be about, Laura? I have … responsibilities. That’s also why I … never mind.”

I shook my head, more than happy to let it go. I did make a mental note however to bring this up again later, as money is the one resource I wasn’t short of. Etienne made a few sounds but never started a full sentence, so I tried to lighten the atmosphere:

“You’re right. We shouldn’t be having the money conversation while ankle-deep in gross water in a cursed dungeon. That’s the kind of thing couples discuss with both their banking details before their eyes and a bottle or two of De Koninck.”

Etienne finally turned around.

“Couples?” He asked, with an unreadable expression.

I shrugged. We’d been in this grey limbo between dating and being together for months now. He’d come over to mine often enough for the concierge to let him in, but not often enough to leave any of his things behind. The line had to be crossed sooner or later, and judging by his softened expression, he shared the sentiment.

“You know what’s funny?” I smirked, in that very clearly ‘funny as in weird’ way, “We’ve had a serious talk, and an argument, and the money talk all before having our first official kiss.”

Etienne chortled.

“Sure, let’s make it official.” He added, bemused. “The corpse of that mountain lion will serve as our witness.”

We found our way back to the rock, and our lips found each other’s.

“Do you think the dungeon will attack us again?” He asked as he undid my scarf.

I had no way of knowing, and I told him as much. It wasn’t unreasonable to assume that it needed to lick its wounds just like we did.

We got rid of our coats not too long after that, and eventually, Etienne’s lighting orb went out in a quiet burst of white light, leaving us in a welcomed darkness.

[https://i.imgur.com/GfBl0kA.png]