deercountry | Sun rises, night falls, sometimes the sky calls...

Airy it is, then.

Manabu startles a little, retracting the unshaken hand, for a moment uncertain of what to do in the face of a curtsy. He defaults to a slight, polite bow of the head and a bit of the shoulders while wearing that uncertain look of his. She's so polite! It's rare in his encounters.

"Uh, li-likewise," he manages, straightening back up and...staying that way. Almost at-rest in attention? It's an old habit. "But! But you don't have to say 'Sir'...just Manabu's good."

In her experience--particularly with Humans--it was better to assume a title and be wrong, than to be informal and end up insulting them. But she wasn't exactly enamored with formalities, so she smiled happily, giving him a nod. "Of course. Manabu. It's a very nice name. Does it mean something?"

She walked over to a small, iron stove in the middle of the room and added a few twisted branches she'd salvaged from the forest.

Ariadne really didn't like fire. But it was a necessity. And she was still a little cold from before.

Plus, she had a guest!

There was no greater hospitality than ensuring your guest was comfortable. Or so she'd been told.

While Manabu may be more reluctant to roam, his omen has no hangups whatsoever: The dog pads around, sniffing at fixtures near his level, craning his head to get a sniff of some of the herbs around.

"Eh?" The meaning? Not a question he'd expect to hear, really. It's kind of a nice surprise. "Aa, uh...we-well, it uses the same character for, like, to...to learn. My own name, I mean. My family name's like..." He sighs, rubbing at the back of his head. "It...depending on how you read it, can be like...possessing a history? Or having a future, I guess. But it's--it's just what the characters mean if they're not read as names, if...if that makes sense."

"It sounds like someone..." Fate. Destiny. Parents. "...expected you to be a scholar of history," she said.

Even if nominative determinism was something Alastrians hated and feared, she found it fascinating. A sort of insight, a window into the hopes and dreams of parents of children.

She gave him a smile. "Are you one of the scholars here in Trench?"

In light of that smile and question, Manabu flushes, holding up his hands.

"Aa, n-no way!" he laughs, shaking his head. "Not a chance, I'm not good for books or studying. If that's really what my folks were hoping, then--" Ha. "Boy, that was a letdown!"

His laugh peters out in his exhale as one hand goes back down and the other to the back of his head.

"Is...that how it works where you're from, though? Your name kind of...painting the route ahead of you?"

This time, she laughed. "No! It's the exact opposite, actually. My people go out of their way to name their children something that means absolutely nothing. Because they want to leave every possible future open for us!"

Which was a sweet thought. And one of the rare times when she would ever attribute the word 'sweet' to anything her mother did.

"But tell me, if you're not a scholar, what do you like to do?"

His head tilts a little. Absolutely nothing? That's strange to him. Then again, he's thinking of her as Airy already, not her full given name.

"Um--" Well. "I'm...I kind of just...help out where I see a need right now. Handiwork, mostly. If there's a crisis, I can help in a pinch, but that's not the kind of thing I'm going out of my way to find right now."

But that can change at any moment, really.

"I actually help out at the Roost? It's in this district, if...if you've heard of it. Diluc's place."

"I'm not sure I have," she admitted. But there were a lot of new shops and taverns and clubs to explore. And none of them had signs, which made it a little hard to keep track. Ariadne was trying her best to memorize them by scent, but with all of the magical blood flowing through town, sometimes her scents got a little confused. "I'll have to make a point of it, though!"

If he worked there, then it would have to be a reasonably nice place.

He seemed like a reasonably nice gentleman.

"Well, it's not this nice," he points out, smiling sheepishly. "But it's also not bad, either!"

But in regard to the 'this' that is this place, Manabu gives it another look around.

"So it's like...plant stuff? Are there things for cooking in here?"

Ariadne laughed. It was a bright, cheery noise like the sound of a bell ringing. "I'm sorry, I'm not laughing at you. It's just that...well, back home, I was sort of banned from the palace kitchens for being a menace."

It wasn't her fault. Not entirely. And the fire had only been a small one. Easily put out.

Curiosity was her nemesis sometimes.

"I don't have pots and pans or anything like that. But I do have herbs and some spices. Dried out fruit from the orchard. And in the summer, I should have fresh fruit."

Banned from...what, now? A palace kitchen? That gives Manabu a reason to peer at Airy curiously. Is she a princess? She kind of looks like one, he thinks. But then, his point of reference is like...books from childhood, and by that baseline, any pretty girl could be a princess!

Thankfully, before he can embarrass himself for that, the mention of herbs pivots his attention. He perks up, feeling hopeful for the potential in that.

"Eh, really? Seasonings for cooking, too? What sorts of things are you taking trades for that?"

It was a question that she'd kind of been dreading. Ariadne knew that businesses had to run on some kind of barter system, whether it was money, goods, or deeds. But she didn't have the best sense of how to handle it. After all, living in the palace meant that most of her requirements were handled by the staff and divvied up according to rank and station. Her needs were met in exchange for her services to the crown. It was simple.

And, of course, before that she lived in a rain forest and her needs were taken care of by her family.

She had...very little experience. And it would probably show.

"I...suppose it would depend," she said, trying hard not to look half as awkward as she felt about it. "I guess I'm flexible?"

Manabu frowns a little. Jeez, this is the problem with no common currency! It just makes things weird...

"Well, ummm..." He scratches at the back of his neck, looking around...and up. "I mean, if there's more work to be done on the building, you can let me do it?" He blinks back at her. "I've been doing a lot of that for folks around town to get by, so it wouldn't be much of an issue. And, and I'm a coldblood, so I won't have to worry about freezing...and neither would you! If I was doing the work, I mean."

She considered it. "I do think I'd like to add a porch to the back entrance," she said. "But that hardly seems like a fair trade for you." That labor was probably worth far more than a few assorted, dried herbs and spices.

This was uncomfortable.

She tried to think of something else she had to offer, but in the current climate, her choices were limited.

"In the summer, I'll have fresh fruit?"

Manabu laughs sheepishly, and it's clear this little idiot would definitely build a porch for a bottle of garlic salt from a pretty girl because currency is dead and he has no sense of his own worth in this world, thanks TRENCH.

"If it's that worrying, aa...how about I just bring you a portion of whatever I make with the stuff?" he suggests with a shrug. "If it turns out good, anyway; I wouldn't share a bad dish on purpose."

Given the fact that Ariadne didn't cook and avoided her own kitchen as much as possible (see the aforementioned little fire), her eyes actually lit up a little at the suggestion. "That sounds like a fair exchange!"

Much more so than asking him to build a porch, which she would feel oh-so-guilty about, anyway.

"I like trying new foods," she admitted. "The more exciting, the better. No such thing as a 'bad dish.'"

"Oh, yes there is," Manabu assures, a laugh in his voice. "Sometimes there is too much salt...or not enough. But I think I'm pretty handy and won't mess things up that bad."

He gestures to her array of goods.

"Can you show me what you got?"

She walked over to the table with spices. The sweet ones were on the right, the savory on the left. They were all in little jars and bowls. A symphony of scents and colors.

"Go ahead," she said, gesturing him over. "Take a look."

This really is a nice setup - almost like something he could find on a nicer planet along the railways!

"Uaa...I bet I could actually make ramen and tsukemen dishes taste properly with some of these...!"

Ariadne turned her back, to fetch him some smaller vials he could use to pack up the spices. Although she wasn't a cook, she understood that it was important to keep them separated until they were meant to be combined.

That was just common sense.

She looked over her shoulder with interest as he spoke, though. "What's ramen and tsukemen?" she asked.

"They're soup-noodle dishes," he replies, leaning away from the shelf so he didn't spit on anything open to the air. "I found out recently they're actually native to a lot of different planets besides the ones I know, too! So it might be as common as baseball or sandwiches, eheh...

"Aa, I, well, see," for some reason, Manabu seems to take on a sheepish note again, shrugging his shoulders up. "My mom owns a noodle shop, so I grew up with those dishes and others like it. Used to help deliver them to the miners on their lunch breaks, too.

"I'm not anywhere near as good a cook as her, but...but I know enough to improvise." He juts his thumb at the shelf. "And some of this stuff will go a long way with that."

She had no idea what baseball was, but decided she would make a point of asking someone like Dean or Orpheus later. Someone who was used to her inane and unending line of questioning.

As it was, she feared she was going to tax Manabu too much, if she let herself.

Best not to let herself.

Still, she smiled when he explained the rest. "Well," she said, "I like noodles very much. I would certainly love to try any of your mother's recipes. Or your takes on them."

Manabu makes a few picks of [suitable cooking spices, i am not a cook, no i will not google it, it's 9am on the weekend i don't think on the weekend], just enough for the small handful of vials that Airy had picked up. At their feet, Magnet circles around and through legs, reaching his limit of not being paid attention to, but still behaving. Mostly.

"This'll be good," he affirms, stowing the vials in his satchel and nodding to Airy appreciatively. "And I'll make sure you get a cut of whatever I make with them, okay? Fair's fair."

"Fair's fair," she repeated, the words fumbling only a little bit. It wasn't an expression she was familiar with, but the nice thing about it was that it seemed to say exactly what it meant.

She hoped, anyway.

Anyway, Magnet clearly needed some attention, so Ariadne leaned over to pet the Omen between the ears. "I'm sorry I don't have any bones for you," she told him. "But there are some nice sticks in the orchard."

Aw, yeah - that's the stuff Magnet's talking about! Well, happily groaning about, anyway. Manabu sighs, now used to this attention-hungry guy's antics.

"It's alright, there's plenty of stuff for him to sniff around town. C'mon Magnet, we should let her get on with her day, okay?"

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