The next morning, Rothol calls a meeting first thing, the whole of the adventurer's guild staff and a non-small number of interested, early morning adventurers gathering around in the middle of the guild hall, in front of the reception desk. We stand to the side, dressed in newly produced guild uniforms. How did they make these so fast?

“Alright everyone. Here is the deal.” With his shoulders set and a strong, commanding tone that dares anyone to try contradicting him, Rothol hides his trepidation so well, I can hardly even see it.

Like so, he tells the guild what's happening, and what's going to happen. Who we are, what we did, why we're here. We draw agitated glares from everyone within earshot, though most of the vilifying stares are directed toward Liina.

He tells them about Felix, and what our discussion the other day brought up. How his eyes have been opened to the possibility that the altraska, yes, altraska, may be more than they have believed. He says that he refuses to be a fool and will see for himself whether the claims stand up to the reality. Then he implores them to do the same, to use their wisdom to determine for themselves if what they believe is really true.

He goes on for a little while to explain everything, but by the end, everyone around looks conflicted and confused. That's better than the angry scowls at the start...

And then, just as he said, Rothol puts us to work.

It's weird, working for an adventurer guild as an employee after spending time as an adventurer. For the most part, it's just standing around or moving paperwork, and both me and Liina fumble our way through pretty badly.

There's also work talking to adventurers, giving them information or advice, but besides one guy who warily asks me a question about basic equipment maintenance, that I only know how to answer from watching Liina maintain hers, no one else really comes to us for anything like that.

It's not just the adventurers. Despite Rothol's big speech, the other employees keep eyeing the collars around our necks and generally try not to deal with us too much. But when they do, they're... mostly civil. With me... Sort of.

Even though he didn't tell them about the relationship between Liina and me, I have a suspicion they can all tell by the end of the day. They keep whispering to each other and looking at us when we're not nearby.

Well, we can deal with that. After Rothol's show of good faith, a few of them are willing to call Liina an altraska, for which we're both incredibly grateful. It helps take the edge of the remainder of their casual, slurring racism.

Unfortunately, that just goes for the other guild employees. The ones who heard Rothol. There were some adventurers around and I get the impression they've started spreading the word, but for the most part, we, and more importantly Liina, have to deal with a whole lot of one hundred percent, verifiable, racist garbage people.

There are droves of adventurers from all over town who drop angry insults just walking past her, or make threats and hurl insults, or bemoan and condemn the loss of life from yesterday's battle. They see the collar around my neck, but without any further information, every word of racist abuse is hurled straight at her.

One man tries to jump over the counter and attack her. I grab her from behind, afraid of what she'll do to the man, but to my surprise, she shows incredible restraint, merely holding tightly around his wrists to keep him from attacking her until other guild workers pull him off and drag him away.

As soon as the man is gone, Liina crosses her arms over her chest and huffs, “And you call me a savage.” I think that showing earns her a few points with the people who saw.

In general, it's incredible how well Liina takes all of this. I don't know how she does it. Just weathering the constant abuse and vitriol from a room full of people she ostensibly loathes, for tens of ours at a time.

Thankfully, we have no trouble with food. Given the sheer number of meals in a day, something I don't know if I'll ever get used to, I was a little worried since we have no money to buy food of our own, but it turns out that the guild sends people out at mealtimes to buy a bunch of food for everyone.

So when each meal comes in, all we have to do is take some of it, whether it's food like wraps or sandwiches, or other things like these breaded, fried... somethings. I'm just glad that we don't get left out of meals to starve or anything.

As the day wears on, despite my best efforts in the new, somewhat terrifying environment, I still nearly collapse around the fifty hour mark, until Liina pushes me to go talk to Rothol. He takes one look at me, nearly asleep on my feet, and lets me take a nap in the back for a few hours before finishing my shift for the day.

Once our long, long first day at the guild comes to an end, Rothol brings us past a general store to pick up the things Liina asked for. The shopkeeper glares at her something fierce, but doesn't say anything when he sees the collar on her neck and the town's guild master standing behind her.

Rothol directs her to pick up the things she needs, and she does just that. She does hesitate slightly at the unfamiliar human-made products, but everything is labeled, so she gets through it. Even if their bottles of shampoo and conditioner are nowhere near the size of what she's used to.

I just stand to the side, letting her hand me the things she collects from the shelves. She already knows everything I need from when she drilled me on all the... very personal details back in Karshis.

We bring it all to Rothol at the counter to look over, and he mostly just glances across it, but stops on the razor, of all things.

“What is that for?” he asks, sounding slightly suspicious. What, because it's sharp and looks dangerous? Still, there's no way I can tell him about that, is there...?

“Yumi needs it to groom herself,” Liina explains, and this time I'm grateful, since that means I don't need to say it.

“Groom herself?” Rothol asks uncertainly, turning a glance to me looking away anxiously and blushing.

“She uses it to remove unwanted body hair.” That draws a few more shades of crimson from me, still staring at the wall to avoid looking directly at Rothol. It was bad enough explaining to Liina who while a fox-person, is at least a woman. Rothol looks like he could be my father! And I hate my father!

Ok, not the point at all. But... still...... Fuck!

I already want to crawl into a hole and hide, so it's lucky that Rothol takes the hint and shrugs, moving on to paying for the order.

Then it's off to... home, at least it's home for now, I guess.

We already changed out of our guild uniforms, into the funky sack clothing Rothol bought, back at the guild, leaving them in lockers there, so our first order of business is dropping off the new purchases, all in the bathroom.

Then Rothol has us make dinner again. Before our bath this time, since it apparently takes us a while, and we aren't in as dire need of cleaning as yesterday. That's... understandable.

Still just doing as we're instructed, we cook, and eat. During our shared meal, Rothol asks about the altraska. It seems like he is pretty serious about learning about them. And Liina shares, mostly without reservation.

For the most part, the questions are incredibly mundane. How they get by in their day to day lives. How they speak and interact with one another on a regular basis. The kinds of stores they have. All of the little things that make up a culture. That prove they're just people with their own way of doing things, not wild animals without any concept of civilization.

The only questions she doesn't answer are the ones that pertain to adventurer work. Something that could be considered dangerous for enemies to know the details of. Rothol lets it pass unmarked, only showing a small shrug the few times she declines to answer.

After dinner, we take our baths again. As it turns out... everything we bought today was for me. Maybe it's because the bottles of shampoo and conditioner are so small that Liina thinks she'd go right through them, but she opts to clean herself again today.

I do my best to ignore her ministrations, just focusing on getting myself clean and then, shaven. She's right, it really does take me a while, especially after everything has started to grow out during our quest and... everything afterward.

Today, Liina finishes up before I do, getting in the bath to soak while I'm still working. Then when I'm about done, she gets out and we switch.

Sliding into the tub, I realize something. No shampoo or conditioner. It smells like Liina. My whole face lights up at that absurdly ridiculous, perverted thought. I shake my head, trying to get myself under control. This is not the time to be getting all riled up. She's not even my master anymore, so she's not going to take care of me like that.

I could always do it myself...

The moment I think of that, getting myself off to her smell in the bathtub, I want to die.

Oh my god I'm the worst.

Someone just fucking kill me...

Forcefully putting all of those thoughts from my mind, I resolve to ignore my stupid body's reactions, and just soak in the tub. Then I get up and march myself back to my room.

Landing on the somewhat stiff mattress, I think back on the day and sigh at the ceiling. This is going to be a long two months.

“Urgh...” I grumble, holding my twinging stomach. Fucking cramps. I made it almost a month into my service to Rothol before this shit came again.

Which itself is weird, but I can't say I'm all that surprised. My cycle's been shot to hell since I got to Verilz, due to overwork, overstress, probable weight loss, destroying my circadian rhythm, literally losing my mind, and straight up fucking magic. It's been fifteen or so days since my last, the equivalent of forty five days back on earth. As I said, fucking shot.

It's better than getting it like every nine days or something here, but still, urgh... Last time it lasted for two days, and it feels like it's on track for that again. Why don't they have some magic to fix period cramps or something?

I mean fine, mine aren't anything like some of the horror stories I heard online, but that doesn't make them any less awful in the moment. Even living here, nothing can prepare you for constant pain that just won't go away...

As I stand, feeling awful and crampy and gross, there's just one upside. It's completely killed my sex drive, which has had me ready to beat my brains out because of stupid sexy Liina. I've been making sure to bathe and go to bed quickly each night so I don't have to see, hear, or smell too much of her because I'm horrible perverted garbage who can't control my own god damn urges more than a literal animal-person.

Ok, that's not fair. Liina has been a fucking rock this last month. She's taken seemingly endless abuse and racism on the chin without so much as a blink or a growl in response. I have no idea how she does it. I hope she isn't about to explode like I was when I bottled it all up inside. Maybe I should ask her about it?

I don't know, maybe. Maybe when I feel less terrible. Or maybe this is a good opportunity, since I feel like too much shit to get turned on just by looking at her...

Fuck me, there have been plenty of hot human guys around. Sexy, chiseled adventurers who would probably be strong and hot and incredible in bed, but here I am getting all hot and bothered every night bathing with Liina because I'm a fucking piece of shit furry.

Of course it doesn't help that there's no way I could possibly sleep with any of the adventurers, now of all times. I'm a contract slave and basically a prisoner doing community service. Who knows what Rothol would do to me...?

Besides, when would I even have time? Rothol's been true to his word, working us hard. We spend all day at the guild, and only return to his house at night to share a meal, bathe, and sleep.

Of course, those are all good reasons, but they feel like excuses next to the fact that while sure, I can fantasize about maybe possibly sleeping with hot adventurers, the mere thought of advancing even a step beyond the fantasizing part makes it feel like my heart is going to explode.

I mean, despite what my Status says, I'm still a virgin with virtually zero romantic experience. I guess normally it involves dating first? How do you even do that? I had no experience on Earth, but even if I did, it might work differently on Verilz anyway!

All of which leaves me here. Standing behind the counter, grumpy with period cramps, yet happy that they've displaced my god damn raging hormones.

Just focus on work, I tell myself for the hundredth time today. Turning my attention back to the paperwork in front of me, I look it over, just more documents about the movements of various numbers of adventurers and supplies between different human cities. I double check the numbers and sign off on it.

It didn't take them that long to realize I had a good head for math, so I'm stuck with a lot of the number checking on various documents. One part of me wonders if that's really something you want to entrust to someone who's sort of supposed to be an enemy slash prisoner, but I get the impression that none of these documents are of any great importance, so it's just whatever.

The other main thing I've done over this last month is absolutely pore over all of the guild's documentation on the different Jobs and Classes of humans, their expected growth, spells, and everything. Unfortunately, Synergist is as I expected, a class that no one focuses on, likely because these 'academies' that I read about in our documents note that they cater to a small number of classes compared to the absurd number of options.

Generally, these classes are considered to be the most useful, either because they have a steady pattern of growth, fewer downsides or weaknesses, or simply because they are easier to use or even to teach others to use. They shuffle students into a given class based on their natural proficiencies, with some schools focusing on different Jobs, like some that are only for magic Jobs, while others spread their curriculum into the melee, ranged, healing, and the vast array of non-combat Jobs as well.

I... think they mostly split up the combat and non-combat jobs. It's a little hard to say, the adventurer's guild obviously doesn't have a ton of information on non-combat related things like that, but I still sort of get the impression.

Of course, the rest of my research isn't that much different, it's not like they have a big academy curriculum lying around, I have to piece it together from the vast number of mentions of different academies and their students, until I can get a mostly complete picture.

That's when I don't have any other work to do though, which isn't often. I'm not surprised, but there's a ton of clerical work that keeps the guild running, and I touch on a whole lot of little pieces of it, mixed in with the handful of adventurers who come to me to do general guild-work like signing up for quests, or buying crests, supplies, and so on.

Liina on the other hand... I steal a glance down the counter to where she is advising a pair of adventurers on how to properly handle and maintain their weapons and other equipment. Despite the race grudges, there's something to be said for one of the guild receptionists actually being a highly experienced adventurer, I get the impression that most aren't.

Which I guess makes sense, a guild employee's pay can't even begin to approach that of the adventurers themselves. I could see powerful adventurers taking upper positions when they retire, like the guild master himself, I suppose. But apart from that, there's not much incentive for an adventurer of Liina's caliber to be a guild receptionist, despite all the good it could do for other adventurers.

Thus, even with their racism, they haven't been able to ignore her wealth of knowledge and experience, probably the greatest asset she has in convincing these... well, maybe I was too harsh on them before.

Sure, everyone in this world seems to be a racist asshole, but as I've discovered, there are lots of decent people here. They aren't racist because they chose to be that way, they just never learned any better. There have been plenty of adventurers that when faced with Liina's terse but polite lectures on all topics adventuring, recognized her immediately. With the reality before them, their illusions of superiority fell away immediately.

Of course, there are the others. The ones who refuse to change their minds. Refuse to look at her or listen to her words, for fear of having any of their narrow-minded opinions challenged.

Thankfully, the language in the guild has improved over this last month too. Where at first, calls and curses directed toward animals, beasts, and so on flew all over, plenty of them directed at Liina herself, it has ever so slowly begun to abate.

Most adventurers clearly still feel too awkward to refer to her by name or race properly, a lot defaulting to 'Fox.' I can't say that feels much better, but Liina doesn't seem to mind it...?

Then an adventurer approaches the counter, taking me out of my own head. I push down the stabs of pain in my gut and smile pleasantly to greet them. Just have to keep working...

“And these bathhouses, they're profitable?” Rothol asks. We've been over almost every imaginable topic, going as far as the average stock and selection of different stores, clothes, favorite accessories of different races, and now we're on public bathhouses, apparently something unique to the altraska.

“I would assume so, or they wouldn't stay open,” Liina shrugs.

“Mm, I could see it,” he nods to himself. “Although, they may not see as much patronage among my people. I get the impression that altraska bathe more often than we do. You two bathe every night, do you not?”

“Yes,” Liina confirms. “Altraska like me tend to bathe more often when we can since it takes a lot of work to keep up our coats.”

“What about you, Yumi?”

“W-well...” at his question about my bathing habits, I stare down at the table, and thankfully, Liina answers for me.

“She tends to slack off keeping herself clean if I don't keep an eye on her.” The way she says it makes me blush. Shortly after we started here, I was so worked up from bathing together that I skipped a night so I didn't need to see any more of her naked, but she gave me this look afterward, and I haven't missed a day since.

“Hmm...” He laces his fingers together, considering it for some time before he returns to his food. The rest of the meal passes as usual, small talk mixing into questions about all aspects of altraskan life.

We're only halfway through, and it's clear that we've already shattered his old world-view. When faced with a people with their own culture, way of life, infrastructure, habits, and everything, there's no way to dismiss them as simple-minded animals.

“Yumi, how do you feel?” Liina asks as I'm washing myself.

“Fine,” I answer, glad I don't feel anything for once.

“You didn't look fine today, and I can smell you bleeding, you know.” I cringe a little. Of course she can smell it...

“Yes, I got my period,” I admit.

“And how do you feel?”

“Not great. Cramps, discomfort, basically what I told you about.”

“I'll give you a massage, if that will help,” she suddenly offers.

“Wh-what? B-but, you- And me- And and...” I stammer uselessly.

“No need to be coy, I'm not your master right now,” she reminds me. “And even if I was, I would still offer, since it's clear you need some help right now.”

I lower my head. “Yes, Ma-” biting my words off that want to come out on habit, I shake my head. “Sure, thanks.”

So after our bath, I lie out on my kind of stiff bed that I'm still not really used to after a whole month, stripped naked, and Liina kneels, basically sitting on top of me.

Slowly, she massages up and down my back, asking now and then to try and get to the spots that help relieve my cramping muscles. My only knowledge of massages comes from what I've done myself, but it's still dead-obvious that she has absolutely no experience and is just making it up as she goes.

That doesn't mean my muscles don't absolutely melt under her strong hands though. Each touch and rub is pure relief. She works slowly and methodically, getting every single spot to loosen up, all over, until I hardly feel my cramps anymore.

It's a good thing my period totally killed my sex drive, or I'd either be a puddle or absolutely insatiable by the end. Instead, I can just relax into my bed, sending a quiet thanks to Liina for helping me. With a toothy grin, she says I'll pay her back for it later, and returns to her own room.

I'm not sure exactly what she means, is she referring to after we go home? She's going to make me give her more massages? I wish I was stronger, I would be able to do so much more. After the way hers felt, I'm sure that I would need a whole lot more arm strength to accomplish anything remotely similar to her.

Well, I'll leave that for later. For now, I just sigh into my pillow and let my relaxed muscles melt into bed for the night.