In fact, she noticed an even further detail by focusing on her peripheral vision to sneakily get a glimpse of their table. Zefaris wasn’t just ogling her, she was using the Homunculus Eye to surpass a normal human’s ability to stare at another’s ass.

Zelsys found this endlessly entertaining for some reason, to the point where she went out of her way to lean on the bar in an exaggerated manner, propping herself up on her elbows whilst holding her head in her palms. She passed the minutes like this, taking on various vaguely suggestive poses for the sole purpose of making the deadeye’s snow-white face turn equally varied shades of light pink, ignoring the leery gazes of the other patrons.

After perhaps three or four minutes of this, while she was in the midst of genuinely stretching her left arm to loosen a stiff muscle, the barkeep emerged from the kitchen, his gaze darting back and forth until he locked onto her and shined with a smile so brilliant not even she could replicate it.

“There you are, my new favorite beast-hunter!” he exclaimed, approaching her. Confused, Zelsys returned to a normal, relaxed stance, raising an eyebrow.

“I’ve not yet done-” she began, but he interrupted her with a laugh.

He broke into a rant, simultaneously deriding Halxian with a surprising amount of venom whilst smiling ear to ear at Zelsys all along. “I don’t care,” he began, “that arrogant little runt has been racking up a tab every goddamn day for months and getting his daddy to pay for it, and every goddamn time that stingy bastard just pays with imported goods from Grekuria. It’s good stuff, sure, but I could get the shit he pays with for half the market price from local suppliers. But enough bitchin’ from me, I take it y’want to know more info on your quarry, eh?”

Zelsys gave a nod, and the barkeep gestured for her to step behind the bar. He led her through the kitchen and into a secluded back-room containing no more than a table and chairs. They each took a seat, and the sunny man briefed her on the situation that led to her contract down to the nitty-gritty details, including how many people the beast has wounded and what the wounds were like.

Halfway through the briefing she felt the Tablet thrumming in its holster. “Just a moment,” she excused herself, retrieving the device. It came alive with a simple message, her hand buzzing as it did so.

FUNCTIONALITY RESTORED: RECORDS

It flickered to that very readout, but it didn’t show any text as she had expected. In fact, it only stated the name of the page, the day, and the title of one entry.

RECORDS Beast-slayer Contract No. 1 - Briefing Record

Curious, she tapped the name of the entry, and with a brief pulse of warm buzzing, she suddenly remembered every minute detail of the briefing up until that point. Not wanting to hold up any more of the barkeep’s time, she placed the Tablet down and prompted him to continue.