A man knelt over a metal stick, which had weird claws at the end. Those claws were broken, and from how the man was behaving, one would assume that he was in deep grief, as if that metal stick was a family heirloom that had been broken. To her left, the culprit behind Claud’s abject grief was skipping up and down, as she reached an agreement with someone who had just returned home.

Dia took a step back and appreciated the incongruity of the whole scene. The way Luna was behaving put her completely at odds with the general mood generated by Claud. In turn, Claud’s sorrow felt unwarranted at first glance, since the thing he was mourning was a metal stick with two weird claws stuck at the end.

“Therefore,” Dia muttered, “I should start by investigating that odd metal instrument first.”

Taking a deep breath, she approached Claud. “What’s that you’re mourning over?”

Claud looked up, a look of utter fatigue on his face. “I took half a day to make this, but now it’s ruined. Rest in peace, old buddy. Thank you for saving me from that dastardly Luna. You will not be forgotten.”

“So melodramatic,” Dia muttered. “Can’t you repair it?”

“I could, yes. But just because I could, doesn’t mean I should forget its sacrifice. Let me mourn its passing for a bit longer.” Claud bowed his head for another ten seconds, before his hands began to move. Within seconds, the metal stick had been dismantled into a small pile of components, which then went into various nooks and crannies of his clothes.

Dia, who was still moved by his earlier sentence about not forgetting its sacrifice, found herself speechless. “You just dismantled it! That’s horrible! What happened to not forgetting its sacrifice?”

Claud looked up at her. “Well, you did tell me to repair it, right? How exactly under the Moons am I supposed to repair it without taking it apart?”

“…Good point.” Dia endured the feeling of being looked down on, before saying, “Why did you make such a tool?”

“Like I said, I needed an anti-Luna countermeasure,” Claud replied. “I was thinking about how she had managed to coerce me back then. Was it due to my weakness? Or was it something else? And then, it hit me. Since Luna was a salesperson, she probably had a skill or two to convince people to buy things, right?”

“Like Area Compulsion?”

“Yeah. She said it herself. These Area Compulsion skillstrips were probably made by her, no? How else would she know their use-by date?” Claud’s voice trailed off. “Hmm. Interesting.”

“What’s interesting?” Dia asked.

“I just thought of something odd, but it’s pretty much irrelevant.” Claud patted his clothes. “Anyway, it seems that Luna has a skill or two to make people buy her products, and that skill probably triggers through contact. When that thought hit me, I immediately came up with a countermeasure.”

“A countermeasure…you really like being prepared, don’t you?” Dia asked. “Hmm. But I did hear of such a skill before, though. The ‘Contact’ skill family. Specifically, Contact Coercion. Now that you mention it, she probably did used Contact Coercion on you last time.”

The ‘Contact’ skill family were skills that shared a constant theme — the need to be in contact. There were many different abilities under that particular label, like Contact Heating, Contact Cooling and Contact Sweating. The last one was particularly famous as a joke skill, since it made the person one touched sweat profusely.

“Oh, so it has a name. That, at least, does justify why she’s been jumping people randomly.” Claud rubbed his nose. “It probably didn’t help that she was…never mind.”

Dia glanced at Risti, whose hands were being held by Luna passionately, and then decided to bail her buddy out before she agreed to buy something even more ridiculous. It was one thing to buy something in a sound state of mind, but it was an entirely different one to buy something while in an abnormal state.

“Risti!” Dia raised her voice. “We really need to be going!”

She looked up, her eyes slightly dazed, before a small tremor ran through her. “Right. Ahem. Sorry, gotta run.”

“Wait! Don’t you want to hear about—”

“I’ll find you if I ever see a need for it,” Risti replied. “Remember to send me those Illuminators by tomorrow.”

To Luna’s credit, she didn’t push it. Instead, she nodded and scampered off, a relieved smile on her face. It would seem that she was really desperate to sell her overtuned products, instead of trying to fleece her customers for the sake of doing so…

Probably, anyway.

“So, why did you get those Illuminators?” Dia asked.

“One hundred hours of sunlight is no joking matter,” Claud added. “How bright is that thing anyway? She made it sound like it could illuminate the entire city, and…wait, the entire city?”

“Do you now see why I brought it?” Risti asked. “The cover of darkness is the best stage for people to sneak into the city. But if Licencia is constantly illuminated by a sun-like source, wouldn’t it be harder?”

“It’s quite the generalisation,” Claud replied. “Such strong light would cast shadows for people to hide in. You’ll have to fire off one illuminator in the middle of Licencia, and then four more outside each side of the city for it to…wait. Huh.”

“You just gave a perfect solution,” Risti replied. “I hadn’t even thought of it. As expected of our security expert. So? Is buying the entire stock a good idea now?”

“Well, I’ll be…but does it produce heat? If so, having five of these things up at once would make everyone sweat buckets, and—”

“Risti, Claud, can we continue this conversation in Moon Mansion?” Dia cut in. “We haven’t eaten yet, we’re dead on our feet, and I really want to rest.”

“Ah, crud. My apologies, Dia. Let’s go, then. It’s not like I can beautify my Picker-upper in its current state now, right?” Claud heaved a sigh. “Where did all that muscle strength come from? She didn’t seem like someone who could truss up a chicken, so how did she break it?”

“Your naming sense sucks, by the way,” Risti replied.

“There were so many things to comment on, and you just had to pick up the name I gave to my little baby, huh?” Claud rolled his eyes. “Come on, you can do better than that. Anyway, the two of you…good job out there. And welcome home.”

Dia smiled.

Risti trembled, and then nodded slowly. “Thank you, Claud.”

Perhaps, for Risti, this was the first time she had felt this moved by a simple statement. Dia didn’t know if that was the case, but there was decidedly a spring in her step as they walked back to Moon Mansion.

Another formless weight seemed to fall off her shoulders as they turned into Moon Street, which was as lively as she last remembered it. Significantly more children were playing games of make-believe, while the streetside stalls that had popped up over the past few weeks were as highly-patronised as ever. Masked people moved together in small groups, mingling and interacting with children that gathered around them as they walked.

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Claud murmured. “If there was such a Moon Street twenty years ago…many people would have had far better lives. Unfortunately, no one dared to unify the underworld. To turn it into a haven of peace, of order.”

“Yes,” said Risti. “It’s beautiful. So much has changed. It hasn’t been all that long, but…yes. Schwarz’s decision to use those ballistae wasn’t wrong.”

“I would never blame anyone for that. You guys did the correct thing, even at the risk of exposure.” Claud chuckled. “Why would I ever blame you? If Count Nightfall had wronged you over that incident, I would do something about it.”

“You?” It was Risti’s turn to chuckle. “You’ll just hide away, knowing you.”

“Hey! We had a moment going there, and you had to spoil it!” Claud huffed. “Anyway, I’m not going to blame anyone for using the ballistae. Sure, we exposed ourselves in the public eye, but plans were always meant to be adjusted. And…I think the lives of the innocent are worth protecting. We could just flee and start over in a new city, but the dead cannot return to life.”

“Still, why did you install those ballistae?” Dia asked, curious. “It must have cost a fortune to install them on something as flimsy as the dome.”

“I have trouble sleeping at night when I feel unsafe, okay?” Claud rolled his eyes. “In fact, I have better naps in Moon Mansion than at my home, which has turned into a storage for apple juice and fizzy drinks.”

Dia licked her lips. “You could move some over to Moon Mansion. We have a nice warehouse that’s quite empty, right?”

“And let you fellows steal from me every day?” Claud sniffed. “No, I don’t think so.”

“Curses. Foiled again.”

Claud laughed. “Yeah, yeah. Hurry up. Let’s go back already. Schwarz, Farah and Lily are all worried sick about you guys. Onwards! Homewards!”

“What are you, a homesick traveller?” Risti clicked her teeth. “Come on, let’s double up…”