"Excellent, the tasting platter, then, noona?"

"Sure, sure. I hope you're not making Kim Hye-jin pay for it."

"What do you take me for?"

"Just checking. Alright, back in a bit."

"Thank you. So I've been house hunting, I think I'm going to find a place to rent. Any neighborhoods you can recommend to me?" 'Not guild ones' is unspoken, and yet still loudly echoes over the table.

Boy howdy does he! He's actually really opinionated about it, it turns out, and very happy to explain his opinions in detail and in useful ways. It turns out that Tae-gun's suggestions are all on Woo-young's list, and he has comprehensive pros and cons for each of them.

His sister shows up with the rosé a minute into this but the sushi will take a little bit longer.

Very reasonable, thank you very much!

Also: yes. This is exactly the kind of information she wants. Yessss delicious opinions yessssss. She'll take notes on her phone, because this does actually matter a bunch!

He serves the both of them some wine and offers his glass for a cheer.

tink!

She's still a little bit formal, and as promised she does only barely sip her wine, but she's still charming company. And she has so many stories from Japan! One of the dungeons she handled was a literal ice dungeon, it was the most hilariously one-sided clear she's ever gotten to do...

Oh he bets! He's seen videos of her in action and it's glorious, honestly, she looks so cool.

Thank you! It took a lot of practice and she's still working on it. There's a tricky art to it, and precision is actually harder than power. A whole part of it is understanding the chemical reactions happening with fire, and how hers isn't actually fuel based, but it's more expensive to reduce materials to their basic compounds, and so it becomes where and when to cheat to avoid smoke or the creation of harmful chemicals that could impact any bystanders...

Surprise! She's a nerd. If he seems to be enjoying the explanation she will happily go into detail about the many, many ways she has figured out her powers. It's actually a lot of work to be as safe as she is with her ludicrously destructive abilities!!! She tries very hard!!!!

Holy shit she's more destructive than she looks??? That's bullshit.

But Woo-young is not, himself, that much of a nerd, even if he finds her excitement contagious. He's had people try to explain to him the principles behind his teleportation and he just went cross-eyed and didn't retain any of it. 

Also, unlike Hye-jin, he isn't avoiding drinking, and his cheeks are slowly but surely turning pinker.

(Here's your food! Enjoy!)

(Thanks noona you're the best.)

"So how've you found the two dungeons you did today?"

"Good! Straightforwardly easy, but really good for practice. Tae-gun-sunbae is a very different partner than my last one, so there was a lot of adjustment."

Mostly on his end but she's not saying that!

"I bet sunbae was fumbling idiotically," he snorts. "That'd be like him."

... okay maybe now she'll say it.

"I was also adjusting to having an actual partner!" she defends, which is basically agreeing that, yes he was, but in a polite way. "It's deeply weird to me to not be dragging along dead weight with occasional assistance in making a wall of fire I don't have to babysit. I was kind of like, 'What? You're helping? Without me telling you to??' Wild concept, I know."

He snorts again and pops more sushi into his mouth. "Sunbae hasn't had a partner in years and it really shows. Hmm. I guess maybe not if you didn't know 'im then but he was... hmm. More?" He downs the last of his current glass of wine then gestures at Hye-jin's glass with the bottle to offer to fill it for her.

No, she's all right, thank you!

"He was a really quick study! And the poor man was really frustrated with any imperfections or mistakes. Korea's dungeons are doomed, by the way, now they've got two raging perfectionists partnered together."

He shrugs and drinks more from his own glass. At this point he's properly drunk, slurring his words a bit and drooping.

"You plannin' on going international?" he asks. "Sunbae does, sometimes, for bigger dungeons. 'S expensive but they got a lot of my power stored up... hmmm..."

"I'm not already?" she wonders, wryly. "I'm kidding, I know what you mean. I'd love to, but haven't had the opportunity yet."

"'M sure you could. Next time sunbae goes, but maybe even without 'im?"

"Does he do that often? I've been avoiding the news lately. It seems like that would be kind of..." Suicidal! With his backlash, especially! What the fuck, Tae-gun!

"Sometimes," he says, doing a so-so gesture with a hand. "More than he ought to. But that's everything, with hunny gunny—ahh, with sunbae."