"The novelty has yet to wear off, no." Felix says in agreeable tones. He thinks for a moment. "Now I wonder what do you think of this place?"

"I haven't seen much of it yet," Leo points out, standing up and holding out a hand to Felix. 

"Shall we explore some more?" 

Felix smiles at him accepts Leo's hand and stands up. "Of course."

They follow the trail and Felix inspects a bush before picking a berry and tasting it. "Huh, kinda chocolate-y with a mint undertone? Which is odd. There is an entire process to make chocolate from cocoa beans."

"Huh." Leo tries one.

"...yeah. Mint chocolate. It's impressive, but not one of my favourite flavours." 

They're still holding hands, which is weird, but Leo isn't gonna be the first one to pull away. It feels a tiny bit subversive to walk through a garden holding hands with a boy—a Vaesteri boy—knowing that everyone looks at Leo and sees a girl. 

"Oh, what about this one over here?" There are so many different fruits to try! If they sample them all, they won't have any room left for their meal, but they can give it a good try. 

That one over here has a creamy texture, almost milky taste, hints of something nutty.

So many fruits, most are bite-sized, but they couldn't possible taste it all in one visit. It's probably part of their diabolical plan to get people to come back. Which might be overkill because the atmosphere is rather nice.

And very romantic, specially when the music starts playing.

Felix doesn't break the hand holding.

"Oh, I think that's part of the trivia game." Felix says pointing at a plaque hanging from a flower bush.

Oh, right, there was a game. As if Leo needed any more things to think about right now. 

...alright, what does the plaque say?

The plaque says

Ask your partner what they used to think about marriage when they were little.

In smaller words. Touch this rune to get to the next question.

"Huh, this doesn't quite sound like trivia."

"But answering the question. I had always been a big romantic? When girls wanted to play pretend wedding I was always for it."

...well, this 'trivia game' isn't going to be quite as fun and painless as Leo was hoping. 

"That's a cute picture. I played pretend weddings with—my friend. But I always wanted to be the groom," Leo admits. "When the adults complained, I pointed out that we couldn't very well have two brides, could we?"

Oh, the irony.

"Sorry. Do you want a hug? I just realized this might make you uncomfortable."

Yes.

"It's fine. They're mostly good memories, just...ironic, in hindsight." 

Leo reaches out and taps the rune as the plaque instructs. 

"Hindsight does a lot of that to us..." Felix gently pats Leo on the back.

The rune points to the next trivia question, which is a classic Elan literature reference that Felix completely fails to know, about a couple coming to realize that they are a good match for each other.

"Oh, this is an actual trivia question! I'm a little less disappointed in these people now."

Leo knows the reference and explains it. Apparently, a romance novel habit is good for some things. "I don't think their situation is much like ours, really." 

"This world's romance novels really lack diversity, yeah. Though, the premise of this one sounds good enough to add to my reading list."

"It's not bad for the genre or the time period," Leo offers. "And it's well-known enough that it's almost worth reading just for the sake of not missing the references." 

On to the next one, picking random tasty-looking fruit to sample as they walk. 

Smile. "Yeah, that's always useful. The other day, we almost caused a international incident because we didn't know what the word parafi was a slang for."

"Yeah, that would do it," Leo agrees, wincing. "I'd be happy to recommend you a reading list to catch up on things like that, but I might miss something that I think is too obvious to cover." 

Snort. "It's exactly the sort of thing that might be hard to remember when you have an inside perspective. But don't worry, we at least got a good story out of it."

"I guess you did," Leo agrees. Felix seems determined to find the good in everything, and Leo doesn't really share his optimism, but it's nice to experience secondhand. 

...this fruit is delicious. "Here, try this one! I don't even know what it tastes like." 

Felix picks up a fruit and chews on it with agreeable tones. "It... I wouldn't expect a fruit to taste like this, but at same time it tastes natural? And delicious." Grin.

Oh no that's a cute face. Leo seems to be smiling as well, how did that happen? 

They walk on through the garden, tasting fruit and answering the rest of the trivia questions, and it's...less terrible than Leo would have expected a date to be. 

Felix appears to be enjoying himself.

Soon enough, they are called to their table. Which rest atop of an extremely beautiful balcony made of magically grown branches holding up a platform. A gradient of red and pink flowers curtains around them giving enough privacy, so they can talk, but not enough for... other things.

Their dishes are works of art, with geometric patterns drawn on the plate with syrups and a square of cake topped with fruits and fancy sugar decorations.

"Well... I knew this place was fancy, but this place is fancy."

"Yeah." Leo pokes the syrup with a fork. "I almost don't want to eat this, it's too pretty." 

"I wish I had brought my smartphone to take a picture. This is so Instagram material."

"What's 'Instagram'?" Leo asks, absently cutting the corner off the cake without looking at it.