"Okay~" 

She takes out her satchel, laying onto on the table, before squeezing her hand firmly, sliding it out from her grip, and dissapearing for a moment, reappearing with two of her bowls placed in front of each of them. 

She sticks her hand into the bag, and grabs them, then - 

A blizzard falls down in front of them, a sweet wind washing through her senses, drifting down like windswept leaves as a soft brown-green light shimmers across them, before they glide into place, arrayed across the bowl like the petals of a lotus. 

The moment passes, and she smiles brightly. 

"Feel free to dig in~!"

Why did letting go of Romana's hand feel like losing something?

Whoa.

"This looks like art, Romana. The preparation was art — but really fast art. It almost feels like it would be a shame to eat it."

That was a question she remembered what to do with, though: it may be art, but it was still here to be eaten — and in time she'd be doing things this amazing too. She took a long moment to savor the experience before her, the lingering memory of the storm of motion that produced it, and the elegant presentation of the leaves in the salad. She leaned down, closing her eyes and inhaling slowly, enjoying the scent of green freshness and a hint of sharp ozone.

She sat back up straight, picking up a fork and taking her first bite. A crisp crunch gave way to a fresh, green, sweet taste, carrying a hint of morning drew with it. A faint sense of storm and gust blew through her briefly with the taste, carried along behind a subtle savory aftertaste that underscored the flavor and made the whole experience stand out.

She turned to look at Romana, starry-eyed.

"This is amazing. You're amazing. I'm going to learn to do this?"

She laughs softly, smiling warmly.

"Thank you. And yeah! The foundation of sky shrub salad I made you is the technique I was most thinking of first teaching you - then the rest are just a bunch of flourishes I've picked up along my path. If I gave you the techniques, you could make a lower grade version of this - albeit a lot less cinematically - in maybe like a day or two? It'll more realistically be a good bit longer than that, but there's all sorts of lovely things you can make even really early on."

She digs in herself, little fuzzy brown forcefields manifesting to serve as chopsticks or forks as she bites into it happily. 

"It's there to be eaten, but doesn't mean that it's not important to tend to that, too, so please don't worry! I do..." 

She waves her hand a little. 

"I guess the simplest way to put it is 'plant formations' sometimes? It's nice to get to make more permanent work, even if the mono no aware is excellent, too."  

Hailey grinned, eyes wide. "That soon? Hell yes. And obviously not to the same degree of elegance and style you just did, not yet, but... It would be damn cool to be that awesome while I'm cooking eventually."

She paused to savor her next bite more fully again, eyes closed and a wide smile over her face as she chewed.

"Mmmm~."

Opening her eyes again, she noticed and was reminded of Romana's utensils. "Oh, and what? You have a utensil technique?"

She laughs quietly.

"It's just a barrier technique - it's a decent control exercise and I can afford to create weak ones whenever - The Firmament Fortress Fields aren't quite designed to go this low, but that's part of what makes it fun to use them." 

She nodded. "Yeah, I'd love to learn that too at some point, if you don't mind sharing. Ain't much you've got that I don't want to learn, though, honestly," she finished with a sheepish grin.

"Which really brings me to the question that's been tugging at me. I love my collection of cookware, but that's about the only thing I love in this city — and even it's not that great, no matter how much love I've put into fixing everything up. The only thing keeping me tied here is a degree I only wanted to be able to explore and work in storms."

Why was it so nervous-making to ask this? Romana was just her amazing gorgeous mentor.

"You mentioned help with the future? I don't like the future I've got in the mortal world."

She nods understandingly. 

"Unforunately, it's an earth technique that judging from your results you almost certainly have a terrible affinity for, and it's only learnable once you hit the third realm, so it'd be a while even if you were compatible... Might be worth looking for a barrier technique that fits you better, though." 

She hums softly. 

"You'll have all the mortal money you want after you finish out your training with me, so don't worry about that? You can do whatever you'd like, in the mortal world or as a cultivator, more or less, and you don't need to follow what you thought you could do, before."

"That's a good point about the barrier technique. Earth being a terrible fit for me makes sense, honestly, too. Guess I'll have to keep an eye out for an air-aligned barrier?"

She hummed in thought, then suddenly stepped across to her desk quickly, coming back with a notebook.

"I should make a list! So much to keep track of."

She quickly noted down the air barrier idea in swooping handwriting.

"So what are my options regarding the training? I basically want to go all-in on this."

"Normal all-in or cultivator all-in? There's... a really large difference between those. Of course, it also depends on how much debt from resources being spent on you you are okay with? It's hard to enumerate options without talking about that..."

Hailey gulped briefly, but nodded. "Cultivator all-in, I think. I don't know how well I understand the gap, but I've slashed and burned my life before, and I want to do it again. As for the debt... as long as it's worth it, and I've got a good shot of paying it off in a time-frame that makes anything resembling sense, I'll just handle it."

"Yeah, I'm... not too sure? At minimum though, I can probably mostly get around any need for sleep you have and get you training harder throughout the day just from access to the cultivation spots we have around. I could probably arrange for maybe 10 hours of kitchen time, probably a lot of that hands on and with me or someone else, if I end up finding some else more suitable or if I can't be around, fill up the rest of it with some more book learning, cultivation time and such? I don't know how much you are okay with mental effects and side-effects - especially if you go for the best bang for buck pills it'll be really really painful and potentially more awkward later down the line, and it's not like that trade off totally doesn't exist in spiritual food." 

She stims, a little, fretting. 

"I don't think that it really makes sense to sign you up for the maximally intense things from the start? It probably makes more sense at that sort of budget to just try to spend a lot of time doing things in a relatively comfortable fashion thoroughly? I'm happy to support you on this, but I'm not especially willing to wreck your mind and/or foundation to give you just-below crippling levels of debt and that sort of nightmare to just get forward. It's probably more important to just get things settled, and going too hard for your current mental set-up can end up ruining your foundation or adding in some risk of death so... It might not even be worthwhile to go like that? It depends on how you end up reacting to it." 

"Wait wha—" That's what cultivator all-in looked like? She couldn't. She had to. She needed to catch up. But—

Hailey deflated a bit, downcast. "Apparently I have even more to learn than I thought. I guess I mean normal all-in, I don't know. I don't know what I need. I just want to start fresh, have this new opportunity be my focus. I don't want to come back to a stupid tiny apartment and study for pointless classes and keep any of this senseless grinding loop I'm doing."

"I just don't know how to do better right yet..."

Nod nod. 

"That's ok. A big part of the reason why I offered the chance to go slower is that making those judgements is pretty difficult. If you'd like, I can give you a few ideas for the level of commitment and focus I was thinking of?"

Hailey nodded, softly. "That's probably a good idea, yeah."

"Ok so." 

She spreads her hands. 

"The most basic option would be basically me providing you 'cultivator university'. There'd be regularly scheduled classes for say, three hours a day except Sunday, some homework, which will probably be just some reading and basic cultivation and cooking work to play around with on your own, and maybe one or two classes that involves field missions. For this, I'd probably end up mostly just making sure you get through your early stage cultivation with a good foundation and get you to the point where you can function well as an immortal chef." 

She pauses for a moment.

"A bit more intense option might be something more like a traditional apprenticeship or salaried job. You'd work 40 hours a week on some projects I assign, be it in the kitchen or in a cultivation spot, and I'd do my best to get you a good grounding in a bunch of different techniques that fit you - grab a few wind things, a proper outfit,  make sure you have the basic weapons you need, beyond the gifts you'll get, a bit more access to some of my products and try to get you into a place where I've covered enough for field missions to be closer at hand just from the basic arrangement."

She purses her lips, thinking. 

"I'm happy to accomodate you however helps? Going for something more flexible is definitely possible, and it's okay if you want to take the first little while on as-desired basis, even if that's a little impractical going forward. If you want to rush a bit more in your cultivation progress, I can get you better materials to work with and more of my work, for a cost in lock-in or debt, depending on what you are looking for, and the actual amount of hours can be tweaked with any of these options. There's also no need to nesscarily set this up exclusively, either - if you feel like it's a good proposition for your time, I can introduce you to some of the rest of group who can offer their own services in training and show you the open source scripture project, if you want to go for a cheaper option." 

Wow. Okay. Hailey let out a soft, slow, contemplative sigh. These were great options. These were almost too many great options. Okay, think about it slowly. What advantages did two have over one, for what costs?

Two looked like it involved more resources, filled her time more. There was more commitment and possible debt, but it avoided leaving her idle.

One leg started bouncing subconsciously, until she noticed and tried to slow her breathing and still her leg again.

Two also sounded like she'd have more help picking things out, and getting adjusted. Which, well, it was embarrassing to need help figuring all this out, but...

Fuck, she really did need some help.

She twisted her hands in her lap for a moment, and took a few deep breaths. Opened her mouth to speak, then closed it, bit her lip, then finally spoke.

"I think I need the second option. I don't know what I don't know, and I don't know what I'd fill my time with if I had as much to spare as the first option does. Even just trying to pick through the tweaks you suggested after number two... it's overwhelming to try to decide. I don't even understand the tradeoffs properly."

She stopped, tried to keep her breathing slow. Even just saying that had felt raw, like the new-nerves sensitivity of just-healed skin.

"Okay." 

She reaches out her hand to clasp hers, again, and squeezes gently. 

"Should be able to get that cleared past the Senior Fox pretty quickly from a standard contract - can send that to you for review once you've calmed down a little. If you'd like, we can talk a little bit more about the tradeoffs, or I can just give you some more time to rest and get into a better state of mind?"

Hailey nodded, slowly, gratefully, and squeezed Romana's hand back. "Thanks. Yeah, I'd appreciate going over the contract after some time to take it all in."

She took a slow breath. What did she want to do right now?

"I feel like I ought to ask about tradeoffs, or what you said earlier about tribulations. But I also maybe just need a break from learning intense stuff for a minute. And then there's this separate weird feeling like I just want to sit here with you for a while? I can't remember ever wanting to spend time with someone outside of trying to accomplish something before, huh."

She laughs quietly. 

"Yeah, the body refinement process can really do that to you. The Seniors always try to emphasize the warnings more, but it's hard to make it read as more then just a webMD side effect blob, you know?" 

She slowly strode around the table, taking the chair casually in one hand, and sat it down next to her, before resting her head against her shoulder. 

Hailey froze again. This was not at all what she meant. She didn't know what to do. This felt really nice. She didn't understand why Romana was doing this. Why did this feel so nice? Maybe because physical contact is good for people? Maybe there were other reasons?