"Oh, come on, I don't think that!

"...You all would definitely recycle."

Snort. "Sure. Recycle you to a nice and comfy and fulfilling and purposeful alternative job opportunity. Like, if nothing else, pretty sure you can sell sperm to gene clinics, they go nuts for esper genes for upping the chances of babies being espers themselves." Pause. "Actually I'm not sure if it's sell or just donate, I literally don't care, but regardless. You are so economically valuable, dude, you clearly have no idea, Russia was lying to you."

Sigh. "They didn't lie. I was compensated well, financially. They just... said I had a duty. And that things were this bad and desperate everywhere, and who would look out for us if not ourselves?

"And, I mean, they're not really wrong, are they? Look at Indonesia. Everyone knows we're all only a few selfish years away from that."

"..... no? No, we're not. That is just factually incorrect, your model of the world outside of your frigid shithole is wrong. Your model of your frigid shithole might also be incorrect, actually, because guilt tripping you and saying that things will be lost without you giving up everything possible is part of the indoctrination to extract more out of you in the short term, but I'm less sure about that one because I don't know how badly that place is fucking up. Indonesia's whole thing is a lack of organization and ability to systematically locate, categorize, and disable dungeons, not a lack of espers working hard enough. Actually, I think it's getting more esper per capita than other places, just because the people with superpowers have to go bail it out instead of letting people with guns do most of the work, but I haven't stalked those statistics lately, so."

"Nothing to do with the individual espers, and everything to do with the benevolence of the organization controlling them, yeah. You and the GBE are in agreement there. They'd just say that you all throw your crazy Western money at the problem whereas xumble Russia must soldier on. You give what you can, the organization sorts it out, and you should be proud to contribute."

"Ehhh. It's not that we throw our crazy Western money at the problem, it's more like we use money to track and reward what is working and what isn't? Just blindly trusting your organization is... well, I mean, is there literally anything making sure your organization is efficient? That it's using the resources it has well? That the people it's got a chokehold over are not going to realize they're being treated like shit and flee the country to somewhere better? I was going to make this point gently with my 'Da-eun-is-like-you' storytime thing, but I guess I can just go full Ji-woo instead. Efficiently leveraged power is better than flat power any day of the week, fuck them asking you to give it your all if your all goes somewhere stupid."

"Okay, just to be clear, I left all that behind, so obviously I... Wait—"

"How do you know I'm from Russia? My official ID and record say I'm from Korea!"

"A-rank sensor, dude, I'm a nosy little snoop even without the superpowers." She sounds exactly zero ashamed of this. "Don't worry though, I tried to cover your tracks where I could, got people in the lobby insistent that people were yelling in German and everything."

That one she sounds very pleased about.

"This is going to be a very rocky transition, isn't it?"

"Yeah, sorry. I swear I'm trying to be as gentle as possible. I can help with accent practice a bit though?"

"Are you? Well, I was also trying to be as gentle as possible with the new blind partner but I guess we're both just sort of fumbling in the dark here!"

"—uh, shit. Bad metaphor."

"Ha! I'm only part time blind, mister, and even when I am, I have better navigating skills than some people with working eyes!" she snorts. "I'm fine, I told you my hard no's and you're respecting them, we're good, man."

She gives him a friendly sort of pat on the shoulder in the cuddles.

"No moving stuff, no tripping hazards, no wet, no sticky. No... backlash accumulation without permission.

"I really am fine, though, to take on more, you now. It's not tough to do if I have the space."

"I'd say 'no backlash accumulation without prior negotiation and consent of both parties,' but sure, permission is close enough. And maybe you are, but I don't know what backlash accomodations you even need? We literally didn't talk about it at all? And that's a scary position to put people in, we Koreans aren't wired to go, 'Oh, that's just the new guy, don't worry, he just screams and cries when you touch him, but he says he's fine, nothing at all to worry about!' like you're not a human being whose suffering matters. You are helping me be comfortable by being okay."

"...Doesn't seem like there's much that needs to be discussed, if you already know about the screaming-and-crying-when-touched thing, A-rank-sensor-sunbae."

... Ah. Hm. Yes. Privacy concerns. She's aware that these are things people care about, and she has perhaps misstepped by being too much of a nosy little snoop.

"I know approximately nothing about backlash accomodations," she says. "And the screaming and crying was extrapolation, not a - condemnation or dismissal of your ability to cope with the debilitating medical condition that's been forced upon you by the weird arbitrary magic lottery?"

Her little shoulder Ji-woo is grumbling under her breath at her conduct here, so to appease her:

"... And, um. Sorry. About the snooping. Without your permission or knowledge. I should come with a warning label on being perpetually curious and bad at information boundaries."

"Snooping? I've lived under a surveillance state with Misha as a partner—I presume I don't need to explain xis pastimes to you, either. The fact that Xa Si-Yeon-sunbae thinks we can keep secrets at all in a place like this—xe's the weird one!

"If you must know, I do not need any particular accommodations, like I said. Si-yeon-sunbae insisted that I ask for some, anyway, so to make xim xappy I requested all-cotton sheets because they are easier on me. And xeated floors are apparently a common thing around xere, so not even a concern! I guess if you really want to baby me, you can give me some warning so I don't have to skip dinner over backlash, but emergencies xappen, so we'll just roll with it."

"Keeping secrets from the outside world is more doable, it's just that I'm a little bit the worst person to try and keep secrets from in this guild. Or the best, maybe, I don't advertise what I know to people? Definitely one of those. But I'm telling you stuff I know about you as a courtesy, not because I make the habit of blabbing to others."

Relatedly: she would only know about Misha's stuff because Da-eun was shielding Si-yeon from him, and while Dasol can probably guess it was her from Minseo's description of her power and basic logic, she doesn't need to spell it out for him. She makes a note to herself to ask about his deal later. She was going to ask anyway, because nosy little snoop, but it's nice when it plays to the narrative of her not already knowing everything gossip worthy in Quasar.

"Anyway, your standards suck, because cotton sheets are easy. These might be cotton already, actually, I'm not sure? But I can definitely make sure they are for next time or before co-sleeping actually happens.

"I don't expect to get surprise emergencies, exactly? I'm a solid dungeon sensor and sometimes get called in for weird stuff, especially with Da-eun keeping me safe, but it's not going to be 'whoops I have life threatening levels of backlash and you need to guide me down in ten minutes or I die' or something? Not that that kind of flexibility to guide isn't valuable, it absolutely is, just. I myself am one of the most predictable espers in the guild, backlash accumulation wise."

“I’d say roughly an 85% cotton blend, based on xow itchy they are. I can tell you for sure once I get a little bit more backlash.

“And my standards are practical. There’s just not that much to be done about it, unless I’m going to be guiding someone in a sensory-deprivation chamber. I don’t even know if that’s possible. But it’s fine, I’ve been doing this for years.”

"Huh. That's a neat application of backlash, kudos for being able to tell. I'll requisition some 100% cotton sheets, then." She pulls up a comm screen and does so. No teleportation delivery, she's not sure the sheets the system has would do for this, so. Ordinary people running ordinary errands it is.

"Well, practically speaking, Russian standards literally led to you fleeing the country. In the interest of Korea not catching their dipshit disease and losing you to, I dunno, Japan, let's raise them just a scootch."

The sarcastic smile is evident in his voice. “I did already. Eighty-five percent at an 800 thread count are what I xad in the den.”

Perhaps he is just tired from some combination working in a second language all day and being stressed out of his mind—certainly the cortisol ache in the shoulder and joints suggests as much, but he was still taken aback some by his own snark just now. Ha Si-yeon had done a number on him earlier with his stapler nonsense. He considers apologizing, but that feels strangely unwelcome. Certainly the banter seems to be entertaining her, and she had complained about being bored before. Maybe it’s fine.

"... Okay, even your raised standards are kind of sad, but I'm still going to support you in them. Just, you know. You can also aim higher than this."

Then the second part of that registers.

"... 'Den'? Why was it a 'den.' ... Did they keep you in a basement. Please tell me they didn't actually keep you in a basement."