Though Bodhi the monk had spent the better part of the season locked behind bars, they really couldn't complain.

The so-called jail cell looked more like a child's dream nursery. There was a realistic depiction of the moon and the night sky painted across the ceiling. The stars even twinkled against the blanket of midnight velvet.

The starry night overlooked a circular chamber filled with life sized rattles and even larger than life teddy bears.

"Don't you just love how they treat us like we're babies?"

The question came from Bodhi's cellmate. A dog spirit, who claimed to be a shiba inu even though her glamour gave nothing away. She introduced herself as Billie upon arrival. Bodhi only cared because talking to someone was one of the few ways they could take their mind off of booze.

Billie told Bodhi that she was an indie game developer with an immersive project in the works called Lucky Dungeon.

"I was arrested for creating a game that is 'deceptively cute' and making 'profitless gestures in public' according to the record."

In other words, Billie was caught handing her demo out for free for beta-testing. The second offense was apparently worse than developing a game that wasn't cute enough.

When Billie was through, she asked, "What are you in here for?"

Bodhi shrugged. "Misconduct."

The monk didn't feel like talking about the real problem. Detoxing had been bad enough. Thankfully, no one else was sharing a cell with Bodhi at the time of their intake. The more sober the monk was, the more embarrassed they felt about everything. This acutely painful awareness of how much they were lacking was precisely the reason why they drank in the first place. After reaching a certain threshold, self awareness was not an issue. Sure it was there. It would always be there, but...

At least when they were drunk, they didn't care as much.

Caring, for whatever reason, hurt more than going through withdrawal.

"You ever heard of E-Village?"

It was the damn dog talking to them again. Bodhi wished that they cared enough to apologize for being such a shitty cellmate.

"Can't say I have," Bodhi mumbled, glancing in the shiba inu's direction with vague curiosity. Billie's glamour flickered in eagerness to explain. By now, she'd been around Bodhi long enough to tell when they were open to one of her long winded rambles.

"E-Village is dead smack in the middle of the Snake and the Rat Province, it's pretty much a game developer's paradise. Anyone can make it out there. And I'm going to be the first spirit from the Rabbit Province to do it."

Bodhi had no idea why Billie was so fired up, but she kept barking about how E-Village was this wild wild west where gamers and creators alike could try anything they wanted and receive a constant flow of feedback and trades of services.

Bodhi replied with "That's nice" a few times. Their overall lack of enthusiasm did nothing to steer Billie away from the topic. Part of Bodhi was kind of thankful that she didn't stop talking. The monk remembered when they used to be excited about things. Well, things other than getting a drink.

The day before Billie's sentence was up, she left Bodhi with something small and plastic.

"What's this?" Bodhi asked, holding it up before their cool gray stare, wondering if it could be sold for some rice wine.

"That dungeon crawler I was telling you about. This is my very last demo," Billie whispered, placing her glamoured paw over the monk's hand. Once she had encouraged Bodhi to stash the plastic chip somewhere safe, she explained, "Lucky Dungeon is totally immersive. Works like a paper space. Once you and whoever else goes inside, you can't get out until you beat it."

When Bodhi gave her a look, she reassured them that the game wasn't some sort of trap. She designed it to be very player-friendly on purpose. And that no one could disturb the gamers once they were inside the program.

It sounded like a portable safehouse Bodhi mused to themself long after Billie had been released and the monk was left alone with their thoughts.

The last thing Billie had done before leaving was hug Bodhi soundly. This sort of affection was not something spirits were prone to do unless they were mentally ill like Sun Ritsu.

"Thank you for being here," Billie woofed softly before letting Bodhi go. "Because of you, I didn't go crazy in this place."

Bodhi wasn't sure what it was the dog was referring to. The monk was so depressed that they barely moved during the day. And they never initiated conversation with Billie.

Blushing and dimly bewildered, Bodhi silently watched the dog be escorted out by two half-glamoured security guards.

The monk pressed their fingers to the chip in their pocket, wondering how long it would be until Sun Ritsu showed up with some food.

Anari woke up with breakfast waiting for her at the foot of her bed. There was a letter that came with the tray of waffles and pork belly bacon.

I missed you.

~ Bai

Anari folded the letter up and set it to the side. She took a moment to unwrap her braids before digging into the food.

The spider spirit had returned to Next Dimension HQ very late the night before. Sun Bai had requested her presence, but she left a message with his secretary explaining how tired she was instead.

After Anari had let her braids down, she poured herself some tea that came with the tray.

She had so many questions.

Like, why was Next Dimension letting bridges collapse on top of forced prison labor? That might have been something a company run by pigs would do, but it wasn't Sun Bai's style. And there was also the hosting of the banquet in the Garden of Immortal Peaches. Once again, something like that had never been the kind of thing Bai did with his company.

Perhaps the organization was undergoing some sort of rebranding? It wasn't completely out of the question. Bai had competitors and commercialization was a surefire way to let the others know that he was a part of the game just as much as them.

Still, that didn't explain the collapsing bridges...

[Good morning.]

Anari blinked. It had been a long time since her boss projected his thoughts into her head like that without warning, but the spider didn't scare easily.

Anari looked up to see that Bai had helped himself inside her dormitory room. By the looks of it, he had just woken up too. The sun clone wore his long white hair undone instead of in its messy half bun. His clothes were looser and more casual than he was usually seen in.

"Bai," Anari sighed, "where are your glasses?"

Her employer shrugged as he approached the foot of her bed. "You haven't started eating yet."

"I barely just poured my tea. It's early." Anari had known Bai long enough to throw in a subtle scolding here and there. Though she knew that if he went through this much trouble to wake up early enough to see her, he was not going to be turned away.

As Anari expected, she and Sun Bai shared breakfast on her bed. It was not an uncomfortable situation, but Anari knew that she had to tread cautiously. Bai had a way of pulling her back into his vortex when she had plans to move on. Sometimes they became too comfortable around each other. When no one else was around, it was easy to forget just how jealous and possessive Bai could be.

Bai's questions started off innocent enough. Mostly ones about how Anari enjoyed herself and what the weather was like.

"I passed through the Peach Festival," Anari mentioned lightly, throwing out a hook to see if Bai would bite.

"Wish I could have been there," Bai said. "There was some event we were signed up to sponsor. I let my outreach department handle it."

Well, at least one of Anari's questions had an answer. Like she expected, Bai was not totally invested in the idea of rubbing elbows with the spiritual elite. It seemed like the feast in the Garden of Immortal Peaches was nothing more than a bribe to get bureaucrats to look the other way when it came to his less than savory real estate projects.

When the two spirits had gotten through the surface layer of their conversation, Bai made himself a little waffle-bacon sandwich and asked offhandedly, "Who were you with all that time?"

Anari played it cool. They both did at times like this. It was a dance of wills that the on-again-off-again couple was quite familiar with. Anari knew that she didn't have to put up with Bai's polite interrogation. He would leave if she asked him to. But the spider was weak for the familiarity of it all. The push and pull that she shared with Bai and only Bai.

"I was with a pig and a monk, if you must know."

Sun Ritsu's golden brown sideburns suddenly flared in the corners of Anari's memory.

Bai lifted a brow. "That's all?"

Anari's gaze almost dropped, but she caught herself just in time.

"That's all."

After a moment, Bai snickered. "You're beautiful when you lie, Anari. I don't think I've ever told you that."

Anari opened her mouth to explain, but Bai drew very close. She fell silent in his shadow.

[I don't want to know who else you shared your company with.]

He spoke with his mind even though they were only inches away. Then, softly he said, "I just wanted to have breakfast with you."

They kissed. It was something that Anari saw coming a mile away and she had done nothing to stop it. Again, she missed the familiarity of being with Bai. She kissed him until Ritsu's handsome golden sideburns were eclipsed by Bai's overwhelming mental presence and his cascade of ghost white hair that seemed to naturally interlace with her microbraids.

Bai had come at the wrong or rather, the right time depending on how you looked at it, Dear Traveler. Anari shared more than just a little breakfast with him that morning. Yes, it is sort of a worrying situation, isn't it? But we all make decisions, don't we? Decisions that we know come with consequences, and yet we make them. To feel good in the moment or simply because it is the easiest decision to make.

The truth was, Dear Traveler, that Anari didn't want to lose what she had with Sun Ritsu. At the same time, she didn't know if she knew how to be with someone who didn't try to control her. Sun Bai was rotten at times, but he was familiar territory. Sun Ritsu, however... his kindness, his goodness frightened the spideress.

There's a lot to unpack when it comes to Anari's relationship history, but for the moment, let's return to what happened between her and Sun Bai after they wrapped up their "breakfast."

Anari tried to approach the topic of the collapsed bridges while Bai was slipping his shirt back on when he interrupted her with a sudden invitation.

"The Sevenfold Peach Championship?" Anari repeated, vaguely remembering an event of that name passing through the Rabbit Province every few years.

"Would you care to join me? Unlike the Peach Festival, I'm required to attend this one. You can be my bodyguard."

It wouldn't be the first time Anari guarded Bai at a tournament. The major difference was that this one would be taking place in Kawaii Village. Anari had no way of knowing if Ritsu and his cadre had left that region. Now that they had a staff, there was no reason to spend money on traveling from province to province.

"You already know that I hate stuff like this," Bai said, "But I'm also going because I have word that a sun clone has unearthed the Compliant Rod from the Heavenly River. An artifact of that prestige shouldn't be left to wander the streets."

Anari kept her expression steady while her mind raced. Was it that tourist entertainer Sun Surina who reported to Bai? Anari didn't want to ask, but she planned to do a thorough search of Next Dimension's record of hired spies. It was information that she could easily access and she didn't need to keep prying in person like this in order to find out.

"The championship would be a good place to start looking since it draws in so many sun clones." Bai went on to say. He helped himself off of Anari's bed and started stacking the dirty dishes and utensils back onto the tray. "And don't worry, Nar. I don't plan on putting a hit out on the random monkey spirit who found the thing. I just want to get an audience with them first and offer a fair trade."

Anari's heart dropped. She didn't even want to consider the idea of her boss having a private sit down with Sun Ritsu. It would be impossible to hide her connection to either of them. The odds that Sun Ritsu would still be there–

[Something on your mind, Anari?]

A shiver bolted up the spider's spine at the sensation of Bai projecting his thoughts again. It almost felt like a blade of grass sliding into her ear.

"I'll join you," Anari whispered, knowing that she really didn't have a choice. This was a job that she had been chosen for preemptively. And Bai had timed the news so well. After he softened her up with breakfast food and the tender side of his company.

After Anari took the job, Bai thanked her for breakfast, picked up the tray and told her to get as much rest as she needed.

When he left, the spider was silent for all of two minutes before she broke down.

Her glamour completely dissolved as she lifted all eight of her arms to catch the tears streaking down her face. Tears of fear and anxiety of what was to come.

There were also happy tears mixed in with the not so happy ones. Because all of this meant that there could be a chance the spider would get to see her handsome monkey king again.