[TEA] (123) 3.22. Clean as a Whistle

It turned out Owl had outdone himself, as the three of them ended up needing to mine their way through nearly ten feet of rubble in order to get back to the main tunnel. By that point, they’d been mining for hours, and they were all thoroughly exhausted.

Tossing their pickaxes and helmets into his Personal Rift alongside all the other junk he was collecting, Asher led them over to one of the express elevators that would take them straight from the fifth level back to the third. None of them were currently in the mood to deal with the throng of tourists and cons going on in the fourth level. It wasn’t until they were back in the far calmer third level of the city that the sound of Brian’s stomach rumbling reached his ears.

“Why don’t we find someplace to grab a bite to eat?” he offered, looking between the two of them. “I think we’ve deserved an actual sit down restaurant after the day we’ve had.”

“That sounds amazing, but I’d feel a bit bad about us going into any serious establishment looking like we do,” Samantha pointed out, frowning at Brian’s appearance. Only then did Asher realize he and Brian were covered in dirt and sweat, and probably didn’t smell all that great either. One of the side effects of Samantha continuously conjuring water all over herself to keep Wet Warrior active was that, now that she’d dried off, she was in a far cleaner state than they were.

“That’s… admittedly a pretty good point,” Asher nodded, scratching his head and actually feeling the grit of dust and small rocks within his hair. “Though I imagine business owners have to be pretty used to people running around being so filthy from how popular heading into the mines is in this city.”

“Most people head straight from the mines to one of the public baths,” Brian said matter of factly while brushing dust off his own shoulders after seeing Asher do the same. Asher and Samantha looked at one another in confusion at his confident tone.

“Dare I ask how you know that?” she asked, raising an eyebrow and crossing her arms.

“Laura’s dad mentioned it when some particularly dirty miners walked by the window,” Brian shrugged, deciding to give up his attempts at cleanliness after realizing just how dusty he was. “This is their fourth time visiting the city. They have family here, so they know how the place works. According to him, people who live here get pretty mad at tourists who don’t take the time to clean up.”

“Guess that settles that then,” Asher shrugged, deciding he would honestly love a bath right about now. He’d never been in a public bath before, but he wasn’t all that modest about his body.

Samantha, on the other hand, wasn’t quite so thrilled about the idea.

“Did they say how the baths worked?” she asked, throwing a sideways glance at Asher that he couldn’t quite read. “Like if they were mixed or separated?”

“He mentioned you had to pay for soap if you didn’t bring any of your own, and yeah, they split them between girls and boys,” Brian said. “I think he mentioned it was more like bathing in a flowing river than a bath, because they don’t want people soaking in all the nasty junk from the miners.”

“That makes sense,” Asher nodded, even more curious now that he knew they’d be bathing in some sort of current. Even so, he didn’t want to make Samantha uncomfortable. Turning toward her, took her hand in his own. “Do you have any interest in giving it a shot?”

“Yeah, that sounds fun,” she quickly nodded, grinning a bit sheepishly. “Sorry, I’ll admit I wasn’t a huge fan of the thought of you seeing other girls in the bath.”

Asher briefly considered teasing her, but seeing the nervous look on her face, he simply smiled and gave her hand a squeeze. It was easy to forget sometimes that the deadly hunter capable of tracking bears and taking down demons was also a young woman who’d never really been in a relationship before. He quite clearly remembered how nervous and awkward he’d been around pretty much every aspect of dating back in high school and the immediate years following it.

He was an entire world away at this point, and the cringe from some of those memories still sometimes made him want to curl up into a ball and ask himself what the hell he’d been thinking back then.

“Alright, let’s get cleaned up, and then find someplace to grab a bite to eat!” he declared, earning two different cheers of agreement.

Asher didn’t have the faintest idea where the public baths were located on the different levels, but all it took was asking a single person who looked like they lived here to get directions. Just as Laura’s father had claimed, the civilian was more than happy to direct them to the baths, and even thanked them for trying to get themselves cleaned up.

The nearest bathhouse was a large building that reminded Asher of an old schoolhouse. There was a slow but steady trickle of fellow dirt-covered miners heading into the building, and an equally slow stream of fresh-faced and sparklingly clean people walking back out. Going with the flow, the three of them joined the line of people heading in and quickly found themselves standing before an elderly gentleman wearing a white robe. Pushing up the glasses on his nose, he smiled at them.

“Welcome to our humble bathhouse. I take it the three of you are tourists?”

[Cleaner] - 2/3 Elements

“Yeah. How could you tell?” Asher asked, looking around the room. The main lobby appeared to be some sort of relaxation spot, where a good number of people rested in fluffy looking robes while chatting with one another.

“When you’ve been doing the same thing for fifty years, you learn a thing or two,” the man winked at them. “I’m Eddie, the owner of The Sudsy Miner. I take it the three of you would each like an hour in the bath? Care for some soap as well?”

“That would be perfect, thank you,” Samantha said, giving Eddie a warm smile.

Eddie ducked under the counter for a moment before popping back up with three small baskets. Inside each was a fresh robe, a soft towel, and a small bar of soap that smelled like flowers.

“The two baths are split over there,” Eddie explained, pointing at the different doorways. “Men’s on the right, women's on the left. Feel free to leave your dirty clothes in any of the cubbies, and we’ll take care of cleaning them for you. If you finish up before they’re done, you’re welcome to wait in the lobby with the provided robe. Finally, if you have any questions, you can either grab the nearest attendant, or come find me.”

Eddie spoke in that calm, confident voice of someone that had been doing the same thing hundreds of times a day, year after year. But rather than sounding like a tired drone, he spoke as if helping them was the highlight of his day, and his gentle smile never left his wrinkled face. Thanking him for his help, Asher paid for their baskets. Agreeing to meet back up in the lobby once they were done, he and Brian headed over to the men’s portion.

“I like Eddie,” Brian stated, glancing over his shoulder at the old man as he went straight into helping the next customer. “He reminds me of George.”

“Yeah,” Asher said, trying to keep the frown off his face as Brian mentioned the kind, older farmer who no doubt had been killed during The Council’s attack on Horntho village. His throat tightened a bit at the memory of laughing around the dinner table as they’d hosted George and his wife Martha, and he swallowed painfully, trying to keep his voice level. “Yeah, he kind of does.”

Following Eddie’s instructions, they peeled off their sweat-soaked clothing and left them in two of the provided cubbies dotting the wall before stepping into the waiting bath. Despite it being called a bath, it was more like a long, wide river flowing from one end of the room to the other. There were small islands situated here and there within the center of the river where a few people conjugated and chatted as they enjoyed the warmth of the sweeping water, and something had been added to the water itself to make it smell almost minty, strangely enough. The water was a light, relaxing green that couldn’t be seen through, which allowed the more private of bathers to keep their modesty.

“This. Is. Amazing,” Brian sighed, sinking down until only his eyes were above the water line. After a few seconds, he popped up, gasping for air and grinning. “I’ve bathed plenty in the river before, I was expecting the water to be cold!”

“I don’t think the bath houses would be nearly so popular if they used cold water,” Asher laughed, leaving their baskets on the side of the bath and motioning for Brian to follow him over toward where the water was coming in. “Let’s head toward the source. I’m curious to see where the water is actually coming from.”

Nodding, Brian waded through the water after him, and the two of them made their way into the deeper portion of the river. The water only came up to about Asher’s ribcage, but that was close to Brian’s shoulders in comparison. As Brian lifted his arms out of the water to keep his balance, Asher spotted the shining bracelet on his wrist.

“You kept on the Bracelet of Observation?”

“Eddie was nice, but I didn’t think leaving it in the basket or with our clothes was a good idea,” Brian shrugged. “What if someone took it?”

“Good point,” he nodded, happy that Brian had such foresight for his age. He doubted Eddie hired anyone untrustworthy, but an artifact was still an artifact. Such an expensive object just sitting there would probably tempt even the best of people.

Thankfully, the artificial river didn’t get any deeper, else Brian would have been forced to start swimming to keep up with him. Once they made it to the wall, Asher found by feeling around that the water was coming in through a large grate just beneath the surface. Due to the green coloring of the water, unfortunately, he couldn’t make out any more details than what he could feel with his hands.

“I wonder if they have an artifact pumping water in, or a rotating staff of people with Water elements,” he mused, scratching his chin.

“Hey, Asher,” Brian said, his concerned tone snapping Asher out of his thoughts in an instant.

“What’s up,” he asked, giving Brian his full attention. “Something wrong?”

“I don’t know,” Brian admitted, nervously looking around the room. “I don’t see anyone looking at us… But I can feel someone’s attention on me. You know, thanks to the bracelet.”

While Asher had lost his own Bracelet of Observation during one of his many battles, he remembered the feeling well. The bracelets granted the wearer the Awareness skill, which allowed the wearer to know when someone was looking at them. The sensation didn’t go away until the user spotted or acknowledged whoever it was that was watching them.

“It’s alright, let me take a look,” he said reassuringly, doing his best to scan the room without making it too obvious. There were a good few dozen people lounging around and enjoying the warmth of the flowing river, but they were all either dozing, chatting with friends, or in the middle of bathing. He didn’t spot a single person staring at them like Brian said, not even among the people currently getting into or out of the water. “Are they still staring?”

“Yeah, the sensation hasn’t gone away,” Brian nodded. “Though it’s weird… It almost feels kind of dull. Like I’m not the one they’re actually focusing on, but I’m still being watched.”

Not the one they’re focused on…

Asher blinked at the realization of what that had to mean, and he had just enough time to grab Brian and shove him into his Personal Rift, the twelve-year-old’s eyes going wide as he was all but hurled out of the river into another dimension.

Just in time to save him from whatever latched onto Asher’s legs and dragged him under the water.