“I...uh” Chen stops short, unsure how to answer. None of the things she’s worried about have changed, but she’d also forgotten about all the things she did today. T-those weren’t princessy things anyway, right? She’d let herself get captured by Cyanis in exchange for a pretty dress that felt so nice to wear, which was totally below her station right? And she’d done nothing to rescue Rose yet. And she had entertained the Sky Castle at the expense of her own kingdoms, hadn’t she???

And yet...she was having fun. She’d been having fun all day and they [i]had[/i] gotten to the sky castle exactly as planned. And...Qiu had chatted ahead for them to expect her and everything. Like...like she belonged at least a little. 

“I guess...” Chen said. She blushed because Jessic was being so nice. She was giving Chen all this time to just think and asking such good questions. “I dunno. Like, this part was fun but...why are we even expected to fight over the shards? Why does Qiu want so many shards and my parents care so much about stopping her? I don’t know how to handle that part, I wanted to just, like, be friends with her.”