Rose from the River falls, but (in a strange reversal of her battle with half of a castle and a naginata-wielding dragon) she does so gracefully. She hops from coin to coin, ruby to sapphire to statue, as if there was nothing at all unusual about the sight, as if she did so every day of the week and twice on Sundays. Her skirt is blown quite up by the wind, but she barely pays it any mind— and, besides, if you’re looking, aren’t those legs worth seeing in all their glory, anyway?

Her serenity is a fitting counterpoint to the wildly flailing, bucking, squirming fox trying to figure out both how to survive the fall (her current plan being “convince somebody to stop me from falling”) and how to grab as much of the treasure tumbling all around her as possible.

Whoosh! Scoop! Squish! Cyanis is picked up and cradled like the most beautiful of princesses by a silenced, smug monk. Her muffled pleas to be untied are met with a boop on her cutie nose and an intensifying of Rose’s smugness. Look at where your pursuit of vain riches and double-triple-trucie-crossies got you, little wish-thief! Smooshed up against the soft silks and firm body of Rose from the River, and the two of you definitely have some discussions to have about, oh, tricking a poor mind-locked girl into aiding and abetting fox crimes, heartlessly throwing her underneath a Countess-shaped bus (not that you have ever seen one, little fox), and attempting to escape your cutie jail sentence.

But then Rose from the River is distracted by a beautiful, perfect kiss. The sort that makes her press Cyanis’s face into paradise to be smothered while she half melts like a squeeing handmaiden. They did it! They really did it! Looking at the two, Rose from the River knows that she no longer has to worry about protecting Yue the Sun Farmer, even if she’s worth more money than the entire world could scrape together. Hyra has Yue well in hand, and if there were ever two girls who deserved to have adventure together, it was those two.

Which means that, really, her part in this adventure should be over. She should sling Cyanis over one shoulder, inform Yue of her windfall, and continue on her way. Unless something wonderful were to happen to her in turn, the sort of thing that would keep her away from her Devotion to the Way, if only for a little longer; a reason to delay Cyanis’s cutie jailing and her own pilgrimage across this beautiful and ever-surprising world. Something to keep her in this story— or someone.

Chen, darling? That’s your cue.

[Rose from the River finally uses her [i]Gallant Rescue[/i] to take a string on Cyanis, having Defied Disaster with Grace and scored a hot, hot [b]11[/b].]