A bookstore, the world within.

Afterwards, the group split off, splintering into the morning crowds.

Yet there was only so much splintering somebody of Kotone’s height could do. Her long, silky black hair was clearly visible towering above, and so it was little surprise when she felt a tug on her sleeve, and looked back to see Ace of Spades.

What was surprising? They were in front of a charming little bookstore at the time.

“Uh, do you want to come inside with me?” Kotone asked.

Ace of Spades nodded. “Yeah.”

And that was that!

One day, Kotone would learn to say ‘no’ to cute girls.

“I’m surprised,” The admiral admitted with a smile almost as ghostly as her skin tone. “Even the experienced ships were only born some years ago, and you destroyers are new to the world. None of the other girls have interest in books.”

“I have an active imagination,” Ace of Spades said, deadpan, staring up at the much larger woman with an even, steady gaze that Kotone couldn’t meet.

Yet Kotone’s smile grew wider and more definite, encouraged by the terse response. “Very well. Forget all the expeditions for barrels of oil, let’s do some real exploring.”

When she pushed open the glass and wood frame, another little bell rang out.

Kotone could see rows of books on shelves from the shopfront windows. What she didn’t see was the inside, which was covered in books. Not only were there the expected rows upon rows of shelving, packed to the brim with bound covers and volumes. They were also stacked like firewood in great piles on the floor. The building’s square footage might have been considered expansive, but there were barely a few navigable foot-paths through the tangled, chaotic mass of book-jungle.

The musty smell unique to old paper inundated them in moments, especially once the door swung closed, and the bustling noise of downtown faded away. Caged up here in a box was ten thousand worlds. It was the only way, in many respects, that a person could escape themselves and go somewhere… else.

Moving your physical body only accomplished so much, but words had potential limited only by the capacity of their reader.

Each book a world, an invitation to sit down for a while and forget Autumn.

“Oh dear! One second, please! I’ll be right over!”

A tiny old lady came around the corner like a drifting stockcar, running sideways and trying to keep a pile of books twice her own height from falling over. It was a losing effort, but she managed to spray them in the direction of other book piles, rather than the newly-arrived customers, so the frantic fossil heaved a sigh of relief.

One that didn’t last long, as the grey-haired lady took the measure of Kotone and Ace through a pair of disconcertingly opaque spectacles, and similarly-grey cat ears twitched in panic.

“I w-was told that I’d have more time!”

Kotone blinked, and looked at Ace of Spades, who blinked, and looked back.

“... That is why you’re here, right?”

Because Kotone wasn’t much for confrontation, her dark-clad chubby destroyer had to ask. In her usual style. “We’ve never met you before. Why are you acting this way?” As blunt as being beaten with a lead pipe, but as per her usual communications, calculated for maximum effect per word rather than social tact.

It wasn’t always the best approach, yet Kotone couldn’t help but admire it.

It was like the old lady had never expected to face the question, and she was brought up short by it. “I mean, um. You two aren’t with the police?”

Kotone considered her reply carefully. “No, ma’am. Neither of us work for the Imperial Police.”

“Y-You’d have to tell me if you are!”

Very untrue.

“... Forgive me, madam,” Kotone ventured timidly. “Um, I can’t help but wonder. What would the police want with a bookstore owner?”

One who didn’t exactly look in fighting age, which was probably why she was still here. Kotone noted the crowds in town were comprised of the young and old.

At least, among the younger races.

There had been plenty of kitsune strolling around, eternal and impossible to even guess an age for. Not burdened much at all by the struggles that so consumed the others. It must have been a convenient existence.

The old woman’s back bent so much that she might have otherwise been a good height, if not for her structural curve. She heaved a sigh, and her shoulders slumped even further. “A question for a question, young lady. What do you think would threaten the police about a bookstore? There’s only one answer. In this case, we received a friendly visit yesterday about certain… proscribed materials I might have forgotten to dispose of properly.”

Kotone felt her jaw tighten, and realized she was grinding her teeth. “Did you? How unfortunate, I’m sorry to hear that.”

The owner of this bookstore wasn’t shy to sound off to complete strangers who were potentially cops, and were in fact servants of that great Empire. Regardless of Kotone’s own thoughts on the matter, there was duty to consider.

“It’s a sign of the times. Back in my day, there wasn’t any big Empire around here. It’s quite recent. We love our Lady, so we go along with the Imperials, but they should remember who’s really in charge of these lands. Yes, sirree.”

I suppose once you get to a certain ripe old age, you get less afraid of speaking your mind. I could admire it, but this old lady might get herself into serious trouble.

“... We’re here to purchase books anyway, and we don’t accept Imperial interdicts unquestioned,” Kotone offered. “Perhaps, if you wanted to dispose of those materials, we could offer you a fair market price for it. In addition to other titles, I’d love a chance to browse your selection of course.”

The old lady adjusted her round spectacles upon her face. scrunched up in thought. “I suppose that would spare me a lot of trouble with the censors, I appreciate the offer. Though, you’re pretty well put-together, and you have money… If you’re not with the police, are you with the other side?!”

Kotone waved her hands in alarm. “C-Certainly not, miss! We’re not shady or suspicious characters at all!”

Ace of Spades huffed a sigh. “Yes, we’re gangsters. Sell us the books, or else.”

“Aces, that’s not-”

“Eeep! R-Right away!”

And so, the books were sold!

Much of the reason to come to a bookstore was to sample the merchandise, and the smaller establishments relished and understood this purpose rather than guarding against it. Getting swept up in the words was the point, a charm spell self-casting.

They cheerfully surrendered to this glamour for some time, and gathered quite a pile. Alongside the proscribed materials, items that Imperial authorities had marked as too dangerous for public circulation.

Not the piles and shelves of erotica and other indecent materials, of course, those were fine. It was just the political stuff that concerned security forces.

A treatise on democracy. A travelogue written about towns gripped in the revolutionary religious fervor of the Unity. Firsthand accounts of foreign lands untainted by the Information Ministry’s trademark flair for exaggeration...

Well, it was a war and everything, after all… didn’t make Kotone feel any better.

Though she’d had nothing to do with this old woman’s woes, and had never set foot in Far Harbor before today, the fact that she put on that same Imperial uniform every day made her feel like she’d come in to hold the old lady up herself.

Really, thanks to Aces, they basically had, huh.

Those contraband books burned a hole in her pockets all the way back to the car.