Taking Care of Obligations

While Kirou was busy enjoying his drinks at the bar counter with Jane keeping him company and Carlos taking care of the patrons, on the other side of the club within one of the VIP booths upstairs was a group of people currently enjoying the club in their own private way. A group of good looking men and women were currently lounging around the room, enjoying their drinks while making small talk with each other. While someone like Kirou wouldn't notice it immediately if he saw them, any random fan of the professional gaming leagues would realize that the people currently in this room are all high profile members of various powerhouse guilds currently found in Immortal Era and other such VR games.

A meetup like this between the various members of the top guilds in these games isn't that common since each guild would usually be busy building their powers in-game but the recent server shutdown left everyone with nothing to do on a Friday night. It was due to this that a manager from one of the guilds, no one knows which, sent a message to all the others to have a meetup between their players. The manager sent it as a joke, never expecting anyone to respond but he was surprised to find out that the other managers had responded positively to it. In fact, after said manager informed his boss about it, the boss decided to book a VIP room for the players at the famous Dragon Lounge Club while commending the manager for his work.

Due to this, the venue for the event was quickly booked, invites sent out and players from various guilds started making their way to the club. In fact, the room was currently only half full of people with more still on their way.

In a hidden corner of the club room, two women were currently with each other. If Kirou was present, he would recognize them as the young woman Kirou nearly ran into at Sanming a few days back and Secretary Yin. Although they dressed in somewhat casual clothing for the venue with little to no makeup, they had still managed to attract the attention of everyone in the room when they made their initial entrance. The young woman had a refreshing vibe and an aura that showed off her youthfulness while Secretary Yin was a classic case of cold beauty. To avoid being the center of attention, after giving a few greetings here and there, both women found a quiet corner for themselves.

"I never thought that the boss would ask me to attend this meetup. I'm not even a member of the main team, so why am I here?" grumbled Yin Jia Rong under her breath, prompting the woman beside her to giggle.

"I'm sorry about this, Big Sister Rong. He probably made you attend to watch over me since I asked if I could take a look at the other professional players." When the young woman said this, though she was still giggling, there was an apologetic look in her eyes.

"Forget it, Sister Yuna. You know I have no problems being here for you. My true complaint is the fact that we have to be here with that ass over there." When Secretary Yin said this, she used her chin to point to another section of the room, prompting Yuna to take a look, only to see someone that caused her to cease her giggling and release a disappointing sigh in response.

"I really am sorry about him, Big Sister Rong. I honestly never expected my cousin would have been this bad or I never would have introduced you to him in the first place, no matter how much he begged," said Yuna, now feeling disheartened.

"Don't worry about it, Sister Yuna. Considering where I work, I was bound to meet him sooner or later. At least this way, I found out about him early and won't end up like all the other women around him." When Secretary Yin said this, she released a sigh while gently shaking her head.

While both women were in their quiet corner, away from view for most people in the room, in another section of the room, a group of fashionably dressed men was currently laughing while being surrounded by a group of women. In this group, there was a man with short brown hair who's dashing looks had quite a few of the girls around him and his group swooning whenever he gazed in their direction. This was the man both Secretary Yin and Yuna were talking about earlier, Shen Jiang.

While the group of men was talking, Shen Jiang was glancing around the room, as if looking for someone. It wasn't until his eyes spotted two familiar silhouettes that he excused himself from the group for a moment before making his way over. When the two women saw Shen Jiang's approach, they had to do their best to keep their disgust of the man from showing. They did try but the man was still able to see the disgust in the eyes of Secretary Yin, which prompted him to smile as he arrived before both women.

"It's a pleasure to see you again so soon, Secretary Yin. I hope my earlier actions in-game weren't too overbearing," said Shen Jiang with a smile that elicited disgust to momentarily show on both women's faces.

After taking a split second to fix her expression, Secretary Yin responded with a frosty tone, "No worries, Coworker Shen. Your actions didn't explicitly break any of the studio's rules for the game so I won't hold it against you." Though she said it like this, to anyone listening, they could tell that Secretary Yin was definitely angry about what Shen Jiang did, especially since there was a trace of anger in her words as she said them.

Shen Jiang pretended to be ignorant of her anger as he turned towards Yuna and spoke, "Sorry for the late greetings, Sister Yuna. I was understandably distracted by Secretary Yin's beauty, along with wanting to apologize for my earlier actions in-game."

"It's fine, Cousin Jiang. I'm not angry at all about you ignoring my presence to talk to Big Sister Rong. In fact, I would be quite surprised if you didn't," said Shen Yuna with a bit of snark.

Shen Jiang paid no attention to her snark as he spoke, "Which reminds me, Sister Yuna. When will you join Immortal Era? I don't mind taking a few hours of my personal time to help you out in-game. I'm sure even Secretary Yin here won't mind pitching in if it's to help our cute little sister."

Shen Yuna almost puked at being called cute by her cousin and was quite angry at his words, which hinted at using her to get to Secretary Yin but managed to calm herself down enough to not reveal any emotion in her voice, "No need to worry about that, cousin. I've been playing for quite a while now and I've managed to have raised my level quite a bit. I don't want to distract my busy cousin from his already hectic schedule, just to help little old me." Shen Yuna even managed to form a very convincing fake smile at the end of her speech.

Shen Jiang looked at his younger cousin's smile and could only silently kiss his teeth before giving up on that idea. Following that, the trio shared a short chat and unintentionally attracted the attention of other members of the room. Considering all three people were good looking, how could they not. Seeing that his original objective was met, Shen Jiang signaled with his eyes for his original group to come over, which they did.

When the group of men and women approached, Shen Jiang went forward and spoke, "Everyone, I would like to introduce you to two members of the Sanming Gaming Studio. The youthful beauty on the left is my cousin, Shen Yuna. As for the bespectacled beauty on the right, she is the head secretary of the studio's big boss, as well as the leader of the alchemist branch guild, Yin Jia Rong." Following his words, Shen Jiang made space for the group of people to approach the two women.

The two women could tell that Shen Jiang was plotting something but they could only comply for the moment as they had to maintain the studio's relations with other gaming studios and guilds, especially Secretary Yin since she's the secretary of her studio's boss. Following the exchange of greetings with the group, both women now found it hard to excuse themselves without seeming rude to the other members of the group.

Both women glanced at each other and saw that they were thinking the same thing and could only curse Shen Jiang for pulling such a move. Shen Jiang himself was very pleased with seeing his plan succeed so easily. For now, Secretary Yin was stuck with his presence and the only thing he had to deal with was putting up with his cousin's presence, a small price to pay within his eyes.

Like this, an hour had passed and everyone in the room started getting into the mood of the club. Some started to dance while others started drinking. Eventually, all the guests had arrived and the party went full swing with dancing and drinking.

On multiple occasions, both Shen Yun and Secretary Yin were invited to dance. While they were reluctant, they couldn't keep refusing without souring the room's mood so both women joined in on the dancing and drinking. Shen Yuna took to the dancefloor while Secretary Yin decided to deal with all the drinking. Both did this to prevent the other from suffering any disadvantage. Shen Yuna was an active woman, to begin with, so dancing came as nothing to her.

As for Secretary Yin, being a secretary, many situations required her to go out drinking with her boss along with potential clients, so her alcohol tolerance was unusually high. In fact, while Shen Jiang and the other men in the group were trying to get her drunk, she was able to swallow her drinks easily from start to end while the men were starting to suffer from intoxication.

By the end of it, Shen Jiang and the rest of the men were passed out drunk while Secretary Yin was only slightly intoxicated. And even that went away after she took a trip to the ladies' room. With them managing to foil his plan and they have now achieved their obligatory goals, both women decided it was time to leave the club. It was a quarter past two in the morning and while Immortal Era was still down, they had other stuff to do.

After both women bade their farewells and called a taxi for the intoxicated mess that was Shen Jiang, both made their way downstairs. Secretary Yin made a stop by the bar to get some water when both she and Shen Yuna ran into a familiar face behind the counter. Before them stood Kirou in a black top with swirls of fire here and there looking at them with a raised eyebrow.

"What are you doing here?" asked Secretary Yin, somewhat confused by Kirou's presence in the same club as her, along with him working the bar.

"Taking over for a friend while he's making some rounds. What can I get for you?" replied Kirou before asking a question of his own.

"You have anything that can relieve intoxication for an hour or two?" asked Shen Yuna half-jokingly while Secretary Yin was still somewhat shocked.

Kirou tilted his head to the side in thought for a bit before he gave a drink to both women. Both looked at him in confusion, waiting for an explanation that prompted him to speak, "For Secretary Yin, a bit of lemon and honey in water will help the hangover that's about to hit. I'm not sure how much you've had but I suggest you head home after drinking that. As for the young miss..."

"Shen Yuna," interrupted the young woman.

Kirou stopped and thought for a moment before continuing, "As for Shen Yuna, since you're obviously the designated driver for the night, you get a glass of citrus punch."

Both women looked at Kirou and the glasses before them before shrugging and chugging them away. They felt surprisingly refreshed after their drinks and looked at Kirou in surprise. Kirou only stared at them with a smile without saying anything. Following that, they told Kirou to charge their drinks to the VIP room and left the club.