This card is an interactive date.

Short Summary: MC cleans Rafayel’s old home, uncovering hidden paintings by his missing mentor. At a winery banquet, Rafayel gifts a cursed wine to the man responsible for his teacher’s death. Later, the owner drowns in wine. MC witnesses Rafayel’s vengeful side but doesn’t turn away, kissing him in acceptance. Finally at peace, Rafayel lets go of the past, no longer hiding his true self from her.

TIMELINE NOTES: Can recognize his art style, after Wisteria Waltz because he talks about returning to the sea, and that’s when MC learns about this tradition in more depht. Very intimate.

MC is at a place Rafayel used to live in. MC sweeps, scrubs and dusts the floor, she observes the ceiling and walls that are painted, she recognize his style but there’s something different.

She grabs his sleeve and shares her thoughts. He tells her her intuition is sharper than 99.8% of the world’s population, she says she picked up a couple of things from him. [He also calls her Master MC]

She notices a part of the ceiling was covered or painted over, and they lay down while staring at the ceiling. There’s a black cactus but orange and pink are underneath. She asks him why. He leans in and their foreheads touch: “Colors that are bright like the sun… Sure, they’re beautiful and passionate… But they can burn anyone who comes too close. Like a kite with no string, the viewer will be caught in the scorching heat until they’re nothing but ash.”

He gets up and pulls her along with him once she asked for more explanation, he says they gotta finish unpacking and then they’ll go to the best seafood place in town.

MC notices a messy stack of sketches next to their suitcases, he looks a bit anxious nad tells her he took these from under a cabinet in the bedroom. He puts them into a bag and says he “thought he already collected all of his sketches, but looks like he stashed some away”.

MC asks if it’s not his, he says it’s not, because he couldn’t bring himself to paint for a while. He says the works and apartment belonged to someone who was basically his art teacher, someone who’s been missing for years, according to the news, but in reality he “just let himself believe he was missing”.

“He liked the world above the waves. Many years ago, he left Lemuria to paint landscapes he had never seen before. Maybe he really did find his own utopia. And it was so enchanting that he forgot to come back.”

MC notices he doesn’t seem sad, Rafayel closes the suitcase. He puts a fancy wine box on a spot, it’s the gift for the winery owner at tonight’s banquet, it’s called Dionysus [wine and festivity].

He grabs her coat in one hand and turns her around with the other. He says they’ll pick up something more suitable at the restaurant.

After dinner they walk back with a small bottle of wine the restaurant owner gifted them because he knew Rafayel, even calling him “Lil Raf”.

He explains he wasn’t a kid but technically underage. She decides to ask him some questions, thinking about the wine. Why did he live here at the time, he says he’s too drunk to remember [liar]. MC points out he’s lying because his cheeks are fine and he’s walking straight.

She asks him if he was unhappy when he lived here because he wasn’t painting, he says he barely went out back then. He plucks a flower from the vines of a wall. He says there was an old butler who accompanied him and told him to stay inside, worried he’d run into trouble. But his teacher would paint and drink all day, took him to the bars and his job was to drag him home once he passed out. [oh my god my baby…]

“While he drank, I just stood outside and watched the world go by one coast at a time”. She asks if it was beautiful, he smilse and tucks the flower into her jacket’s pocket, then takes her hand, he offers to show her.