"Did you hear?"
"Of course, I heard. Even if the wedding was small."
"You class-lacking hussy! I didn't hear until it was over! I can't believe they got married."
"I think it's about time those two tied the knot."
"They still didn't invite me. Hell, Kilik (pole swinging ruffian) was Hwang's best man. How'd he manage that anyway?"
"…………. You have a really good point there, but Taki-san (that smart girl) figured that Yunsung would be too drunk (and he was) to be the best man."
"I bet the speech was damn awkward for Kilik….. heh heh heh….."
"No luck, Raphael dear, you see..."
Kilik was the last one to make a toast, because at the reception the rest of the world seemed to magically appear at the cry of 'Free Beer'.
By the time he managed to get a word in, he was half-way tipsy and near slurring. Red-faced and jovial, he actually stood up on the table and half-sang a limerick. A very, very, very crude limerick.
Not to be outdone, an equally red-faced Xianghua, dragging a very reluctant and swaying Cassandra, boldly raised a toast to the fertility of the newly weds, boasting the blonde's knowledge of birth control.
This starts an entirely new commotion where many pieces of cake are flung, and many of tables are broken.
"…Therefore, Kilik never had to go through any awkward speech or anything… It was quite amusing, and I'm sure some of the poor dears still have hangovers"
"And you don't? Miss Ivy, if I remember correctly, you did mention something about winning one of those classless 'chugging competitions'."
"Bah, I can hold my god-cursed liquor. Besides, the local apothecary's around here have some pretty good remedies for those hangovers. Actually, I just heard from this store owner..."
Those local apothecarys always love weddings and things. Good business they get from those hangover remedies, you see. Locally there are even a few competitions going on. One particular rivalry, very close to the bazaar, involves two stores that lie directly across Market Street.
Why the owners would decide to put the two apothecaries so close remains an unsolved and completely irrelevant mystery. But if business is good, who cares? Most (unsuspecting) customers were under siege the moment one apothecary knew it was a customer, offering the best deals and the best medicines. Excluding, of course, the extremely drunk customers on the verge of throwing up. Most shopkeepers tend to find those fake smiles and niceties difficult with such people.
However, when some weirdos are unavoidable, then the best way to deal with them is get them out of the way quickly.
The head shopkeeper of the north apothecary was the first to note the cranky people. They bickered over nothing and didn't bring enough money for more than 1 serving of hangover remedy for two.
Perhaps it would be safe to say that it was actually more of the young man doing the bickering, especially after drinking the hangover remedy. The young lady (looking terribly distraught) took more of a defensive stance, with a red-eyed death glare moments after drinking the remedy.
After sending the couple on their way, the amused apothecary vendor (in the span of two minutes the two had bickered over 'what really happened', who had better hair, who would drink out of the bottle first, who would pay, who made more money, who won more fights, who had better friends, and what breakfast would be) turned to even out the score between the rival across the road.
"Hm, mildly interesting. I suppose you have another story by the look on your face Miss Ivy."
"Ha ha, you are correct. Those kids are just so amusing. You know that Yunsung was drunk for the wedding, yes? Well, you see, he proposed when he was drunk, and then at the reception when everyone was drunk..."
All Talim had to do was pretend that it wasn't real. Yunsung was drunk at the wedding, he didn't really propose.
He walked in swaying. Mina-san had told her that he'd get drunk before he went to the wedding, but she hadn't wanted to believe that he'd really attend the wedding wasted. She wanted to think less of him now, think of Yunsung as pathetic for being this impolite, but she couldn't.
Talim caught him as he staggered into the training hall, where so many fights had taken place and where now there was to be a wedding. His eyes focused and unfocused on her face for a moment, before he tried to speak.
"Hey," was what he managed, and then, putting his hands on her shoulders for support, he bent down on one knee...
The hangover remedy was working slowly (probably because she only took half the suggested dose), but her head wasn't pounding like it had been when she had woken up hugging Yunsung, unarmed, feeling like she was as close to naked as she could get (without actually being so). She still couldn't remember what happened after that second shot, but that was probably due to her own subconscious- suppressing those unwanted memories.
She couldn't have really married Yunsung at the reception, right?
There's no possible way that they could have gotten that drunk.
Besides.
He hadn't even given her a ring.
