[Rank-Up]Hrist learns... Something?

Over the past seven months, Hrist had learned a fair number of things. For one, they'd learned that some pokemon despised their reflections, and could be bonded to by the simple act of covering a mirror. They'd also learned how to baby-proof a hideout entirely, solely because they'd once stepped on a still-sparking cord, and nearly been sent straight to Darkrai's realm. Perhaps their most important life-lesson, though, had been not to fall asleep in random places, for fear of being mistaken for dead. Or, well, maybe they had learned to do that? They'd done it at least twice, to be fair.

The first time, they'd woken up cold, scared the hell out of a man, and ended up buying him dinner to make up for the apparent trauma of having a supposed corpse sit up in the morgue. Frankly, it'd been a miracle he hadn't swung that book at them in fear or pure panic. Hrist had gotten him calmer, and he was cute. By the time Hrist had gotten home, they were kicking themself- they'd forgotten to grab his number.

So, naturally, Hrist had tried to replicate the circumstances that had brought about the 'meet-cute'.

To some extent, it had worked.

They'd traumatized yet another morgue worker. Autopsy guy? Uh. Mortician! That had been a word they'd learned, too. So there was that.

After a call to the other morgue, and a heartfelt apology, dinner was on yet again. Number gotten, but at what cost?

Well, Hrist was. Fairly certain that they were going to end up billed for somebody's therapist appointments in the very near future.

To avoid accidentally horrifying any unintended targets, Hrist had decided that their next life-lesson would be, simply, to learn how to flirt.

It was not.

Not simple, rather.

Flirting was an esoteric art form, one that they'd had little experience with in their youthful years, and, as an adult, the only real way to learn, was to do. But they didn't want to. Practice. Publicly. So, instead, they'd gone to the next best source of information than the school of hard knocks- the library.

Looking it up online felt too much like leaving a solid trail, after all.

So, once they got to the library, they had wandered the aisles with intent and next to no direction. How did one find anything in here? The system of reference didn't. Make any sense to them, and looking by category took so long. Eventually, they gave up, and went to the front desk. Sheepishly, they'd asked after dating advice, and simple things like, how to overcome anxiety.

Luckily, the librarian didn't offer up any look of pity or mockery. She'd given Hrist access to the catalog, to let them look things up on their own, and also pointed them towards the life advice section of the library. She also helped them set up an account with the library, a process that took all of five seconds.

At the end of the day, Hrist had a stack full of books, and a firm grasp of the general ins and outs of the Dewey Decimal system. Still no idea how to flirt, though.