Strength is my...uh...

[sheep fluff–there is no way he’s styling his hair into a pompadour–poor fashion sense–

Even if his hair looks like he got caught in a windstorm, and he doesn’t know how to dress, and maybe even if he still hasn’t confessed to Agnès, you shouldn’t bring those up in front of him! That’s just mean.

She isn’t one to talk about practical clothing, but at least she feels light enough to be comfortable in battles. Her speed and ability to jump are key to her.

Thinking about why they had reason to put the holes in this clothing is a bit nauseating sometimes--he’s tested and prodded the skin under the holes himself, and once, when he’d pressed too hard, he’d felt bone shift where it shouldn’t, and had very quickly stopped with that.  He knew it was nothing malicious at least, they had probably just been trying a more aggressive treatment that didn’t yield the hoped-for results, but it was creepy to think of the decisions that had needed to be made while he was unconscious.

The obvious answer was to think about those as little as possible, and once Magnolia’s done poking, he grabs the intact shoulder strap and gives it a tug to pull the fabric back up so the holes quit sticking to his skin.

He really probably should change into something else. 

He can’t really say no just because they’re leggings, after Arcanist.

So after some brief deliberation over color (white, red, black, gray, gold?  ...he’ll just go with white, it seems safe), he disappears into the fitting room.  It’s just one outfit.  Shouldn’t take any time at all.

And, indeed, doesn’t take much time for Tiz to remark: “...This shirt was not made for leggings, Edea.  It’s too short?  You can see...”

It does good work at defining his butt and muscled legs.  It’s also a more defined view of other parts than either his pants or even the arcanist leggings offer, and he opens the fitting room door halfway to show Edea the fluster on his face and the simple fact that this sort of fit at the crotch is not what he’s used to, especially when the last button of the shirt hits just below the waist, allowing the rest of the shirt to part and not conceal it at all.

It’s not completely unwearable so much as that he’s pretty sure this is leaning more toward the sort of thing Ringabel would wear.  He feels a little weird letting Edea see him in it, but she’d probably be annoyed if he didn’t let her know what exactly the issue was.

Tiz is right; that shirt with THOSE pants? She shakes her head before he starts looking again.

Not for things like this, though, he’d just be insufferable.  (Perhaps the kind of insufferable that would get Tiz into multiple new outfits, but still.  Insufferable.)

“Of course it doesn’t count,” she says, but now examines the shirt that he’s selected, at first simply staring at it before rubbing the fabric between her fingers. It… it looks nice! Really nice!

Is he going to walk out of here with only one new outfit?  Maybe.  Maybe he’ll figure out another shirt to snag on the way out.  For now, he looks at the few pants he took, and winces a little as he holds them up to the shirt.  Because he does have working eyes, contrary to a few of Ringabel’s statements, and he can tell the pants don’t go with the shirt that Edea’s approved of.  They’re baggy, and it just looks weird with the shirt’s fitted cut.

 Even if Tiz is pretty adorable when he’s blushing, it all means nothing if he keeps wearing that terrible onsie (which is totally the complete opposite of adorable)! Edea stands up, ready to pounce on him if need be.

He already has the feeling that doesn’t count, and he resignedly looks once more through the clothes he put down.  Most of the shirts in it are cream or white, neutral colors, but there are two in bright red, his favorite color that other people will actually acknowledge as a color.  The one that was more eye-catching to him is red with clean white accents, and he pulls it out, staring it down.

She did say it a lot, though. It was an habit she’d picked up as a child, and it still stuck to her many years later. It always made her colleagues laugh, so she shrugged and went on with the joke. Now it had turned into her catchphrase, even if people in Luxendarc couldn’t understand the language of the Moon.

It is weird.  It is plenty weird.  It’s not even that comfortable, which is what Tiz was going to say before remembering that the missing shoulder strap bugs him and the extra belts elsewhere annoy him.

“...It’s all right.”

He’s not exactly presenting a great defense here.

“…Shouldn’t it go without saying I can pick?” Tiz mutters in response to that last part.  Though the look he gives Edea isn’t even half as exasperated as it could be, and he keeps his arm hooked with hers.  He knows, he knows.  Once she gets an idea in mind, she has a tendency to pressgang everyone else into going along with it.  At least she already has thought to let him have some choice.

She just smiles at him instead of responding. She loves Tiz, she really does, but he knows nothing about fashion. Except maybe bumpkin fashion. And while bumpkin fashion is okay, it’s not in season.

“Wh-who’s even looking at that?!  Agnès isn’t going to see--we’re talking to her through a pendant!”  You know, a small, spherical object that tends to distort whatever’s not in the center of the image and he is not presenting his booty for Her Holiness’ approval.  This is just not a thing that is happening, the pendant is not going anywhere near there.