Taking Hearts, Breaking Limits (Persona 5 Royal x Final Fantasy VII)

XVIII

5/5 - Thursday - Daytime

Ren's POV

So... it was celebration day. Yay!

The place Ann chose was overly grand and luxurious. It was a fancy hotel that had an even fancier buffet that served expensive and divine dishes. The place was filled with rich and powerful people. There were so many that it made the group look like misfits, but they were already misfits, weren't they?

They grabbed food immediately when they entered. Ren and Cloud just grabbed some appetizers, but Ryuji and Ann grabbed so much on the get-go. Ryuji grabbed multiple plates of different meat, while Ann grabbed a lot of different deserts and pastries.

"Mmm... sho ghod..." Ryuji said muffled while eating happily.

"No wonder why Lady Ann chose this place!" Morgana said in amazement. Ren was still a bit surprised they were able to sneak him in there with his bag.

"Of course it's good. This is a famous hotel after all!" Ann said. "Oh yeah... by the way, I heard that the police are coming to interview some people at school."

"Well... that's gonna be troublesome." Cloud said. "Your names are probably gonna come up, considering all the rumors about you guys and Kamoshida."

"Well, on the plus side... we got 'em pumped up! I keep hearin' stuff like, "The Phantom Thieves really stole his heart!"" Ryuji said enthusiastically. "I think most people don't believe it, but some of 'em actually seem grateful. I mean, look at this!"

He pulled out his phone and showed it to everyone. On the screen, there was a website displayed.

"The... "Phantom Aficionado Website"?" Cloud read the title of it.

"Oh look, there's some posts." Ann called out. ""Well done, Phantom Thieves!"... "Now I can keep going too!"... "Thank you for giving us hope!"" she read them out loud.

"Pretty cool, huh?" Ryuji said.

"To be honest... I was just desperate to deal with my own problems, but seeing people saying all this feels... strange." she replied.

"Yeah... same." Ryuji said back. "Hey Renren... what do we do now?"

"You guys planning on eating?" he replied while taking a sip of some soup.

"He's right, you know." Cloud added while eating bread. "Don't we have a time limit or something?"

"Ah! You're right! I forgot about the limit!" Ann said shocked.

"Oh, crap! We only go an hour to eat!" Ryuji added, shocked as well.

"Ugh... just fifty minutes left!" she worried.

"Ain't that a lot of time though?" Ren titled his head.

"Are you for real, Renren?!" Ryuji exclaimed. "I'm not gonna finish all the beef dishes at this pace!"

"I need to eat my way through the entire desert menu!" Ann added.

"Look after our stuff! We'll snag somethin' for you guys too, don't worry!" Ryuji said before he and Ann ran off to get more food, leaving Ren, Cloud, and Morgana alone.

Ren and Cloud just finished the rest of their appetizers. It took them about fifteen minutes or so. However, even after that, Ryuji and Ann hadn't returned. They occasionally ran back to the table to leave their food there, but they always went away for more.

"Are you guys always like this?" Cloud asked.

"Always like what?" Ren said.

"Moronic."