Despite all the flattery, the blonde weight-lifter and she didn't quite indulge each other with much flirting. It was quite apparent that he did like her, but Akira didn't care to discern in what way and definitely didn't encourage anything that'd give him the idea that she was romantically available. Mostly because she wasn't sure if she was. While she and Tsuru and never really bought the topic up, it felt more and more like their friendship had evolved to something more akin to romantic affection. After she was certain that she'd made her intent amply clear, she decided to accompany him to lunch after the exhausting work out session. It was mostly him doing all the work, but even the little aid that she had offered him, left her feeling quite shaky and weak. I either should put in some work on that front, or simply just accept that I'll never be strong enough... she muttered as she felt the familiar sting of not being good enough at something.

Akira had a nasty tendency to want to be good at everything even with minimal effort and her competitive streak definitely didn't make it easier for her accept that she had just not focused on a certain aspect of her skill set and that legitimately made someone better than her. She was a little distracted over the lunch and merely chuckled at all the jibs the blonde through at her about eating like a bird, while he happily scarfed down his meaty treats. She watched with mild amusement, mostly allowing her thoughts to flit to Tsuru and how different the two men were. He had introduced himself as Jay and she had not needed to return the favour given the correction she made at the show, which certainly aided in making sure her name was easier to recall than the others. When he asked her about that whole shenanigan, she decided to deflect the question politely.

In fact, just for the time being, much like she'd enjoyed wearing the garb of the dainty model, she enjoyed playing the casual citizen. She hadn't given up the fact that she actually worked for the Rune Knights, not yet anyways. Perhaps as they got to know each other she'd let him know. Or even better would be to end their little interaction with that piece of information. She hoped that it would elicit the same amusing shock that she'd elicited from Fernando after revealing her identity. There was a danger in enjoying that shock value too much, she may potentially lose her true self while she honed her skills at pretending to be someone she wasn't, or to only wear a part of her reality. But then, she was also cursed with the affliction of over thinking everything, perhaps she should allow herself the liberty to just with the flow on this instinct. Once they finished their meal, Akira asked the chiselled blonde man what exactly drove him to work so hard. Wondering if he had aspirations to join a guild as a defender or a warrior of some sort...

Jay grew a little shy again, as if unsure of his own ambitions. She prodded him a little to reveal his goals, it involved reassuring the man that she wouldn't judge it, nor would she deem it to be implausible or impossible. She lied quite fluently there, because usually her pessimistic side would always pipe up to remind someone of why something was either a bad idea, or to poke holes in grand schemes and dreams by using the weapon of practicality and logic. If nothing else, at least in the past she found herself relying on the core nature of humans being selfish and how that would always get in the way of the progress of humanity. None of that today though, she truly remained encouraging and positive after he nervously shared with her his passion to win the local competition. It didn't seem all that difficult, but she reserved that judgement, given that she'd also thought one didn't need to possess anything too special to be a model and it turned out simply maintaining that look could be quite draining.

However, she did feel it was her obligation to bring to his attention, the fact that there were other ways to for him to use his strength. There was of course nothing  him that he could do so much more with that strength if he decided to hone other skills with it. He considered it, but only as though to humour her opinion. It seemed like he had no inclinations to bring upon him the responsibilities of being a defender or a fighter. While he didn't seem cowardly about it, he did mention that he didn't quite want to put himself in harm's way for the sake of others on a daily basis. She heard him out, cocking her head and finding it difficult to judge him for it. Especially because in some ways she had very similar opinions before she started her work for the Knights.

Eventually however, as they strolled back to the beach, he stopped dead in his track and slapped his hand on his forehead. He said that he just remembered that the deadline to sign up for the competition was this evening. Before Akira even had the chance to get more details, he ranted for a bit about how he'd have to wait all the way till next year to be eligible again and such. He was sure he'd already missed it. He whined about how he'd allowed himself to get distracted with her lovely company and then coyly had to add that he didn't mean to blame her. Akira finally had to put her foot down and find out the exact time of the deadline. Apparently, he still had about half an hour, but the beach gym was on the other side of the cove. She decided to test her own mettle and quickly jotted down his details. He was rather grateful and wasted some more time in debating whether it was ok to take help from a girl this way. She decided to not wait for him to make a decision and just went ahead and finished the job, with relative ease too, although she did have to run at full speed to do it.