Soon, the nostalgic lines of Carelina town came into view.

“We’re almost there,” I said.

Willem-san, who had remained pale-faced throughout the ride back on GG Airways was muttering, “Come on… come on… let me down quickly…”

At least he did not faint this time. I think Willem-san had more or less gotten over his fear of flying, but was unfortunately the type who is not good with air travel.

“We are about to land,” Grandpa Gon announced.

I swear, Willem-san’s face actually turned green when the air pressure changed as Grandpa Gon suddenly descended. Soon, a thump and a slight shake signalled that we had landed.

Willem-san immediately sprang up and practically skated down Grandpa Gon’s body to flop face down on the ground.

“I-it’s Carelina! I’m finally back at Carelina!”

It was kind of sad and embarrassing to see him screaming with his hands in the air, as though thanking the gods for something.

“My feet are now on the ground… *sob* I have never felt so secure in my life…” he suddenly turned towards me. “I shall never ride on a dragon ever again!!”

I scratched my cheek and muttered, “Well, for your sake, I guess it’s best not to…”

“Right!” Willem-san stood up straight. “Onwards to the Adventurer’s Guild!”

“Hey, I haven’t even been home yet…” I said lamely and was met with Willem-san’s glare.

“You… do you know how much I have put up thus far??!”

[1] “It’s not like it’s all my fault…” I muttered, mostly under my breath.

[1] “Kuuhh… fine! I know this! But, you should understand my position too! I have done my best to be understanding, but… as a guild master, it is my duty to find out as much as I can about what you know! I know that you have given me the outline of what happened, but please, please, for the love of all that is holy and good, by the Goddesses of Water, Fire, Earth and Wind, come with me to the guild for a proper report! You’re not the only person who wants to go home, you know?”

[1a] “Ah, well,” if someone like Willem-san who had been suffering from airsickness and the unreasonableness of my familiars… I guess the least I should do is give my report properly. “I could stop by the Guild first…”

Naturally, this suggestion caused a cacophony of complaints from the other side. The Gluttonous Quartet began to complain, chief of the complaints being ‘I’m hungry’, ‘food!’ and ‘meat!’.

“Hey, I have to do this first. We’ll have a steak feast later, okay?”

[1b] There was a collective ‘Yay!’ punctuated by various degrees of ‘umu’, but I was already heading towards the Guild with Willem-san. Steaks, well, it’s not too difficult to cook a whole bunch of steaks at once with six working stoves and a large oven. Not to mention, I could adjust the flavour with store-bought sauce, so it was not too bad.

My main concern was how long the interview would take…

Trudge, trudge…

I-I’m exhausted…

It was late afternoon when we arrived at Carelina via GG Airways. Soon after we landed, Willem-san escorted me to the Adventurer’s Guild and proceeded to interrogate- no, question me- um, request for my view- no, it was an interrogation, wasn’t it? An actual interrogation!

Part way through the interrogation, I was given a brief respite to feed my familiars because they were getting very noisy. I guess I could have gone home then, [1a] but there was this odd look of desperate craziness in Willem-san’s eyes that made me reluctant to say anything when he ‘hinted’ for the interview to continue.

When we were finally released from the Guild, it was already pitched black outside.

[2] “Oi, you’re too slow. I’ll-”

[2] “Fer, if you touch me now I’m going to be very angry,”

[2] “Erk, but-”

[2] “I’m so exhausted now that I would just fall off your back and die. Do you want to see me dead, Fer? That would be the end of all your food. In fact, I don’t care if I die now. So, go ahead if you dare.”

“”Sui be Aruji’s ride~?””

“Ah, uh…”

It was tempting. So tempting. However, I must resist the urge because what would people think if a huge Slime suddenly appeared within the city and rumours of my sweet Sui devouring people began to spread?

Aahhh, I have no choice but to slowly walk home.

Uuhhh, homeee… home is finally within sightttt…

“Ah, welcome back, Mukouda-san~”

“Welcome back,”

The ones looking after the gate tonight were Tabitha and Bartel.

“I- I’m home~~”

“Mukouda-san, you looked exhausted, are you alright?” asked Tabitha kindly.

“Aah, all kinds of things happened…”

“I see, please rest well tonight,” she nodded gravely as she opened the gate.

“I’ll do that, thank you. That’s right, I’ll be visiting everyone the day after tomorrow. I have some souvenirs from the Royal Capital. So do let them know.”

“Of course, Mukouda-san.”

“Souvenirs? Surely it can’t be anything better than Mukouda-san’s liquor,” Bartel muttered.

I wasn’t sure whether I was supposed to overhear that, but let’s ignore that alcoholic Dwarf.

After leaving Bartel and Tabitha to their duties, I made my way to the main house and flopped down on a chair.

“Ahh… I’m exhausted.”

“Oi, where’s the Steak Feast?” asked Fer.

I blinked.

An excited Fer was wagging his tail in front of me. Behind him, Grandpa Gon, Dora-chan and Sui were practically vibrating with anticipation.

Steak Feast? Wait, why are the words capitalised… that’s right, I promised to make them as many steaks as they could eat just to go and be interrogated at the Adventurer’s Guild.

“… …”

[1] Thinking back, that was an incredibly foolish action.

I was thrown into a panic by Willem-san’s very stressed-out face and made a reckless snap decision. Haahhh… I wonder if I could convince them to let me off with some quick rice bowl dish?

“A Steak Feast, huh? If possible, I’d like to have Dragon Steaks, but since we don’t have many left… umu, Leviathan would be good too. Maybe some Gigantic Minotaur meat, and some Dungeon Beef and Pork.”

“”Hey! That’s a great idea! Let’s have a steak extravaganza with loads of different types of meat! Oh, we should have Cockatrice meat too, so that we could better enjoy the deeper flavours of other meats!”

“Having several different kinds of meat at once, what a compelling idea.”

““Meat~! Meaty meat~! Yay~!!””

These carousing carnivorous quartets…

I can’t look at them anymore.

“Yeah, I’m just… going to go and grill up some steaks,” I muttered.

As I made my way towards the kitchen, I could still hear the conversation floating towards me.

“Hey Fer, since we’re running out of dragon meat, shall we go and hunt more?” said Grandpa Gon.

“Of course, but the issue is their scarcity.”

““Yeah, we were already quite lucky to encounter the Earth Dragon and Red Dragon,”” said Dora-chan.

“Hmm, I know an area where a Green Dragon had made its territory. We can go and collect it anytime.”

““Oh? A Green Dragon? Those are fairly rare, I have only seen them twice thus far,”” said Dora-chan.

“Those fellows… they are said to be some of the stupidest of the dragon species. They are also extremely territorial and hated by others,” said Fer.

“They are arrogant against beings they deem weaker than themselves, but when they encounter more powerful creatures, they shut themselves away or hide,” said Grandpa Gon knowledgeably.

”Umu, let’s hunt them down. We would be doing the world a favour.”

I could just hear the smirk in Fer’s voice.

““Hey, if they hide away from creatures that are stronger than them, would we have to hide our presence when hunting them?”” asked Dora-chan.

“Hoho, that’s fine. I know exactly where that fellow’s hideout is. I left it alive as a special future treat for myself~”

“”Dragon~? Dragon meat~?””

“Indeed, Sui, we shall be hunting dragons soon.”

“”Yay~~!!””

“… …”

Lalala~ I heard nothing~!

Lalala~ look at all this wonderful meat~! Let’s throw some Cockatrice into the oven for grilling~ No, wait, let’s make a roast too! Ahh, I’m so busy~

Uwaahh~ smoke got into my eyes!

I’m tearing up!

Sob.

[Gumihou: Poor Mukouda-san~]

[1] Add details to make it so that Mukouda is not so pushover-like

[1a] Instead of Mukouda being intimidated into doing what Willem-san wants, have him do it out of pity

[1b] Instead of ‘oh noes, I have to grill so much steaks’, it’s just another chore to get through, like, whatever, so annoying…

[2] Expand the scene instead of ‘Fer did this’

chapter-578
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