"Oh, it's Rei."
Seeing Rei enter the warehouse, the Foreman, who had been eating a meal spread out on the floor, called out to him.
The food was probably from one of the festival stalls. Since a Guild Staff Member had brought stall food out to the Fleeing Adventurers stationed in front of the warehouse, it wouldn't be surprising if they'd done the same for the Foreman and his team inside.
Given that the Crystal Dragon dissection was scheduled for today, though, they were only drinking water with their meal. No alcohol was present whatsoever. That was just how significant the Crystal Dragon dissection was to the Foreman and his crew. From Rei's perspective, he was simply glad they were approaching the job in top form, so he had absolutely no complaints about their attitude.
"Yeah, I just came to check on things. Looks like you're resting up and gathering your strength, which is great."
"Of course," the Foreman replied, as if to say it was only natural.
No, it wasn't just the Foreman. The others were fully prepared too, ready for the dissection to begin at a moment's notice.
"Sorry to interrupt when you're all raring to go, but a lot of people are still coming to see the Crystal Dragon corpse on display on stage. It'll take a little more time before I can bring it here."
"...I see..." the Foreman muttered, clearly disappointed.
Since Rei had come to the warehouse, the Foreman had probably thought he might have already brought the Crystal Dragon corpse with him. But Rei had explicitly denied that, and the Foreman reluctantly reached for his food again.
As he did, the Foreman turned his gaze back to Rei and asked, "Then what did you come here for?"
"I had nowhere to be."
"...Ah." Understanding the meaning of Rei's words immediately, the Foreman gave a short reply.
Seeing the Foreman's reaction, Rei nodded to himself, convinced that the man was a former adventurer after all.
"In that case, you can stay here for a while. The only ones who'd come here right now are... our companions, anyway."
"Sorry. I know it's just a bonus, but eat this too." As a token of thanks, Rei pulled some Yaki Udon out of his Misty Ring.
The smell of food had already been drifting through the air, and the aroma of the Yaki Udon mixed right in. The scent of charred sauce stimulated the Guild Staff Members' appetites.
"Whoa, that looks delicious."
"Not just looks delicious—it is delicious. I went out of my way to stock up on this Yaki Udon from a stall, you know? I wouldn't do that for bad or mediocre food."
"You said it. Alright then, let me try this Yaki Udon you're so proud of, Rei."
Fortunately, forks and knives were already on hand for eating the stall food. The man who had called the Yaki Udon delicious immediately twirled some up with a fork and brought it to his mouth. The way he wound it around the fork made it look more like he was eating Pasta than Yaki Udon, but in Gilm—where chopsticks and similar utensils didn't exist—Yaki Udon was generally eaten with a fork.
In the Western movies Rei had seen back in Japan, there were scenes of people eating Cup Ramen with a fork. Or perhaps he also remembered seeing Cup Ramen eaten with a fork in an anime about the grandson of a master thief. In that sense, even for dishes Rei considered natural to eat with chopsticks, it was only reasonable to think that overseas, eating them with a fork was the norm.
While Rei was thinking about all this, the other Guild Staff Members each tried the Yaki Udon and declared it delicious. Not only that, but even the Foreman was eating it, murmuring sincerely about how good it was—which made it undeniable just how highly rated the Yaki Udon was.
(Well, there are some Yaki Udon that are Yaki Udon in name only.)
Yaki Udon was called Yaki Udon because the udon was grilled. That was obvious from the name itself, but among the stall owners selling Yaki Udon, there were some who simply placed boiled udon on an iron plate, immediately added sauce, and mixed it with stir-fried meat and vegetables—producing something that would be better described as mixed udon rather than Yaki Udon.
It wasn't that such dishes were inedible. Also, there were people in the world who actually preferred it mixed that way rather than properly grilled, but for Rei, there was no question that he preferred regular Yaki Udon.
And even among properly grilled Yaki Udon, the batch Rei had served to the Guild Staff Members was something he could confidently declare to be top-tier in flavor, even by his own standards. If anyone tasted this and said it was bad, then their food preferences and Rei's would almost certainly never align.
"No, this is seriously good. I had no idea there was a stall serving Yaki Udon this good... I've been eating at taverns all the time lately. I'm honestly impressed."
"Hey, you've been eating at taverns all the time... at least take a little better care of your body."
"Easier said than done. I'm too busy to cook for myself... and I don't have anyone to cook for me, either."
At those last words, the man who had told him to take care of himself quietly averted his gaze. He fully understood that the complaining man had no lover or wife. And he himself had a girlfriend who took care of him in various ways. Knowing that, he probably judged that probing any further would only lead to trouble.
That was why, to change the subject, the man with a girlfriend turned to Rei and asked, "Rei, you have an Item Box... or was it the Misty Ring? With that, it seems like you'd never have any trouble with meals."
"Yeah. With this, I can eat whatever I want whenever I want. It's incredibly handy. But I'm the one who chooses what food to store in the Misty Ring, so I need to verify for myself whether the food is actually good or not."
Rei didn't say it out loud, but choosing the food himself also meant he had to manage his own nutritional balance. Eating an unbalanced diet—only meat dishes or only fish dishes—was bad for the body. Of course, Rei's body was not that of an ordinary human; it was a creation forged using the pinnacle of the Zephyle Clan's technology. He didn't think a slightly poor nutritional balance would have any effect.
Even so, for the sake of his health—not physical, but mental—Rei made an effort to eat as balanced a diet as possible. Though with his appetite being what it was, his meals still tended to be meat-centered.
"Besides, even without the Misty Ring, I just go home and Marina cooks for me every day. Thanks to that, I don't have to eat unbalanced meals."
Creak.
The sound of the air inside the warehouse groaning was probably not Rei's imagination.
Rei wasn't concerned about it at all, but to the Guild Staff Members, Marina—who had been the Guild Master until recently—was a presence of tremendous significance. Many had been captivated by her beauty, and many were devoted admirers of her ability and charisma.
For such Guild Staff Members, Rei's situation—going home to find Marina cooking and waiting for him—evoked extremely complicated feelings.
Envy. That was certainly present. In fact, there were more than a few who harbored feelings of envy and jealousy so strong they wanted to punch Rei over it alone.
Awe. This feeling, while not as strong as the envy, was still held by everyone. Marina, a special existence to the Guild Staff Members, cooking at home. The fact that Rei could accept that as perfectly normal meant it wouldn't be surprising if the people hearing this regarded him with awe.
Even the Foreman was surprised by Rei's words just now. How much persuasive power had Rei's statement carried? Seeing the Foreman's reaction made that abundantly clear.
(In that case, maybe I shouldn't mention that Marina became my negotiator? If I said that, given how they're reacting now, they'd probably be shocked all over again.)
The difference in how they interacted with Marina was probably a big factor here. The Guild Staff Members had observed Marina up close as the Guild Master and experienced her high ability firsthand on a daily basis. Through those days, they had come to recognize Marina as a being above themselves.
That didn't mean they disliked her. Even as a superior existence, it was an undeniable fact that everyone adored Marina. That much was clear just from seeing Kenny and Lenora talking with her.
However, unlike those Guild Staff Members, Rei didn't see Marina as a being above himself, but simply as Marina the individual. ...That was largely the reason Marina had been drawn to Rei, but that was beside the point.
Because Rei was who he was, he was happy and grateful that Marina cooked for him and served as his negotiator, but he didn't consider it presumptuous or beyond his station. That difference in sensibility was probably the gap between the Guild Staff Members who had worked under Marina and Rei.
"Now that you mention it, Rei, you're living together at Marina-sama's house, right? What's that like?"
"What's it like, you ask... well, it's definitely quite comfortable thanks to Marina's Spirit Magic. Cool in summer, warm in winter, that sort of thing. Heck, even in winter I can relax in the courtyard normally."
How envious. That was what the Guild Staff Members thought upon hearing Rei's words.
The Guild Staff Members' salaries were fairly high, and the ones here specialized in dissection—when they did dissection work, their pay increased on top of their base salary through a commission system. Considering that, the people here were definitely high earners. They could afford to find a comfortable residence and move there, or purchase Magic Items to make their current living situation more comfortable.
But even understanding that, Rei could confidently declare that it still couldn't match the comfort provided by Marina's Spirit Magic. Though, being able to do such a thing was only possible because Marina was a Spirit Mage with outstanding ability.
Originally, mages were quite rare, and among them, Spirit Mages were even rarer. Among so few, a Spirit Mage with Marina's level of outstanding skill... Rei couldn't definitively say there were none, but he felt she wasn't someone who could be found so easily.
"Marina-sama's house is in the Noble District, right? Are there any problems living there?"
"I'd like to say no, but there was a fairly large-scale murder case not too long ago."
Rei recalled the murder case in the Noble District and grimaced. It wasn't that Rei had been completely uninvolved in that incident, and he apparently had his own thoughts about it. The Foreman seemed to notice something from Rei's demeanor, but he simply brought food to his mouth without saying anything in particular.
"Huh, so nobles really are a scary bunch."
"I'm not going to deny that either. I've seen plenty of how nobles operate."
Rei agreed with the Guild Staff Member's words, but such a Rei had been regarded with awe and fear by many nobles—especially those with shady backgrounds. After all, while one would normally show some restraint when the other party was a noble, Rei didn't care about noble status at all and would use force without hesitation. To the nobles, he was probably perceived as an existence completely incomprehensible by their common sense.
"But the Noble District is definitely safe, right? The Guild gets guard and patrol requests from nobles there all the time."
That was information known precisely because he was a Guild Staff Member. Well, more accurately, if one frequented the Noble District, it was obvious that many adventurers were patrolling, so the fact that requests had been submitted to the Guild was plain to see.
Those hired by nobles to patrol the Noble District were a diverse group. Some patrolled in normal adventurer gear, while many others were told by their noble employers to wear provided outfits while on patrol. However, since it was a Noble District patrol, only those with a considerable degree of trust from the Guild could receive such requests.
Thinking about all this, Rei enjoyed a brief feast—alcohol excluded.