"Grrrrrl."
"You look happy, Seto. ...But wouldn't you have preferred to go somewhere else?"
Rei said this while stroking Seto as the gryphon walked beside him.
They were currently making their way through the Slum District.
If they walked through the city center, there was a chance of trouble—either from Dolan Workshop pursuers trying to capture Rei or from the guards.
But this was the Slum District.
It wasn't a guarantee that they'd never be attacked here, but the odds were still lower than in the city proper. More importantly, since this was the Slum District, if they were attacked, they wouldn't have to worry much about collateral damage to surrounding buildings.
That said, pulling off something like this was only possible because Rei had the strength to back it up.
That was precisely why Lindy, whose combat ability wasn't particularly high, and the others who lacked confidence in their fighting skills were still at the Fusetsu hideout.
Anne and a few others were helping out with cooking, cleaning, and similar chores.
"Peaceful, isn't it?"
"Gruu."
By all rights, Rei and Seto's current situation was far from anything that could be called peaceful.
Even so, they still had enough breathing room to take a stroll through the Slum District.
Normally, anyone walking so carefree through the Slum District would be asking to be attacked.
But Rei had Seto with him, and with a rumor spreading from who knows where that he was a guest of Fusetsu, no one was going to try anything.
(Nina really is sharp. Something like this is fine, though.)
As someone who had been making all sorts of unreasonable demands on Fusetsu, Rei had no intention of complaining about Nina using his name to expand their influence beyond its current level.
Of course, if she ever crossed the line of what Rei found acceptable, he intended to make that clear.
Nina naturally understood that as well, and showed no signs of overstepping.
"Grrrrrl?"
As they walked through the Slum District, Seto suddenly looked toward a spot some distance away and purred.
Following Seto's gaze, Rei understood why he had reacted that way.
At the end of that gaze were two children, watching them fearfully.
Both looked to be around ten years old, if that.
The visibly thin children bore all the hallmarks of Slum District residents.
(What should I do?)
Seeing those children, Rei genuinely felt pity.
But handing them food here would be nothing more than empty virtue.
A single meal's worth of food would only solve their immediate hunger. He couldn't possibly take responsibility for what happened to these children after that.
He understood that full well... and yet, Rei still couldn't simply walk past them.
If it were just him alone, he might have done exactly that.
But Seto, who loved children, had already spotted them.
Given the situation, there was no way Seto would just abandon them.
To Seto, children were playmates—companions who would play with him.
"Gruu."
"Alright, alright."
When Seto purred his request, Rei gave in with a sigh and headed toward the children.
If they had been adults, Seto probably wouldn't have shown this much interest.
But they were children.
That was why Seto was interested, and why Rei couldn't bring himself to refuse.
...That said, that was strictly Rei's own reasoning.
Seeing Rei suddenly approach, the two children directed looks of clear wariness at him.
Living in the Slum District, they were naturally on guard.
More precisely, children who weren't sufficiently wary wouldn't survive long unless they were exceptionally lucky.
That was exactly why the two children were cautious of Rei, who had approached them out of nowhere.
The fact that they didn't run was perhaps because they judged fleeing to be more dangerous.
Or perhaps, seeing a gryphon like Seto for the first time, they were so overwhelmed they couldn't move even if they wanted to.
At any rate, all the two children could do was watch as Rei approached.
"Got a moment?"
"!? ...W-What...?"
The bolder of the two children responded to Rei's question.
Their posture made it clear: if anything happened, they would protect the other child.
In response, Rei held out bread he had taken from his Misty Ring.
Not just any bread—he had bought it freshly baked and stored it in his Misty Ring, so it was white bread with a crisp exterior and a soft, fluffy interior.
"...Huh?"
Why were they being given bread like this?
Unable to make sense of it, both children stared at Rei... but the aroma of freshly baked bread drifting through the air was more than enough to pull their gazes away from Rei and toward the bread.
They looked at the bread, then at Rei, then at the bread, then at Rei again.
After repeating this a few times, Rei once more held out the bread, silently urging them to take it.
"Can... can we really eat this?"
They asked the question, but the bread already in their hands was something they would never give up, no matter what.
The child looked at Rei with a gaze filled with that resolve.
The other child, though quieter in demeanor, had no intention of letting go either.
Rei nodded to the two wary children.
"Yeah. Seto... the gryphon over there seems to have taken a liking to you. But... right. Have you heard anything about a large number of strangers coming into the Slum District since last night?"
Asking the information broker might have yielded more accurate intelligence.
But if he had handed over bread—freshly baked bread at that—with no strings attached, he couldn't be sure they'd believe what he had to say.
That was why, just this once, he had offered the bread under the pretext of asking for information...
"Yeah, nearly twenty people have come in."
That was why Rei was surprised when one of the children gave him that answer.
"Really?"
"Yeah. They're dangerous-looking, so we've been told to stay away from them."
Who exactly had told them that was somewhat concerning, but there was probably someone acting as a leader figure among the children.
Whether that leader had taken on the role out of pity for the children in the Slum District, or was doing it for their own benefit—Rei couldn't say.
But the fact that they were sharing information about dangerous individuals and looking out for the children's safety was undeniable.
Given that, this person was probably someone the children needed.
(Still, about twenty people. With me and Seto, we can handle that.)
Normally, it would be hard to say with confidence that you could manage against twenty opponents.
But in this world, quality surpassing quantity was not uncommon, and with Rei and Seto together, dealing with around twenty was certainly within reach.
"Do you know specifically where those twenty are?"
"Huh? Well... I know roughly where. But we've been told not to go near there."
"Then just telling me where they are would be enough."
"Even if I tell you, this is the Slum District. You won't be able to find it just from directions."
"Then, let's see... If you guide me to the area, I'll give you bread... no, twenty sandwiches. You can share whatever you can't finish with your friends. How about it?"
The season was already better described as early autumn than late summer.
Even so, while nights and mornings were one thing, daytime was still quite hot.
That meant there was a good chance the sandwiches would spoil before twenty could be eaten.
But since the children helped each other survive in the Slum District, Rei figured they could just divide the extras among themselves.
"Um, but... hmm..."
The child hesitated at Rei's offer.
The other one, apparently leaving the decision to their companion, simply waited quietly.
They needed one more push.
Judging that, Rei pulled a single sandwich from his Misty Ring.
Even among sandwiches, there were those with thin slices of ham and those packed with a solid slab of meat.
The kind of sandwiches children in the Slum District could get their hands on were the former.
Even those were close to a luxury.
What Rei produced fell squarely in the latter category.
Orc meat, grilled until the outside was crisp and the inside tender, layered with a thick, reduced sauce and fresh leafy vegetables.
In Gilm, Orc meat was fairly widely available, but outside the frontier, while not impossible to find, it commanded a respectable price.
As a general rule, the higher a monster's rank, the better its meat tasted—but that was only a baseline, and there were exceptions.
Orc meat was one of them: meat with a flavor that punched well above its rank.
A sandwich made from such meat, prepared by a highly skilled cook.
It was the kind of sandwich a child in the Slum District could go their entire life without ever tasting.
"Deal."
The moment the child saw that sandwich, the answer came instantly.
For them, the sandwich in Rei's hand was something they desperately wanted to eat.
"Alright, it's a deal. Guide me to where those people are."
"Got it. Let's go."
As if there was no way they'd let the sandwich slip through their fingers, the child set off, leading Rei and Seto.
"Living in the Slum District—it's manageable now, but wouldn't it get tough in winter?"
"Yeah. Winters here are cold, and it snows. Quite a few people freeze to death."
That was no different in Gilm's Slum District.
But in Gilm's case, Rei had hired people last year to help with the Gigant Turtle dissection, and many had made it through winter because of that.
Of course, that was strictly something Rei had done on his own.
Even with the Guild and Daskar cooperating, once the Gigant Turtle dissection was finished, the work was gone.
Even so, it was undeniably true that for several years—perhaps a bit longer—more Slum District residents would be able to survive winter than before. In that sense, Rei was a benefactor to the people of the Slum District.
But that had only been possible because it was Rei, and because there had been a Gigant Turtle corpse to work on.
There was no way something like that could be replicated here in Egginis.
Which meant that getting through winter in Egginis would be brutally harsh.
Even so, there was no way Rei could tell the children here to come to Gilm.
For one thing, just traveling from Egginis to Gilm normally took a considerable amount of time.
Only Rei, who could ride Seto, could bounce back and forth between Gilm and Egginis so easily.
Even Camila's solo journey from Buldan to Egginis had only barely been possible through sheer, layered good fortune.
Given that, telling children to travel from Egginis to Gilm alone would be no different from telling them to die.
(The Seto Basket could manage it, but... that would bring its own set of problems.)
If he announced he was taking people to Gilm, there was no telling how the residents of this Slum District would react.
Since Gilm was well known as a frontier, some would undoubtedly refuse to go to such a dangerous place.
On the other hand, hearing that Gilm was currently expanding and had no shortage of work, some might jump at the chance to escape the Slum District.
Or perhaps those who had lost power struggles within the Slum District might see it as an opportunity to start fresh in new territory.
If that happened, Rei had absolutely no idea how many people would try to go.
He did briefly consider whether bringing just the children might work, but that too would likely cause problems—accusations of child abduction, for one.
"Hey, mister. Hurry, hurry. This way!"
The sandwich must have been that irresistible.
The child leading Rei called out, pressing him to move faster.
...The fact that they showed no fear of Seto walking at Rei's side—whether they were forcing themselves to be brave or had instinctively sensed that Seto meant them no harm—Rei couldn't say.
But regardless, Rei pressed on through the Slum District, following the child's lead.