I’d assumed she’d have more cute ones, but she seemed to be a fan of more grotesque creatures. I was a bit more familiar with Sky Sharks, but what in the world was a Saurusman? Was it literally a dinosaur? There were way too many different types of monsters in this world.
Carbuncle suddenly showed interest in the pot that Linte had brought out. It brought its nose up to the pot and began sniffing, clearly curious.
“This is the one that’s been hanging out at the reception area, isn’t it? I haven’t really seen any other animal like it.”
“Yeah, I hear they aren’t easy to find,” I said.
“Hmm. So it’s rare, huh?” she said, her eyes narrowing as soon as the word “rare” left her lips.
“Mew mew mew?!” squealed Carbuncle.
Quickly looking at and away from her, it must’ve sensed something unusual about Linte. Thinking its pelt could be in danger, it zipped to the opposite side of me and hid away from her sight.
“Aha ha, I wouldn’t do that. You’d need to be bigger if I were to wear you,” she laughed.
“Mew...”
Carbuncle gave her a wary look, then it started shadowboxing as if challenging her to a fight, all while still hiding behind me. Maybe it’d been affected by the TV show I’d been watching in my living room the other day. It put on a brave front, but it was obviously scared judging by the way it gradually backed away further from her.
I didn’t want her to be the second coming of the Facepeeler kaijin either. Our peaceful and heartwarming story was about to turn into a psycho horror story real quick. Japan had been a pretty scary place until that menace had been defeated.
I picked up Carbuncle and placed it on my lap. It was scared stiff as I brought it very close to Linte without warning, but it relaxed into a liquid, like cats and rabbits did, when she began patting its head.
“Mew...” it said contentedly. This animal sure loved head pats.
“What’s in the pot, by the way?” I asked.
“Oh, this? It’s honey. Why?” said Linte.
“Thought so...”
I knew it. Of course it was honey. She was an Adorner, after all. But I just wanted to make sure, you know? I mean, there was a small chance it could’ve been something else, but Adorners still loved honey as much as ever.
“Do you scoop it with your finger and lick it too?” I asked.
“No, not me. I put it on this.” She stopped patting Carbuncle and took out what looked like a small stick of bread. Surely that was what she used to dip honey and eat for a snack.
“So that’s how you eat it,” I said.
“Of course. If I’d used my finger, I’d have to wipe it down every time. It’d be a waste.”
“I’ve seen people lick it off of their fingers.”
“I don’t like doing that. It looks so gluttonous,” she said.
I felt like that was a silly thing to worry about considering Adorners became immobilized from hunger by default. It was as if they had a hunger gauge that depleted like in Shiren or Torneko. If there were a hunger spell, it’d probably kill them in one hit.
We continued talking for a while longer, and Linte took out her breadstick and dipped it into her honey for snack time. She had a wide smile on her face as she began stuffing her face.
As she bit into her fourth stick, she looked toward me and asked, “Hey, aren’t you gonna eat something? You must’ve come to the dining hall because you’re hungry, right?”
“No, I just decided to stop by on a whim,” I said.
“Did you bring anything? Like jam, maybe?”
“You want something of mine? Are you trying to mooch off me?”
“Yep.”
She really was straightforward when it came to these things, and she didn’t intend to hide her gluttony. What was that about not wanting to look gluttonous earlier?
Well, it was about time for me to have a snack too, so I didn’t mind. What did I have on hand, anyway? She’d probably want something sweet, but I didn’t have the honey sugar bread that Reverie had liked last time. I started digging into my Dimension Bag like a cat-type robot who was visiting from the future.
“Oh yeah, I forgot about this,” I said as I pulled out a pack of chocolate and some fresh cream.
I didn’t remember why I’d even put it in there, but it was probably so that I could bring it here and share it with someone. Maybe I’d been forgetting things more lately because I’d been through a lot of traumatic things.
“That smells sweet,” said Linte.
She moved her face closer to the packaged chocolate bar and sniffed like Carbuncle had done earlier. From a certain angle, she actually looked like a monster because of the pelt she was wearing.
“I haven’t even opened the package yet,” I pointed out.
I took out my cassette stove and a small pot, then I heated up the fresh cream and threw in the chocolate that I’d broken into pieces. I then stirred the concoction, and the easy chocolate fondue was ready to eat.
Linte looked restless as she gave me a sidelong glance. “Hmm...that smells and looks good.”
“Sure does,” I said.
“It smells and looks good,” she repeated.
“You just said that.”
“You know, that smells and—”
“If you want some, you could just say so,” I said.
What was she? An NPC who could only say a predetermined line?
“Shouldn’t you be moving the pot closer to me so it’s easier for me to eat?” she said, undeterred.
“I don’t even know what to say...”
Why was she like this? I mean, I was sure this was her way of joking around, but still. Some people didn’t know how to simply ask for things.
Linte dipped about half of her small breadstick into the sea of fondue, then she put it in her mouth.
“Oooooooooh?!” she yelled, and I turned to her in surprise.
Linte was frozen in place with the piece of bread still in her hand. Her face was stuck in an astonished expression, and her voice was a bit muffled with the bread still in her mouth. She was surprisingly loud for how calm she usually was. The taste of chocolate must’ve been just that shocking to her.
She eventually recovered from her awe and put more chocolate on the rest of her breadstick, then she chewed some more. She then turned to me abruptly, grabbed me by the shoulders, and shook me with the force of a magnitude-six earthquake.