"More! More! More!" Those insatiable little monsters chanted as they cheerfully banged their hands on the table I set out for them.

They'd already had five pancakes each, whereas I'd probably be done after three. Did all monsters just have a black hole as part of their digestive system?

...There was a non-zero chance of that actually being true, and wasn't that a frightening thought? It would explain how you could just endlessly keep shoving food down their throat for affection points in Paradox. I don't think I've ever heard one claim they were 'full' before, either. There was probably a lot of cooking in my future, provided it wasn't cut short.

I only wish I had practiced tofu-based dishes more before all this. With Alma Elma cutting off the sea route and, consequently, the only source of imports, even if I could get my hands on any, it wouldn't be enough to get good with it... There went that method of making a good first impression.

"More! More!" A definitely not-so-little monster eagerly joined their chorus of gluttony, thankfully pulling me out of my thoughts before anything could get burned, though that was subject to change at any moment now.

I hurriedly lifted the pancake with my spatula and deposited it on Vanilla's plate, the little vampire only refraining from devouring it for long enough to slather a generous helping of Happiness Honey onto it; the heat from it being fresh out of the pan barely even noticed.

Honestly, I wasn't sure whether to be more surprised at the fact Alice still had that jar or that she was actually willing to share. I suppose it may be her way of making it up to them.

As Vanilla ate, the others merrily continued their chant, making me let out an exasperated sigh. It sure didn't take them long to change their tune once food was on the table, though ultimately, I couldn't help but smile at their antics; Things were much better this way. "Pancakes may be quick, but they do still take a bit of time, you know," I said, pouring the next portion of mix into the pan.

It scarcely took a few seconds for the previous one to be scarfed down. Licking some leftover honey from her lips, Vanilla looked at me with a happy smile. "You really aren't so bad after all. You'd probably make a good wife!"

"See? I told you Shishou is great!" Gob helpfully added.

I slowly looked up from my frying pan and stared at the two of them blankly for a few moments before my gaze settled on Vanilla. "...You mean husband, right?"

The calls for more ceased, replaced by three quizzical looks. "...A wife is the person who cooks for you and does laundry and stuff, right?" Papi asked and then pointed next to her. "Like Teeny." The tiny lamia let out a long-suffering sigh in response. Clearly, that wasn't the first time she had to deal with that moniker.

"That's... not quite how it works," I slowly began to explain while considering my words as I wouldn't want to be insensitive enough to do something like point out how that description also applied to mothers, only to freeze when I suddenly felt a hand on my shoulder. My gaze reflexively shot over to the empty seat where Alice was supposed to be. Craning my head around, I found her behind me, looking at me with a massive grin.

...Please no.

"Now, now, I believe she is quite correct. I am certain you will make some man very happy one day. Truly, they could not ask for a better wife than you."

I clenched my eyes shut along with a groan for a moment before shooting her a light glare. "Screw you, Alice."

Her smirk only rose higher. "Oh? Now, all of a sudden? There is no need for you to prove anything; I shan't judge." Her expression then turned thoughtful. "Hmm, that inclination does actually explain a lot. Uncaring of womanly charms, yet not willing to give up on the pleasure only monsters can give. It makes sense now that I think about it."

I gaped at her. "Could you stop coming to weird conclusions!? I am perfectly straight!"

"Forgive me for being unable to take those words at face value, especially considering what you have at face value." She chuckled.

I stopped looking up at her face for a moment as my brain processed her words. I usually made a concerted effort not to look at them lest she get any ideas, but apparently, that backfired. Having her breasts just short of motorboating distance would have probably flustered me under normal circumstances, but as I was currently running on energy-saving mode, I only let out a tired sigh. "Yes, yes. They are very nice, Alice."

"...Spoken like someone who genuinely holds no interest in them," she said, a lot less triumphantly than I would have expected for 'proving' her point, before pointing down with the hand that wasn't 'supportively' grasping my shoulder. "By the way, I admit I do not know much about cooking, but shouldn't you be flipping that one?"

"Ah!" I hastily turned the pancake, only to reveal one side somewhat scorched. It... should still be edible, if barely. At the very least, it couldn't be any worse than the ashen tang Alice's stupid spell left in my mouth earlier. It still felt like I could taste it even now.

I sighed. "Guess that one's gonna be one of mine."

"Don't be ridiculous," Alice immediately denied. "We would not want you to wreck your delicate human stomach. I shall be the one to sacrifice myself for the greater good."

My body stiffened at those incredibly unfortunately chosen words. Goddamnit, Alice.

...Hold on. Four Heavenly Bandits and the Bandit Lord... surely all of that wasn't meant as a practice run for her... right? Was she... still planning on martyring herself? Was she even planning for it yet? I had the impression that nonsense only really took shape starting on Sentora. Either way, I don't think threatening to sic foxes on her would work if there was a next time. I suppose I could always just refuse to finish her off if it came down to it... provided I win, that is. Still, I really wish she wouldn't pull that crap in the first place.

"You don't need to burn the other side too!"

Being suddenly yelled at as I was deep in thought caused a knee-jerk reaction, catapulting the pancake high into the air. Alice immediately entered lock-on mode and jumped after it, doing a flip as she caught it in her mouth and then stuck the landing with surprising grace, the pancake already gone. With a slight bow, the peanut gallery erupted into raucous applause.

"That was amazing, boss!"

Alice, who had been basking in the cheers, now looked at the former bandits with a somewhat confused expression. "Why are you still calling me that? I already told you, I am no longer... No, I suppose I technically still am, even if on a far greater scale."

I chuckled as I started my cooking back up. "It may have been only for a few hours, but they technically had the same status as the Heavenly Knights."

"Whoa, you're the Monster Lord, boss?"

"Does that mean you know the Heavenly Knights!?"

Alice smiled dryly. "I am passingly familiar with my direct subordinates, yes."

As the little ones peppered Alice with questions, I was thinking. They had completely changed their minds about me. Gob especially seemed to be fond of me... for reasons I didn't entirely understand. I couldn't really fulfill her request of becoming my disciple right now, not that I had much to teach her now even if I could, but perhaps a bit down the line... a mutual one? "Hey Alice, just out of curiosity, how would the Heavenly Knights feel about some Heavenly Squires?"

I flinched at the high-pitched gasps and squeals of excitement my question elicited, and so did Alice, for that matter.

"That is... an idea," she said carefully. It was probably the most diplomatic I'd ever seen her. "Though perhaps it may be more prudent to revisit that thought in a few years when they are older. I am not confident I can entrust my Knights with childcare currently."

"Why's that?" I asked, pushing past the loud exclamations of disappointment.

"Well, let us start with Granberia. Dragons have precisely two methods of parenting... or just one, considering the first is just abandoning their children, often before they even hatch."

I struggled to keep a grimace off my face, both due to what Alice said and how, from the corner of my eye, Papi seemed to shrink in on herself when she heard it.

"As for the other," Alice continued, "It would best be described as fierce. Both in its protectiveness and the training regimen for the pup. Granberia, sword and battle maniac that she is, would probably be more intense than even the average dragon in that regard. If her instincts were to label her charge as inadequate on top of that..."

"I- I can take it!" Papi insisted.

"Perhaps," Alice conceded. "Though you would still be liable to regret every waking moment once it came to that."

"Anyway, moving on!" She quickly continued as she saw the little dragon on the verge of crying once more. "Erubetie would accept the duty if I gave it to her, but that would be all it is to her- a duty. As she is now, a child under her care cannot hope to receive any warmth, neither physical nor emotional. With circumstances as they are, she simply does not have the capacity to empathize with anything that is not a slime. I heard she was not always like that... I can only hope that she returns to that prior self once things are set right."

"I can fix her!" Teeny called out.

I instinctively opened my mouth but then thought better of it. Nothing good would come out of interacting with that kind of mindset.

Apparently, Alice wasn't going to say anything about it either as she cleared her throat after a short look at Teeny. "...Right, Alma Elma next then. She might turn out to be either a surprisingly good mother, albeit a bit... quite lacking in disciplinary actions... or she would go out to get 'milk' and never come back, or at best, about once a year with some presents. I am genuinely not sure which option is more likely."

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"She's so cool, though! I'm sure she wouldn't do that!" Vanilla asserted.

"And Tamamo?" I asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Yeah, I heard she's really nice!" Gob added.

Alice huffed and muttered something beneath her breath before addressing us. "That is not necessarily a good thing when dealing with children. She has many duties, so she does not have a lot of time to spend with individual children. And while she is not entirely above discipline if she feels it necessary, she greatly prefers spoiling them utterly rotten whenever the opportunity arises. I mean, have you seen the girls she has raised? Terrible brats, every single one of them, I assure you."

"...You do realize that would include yourself, right?"

She shot me a wry smile. "And you may feel perfectly free to lay the blame for any grievances you may have solely on her."

I considered that outrageous suggestion for a singular moment and then shook my head. "Honestly... I think she did pretty well, all things considered."

Both of her brows rose as one. "Is that... a compliment? That... is not what I expected out of you, certainly not today, at least."

I blinked in bewilderment before shrugging. "Sure." It wasn't meant as one, not to her anyway. And even if it was, it should have counted as backhanded at best, but if she wanted to take it as such, who was I to deny her?

A small smile rose to her lips, which immediately died a painful death as she turned and beheld the pouting faces of four children who just had their idols bad-mouthed.

She looked back at me. "...Food?" she asked, the word sounding almost like a plea for help.

With a good-natured roll of my eyes, I set the small stack of pancakes I finished while Alice was talking down on the table. "One at a time now, you hear?" Their discontent was almost immediately forgotten as they greedily lunged for their prey.

The breakfast, as Alice insisted on calling it, lasted about another 45 minutes, not because those bottomless holes disguised as little girls were satisfied, but because my ingredients for pancakes ran out... already. It was probably a good thing I didn't end up receiving the Pocket Castle; I couldn't even begin to fathom the logistics involved in keeping hundreds of monsters fed.

With the table and dishes safely stowed away, I nodded toward the campfire. "Papi, Gob, if you would?"

"Yeah!" "Leave it to me, Shishou!" They called out, attacking the fire with newly acquired frost breath and kicked-up dirt, respectively. The flames made a valiant effort to stay strong but were fighting a losing battle.

"I presume you have some other plan on what to do with them?" Alice asked, turning away from the very one-sided combat.

"Well, I was thinking of bringing them to Iliasburg to apologize for the trouble they caused and see if they could stay there, maybe take on apprenticeships." Then, once they had down the basics, come back to help them with advanced training and making connections in exchange for a percentage on their future sales. I would be damned if I had to work a single day in my life unless I wanted to if I actually managed to surv— when I finished this journey.

"...Do we have to?" Vanilla complained.

"Bad girls who haven't atoned for their criminal record don't get to be squires."

"We'll do it!" They all shouted in unison. Heh, so easy.

Alice frowned. "...Right, their willingness to walk straight into the proverbial tiger girl's den aside, do you really believe that to be a wise course of action? I have heard of several examples of 'mob justice' being enacted on humans and monsters alike in the past; they might be lynched as soon as they step into the city. Never mind the chance of a random Hero deciding to nip some problems in the bud."

I tilted my head, taking a few moments to think. "Heroes are already in a precarious enough situation there as it is without actively going against public opinion. Anyone left in Iliasburg should be pretty much the absolute bottom of the barrel, only getting by on their perks. Those with any amount of guts would have long since moved north... or ended up in someone else's gut, as it were. If it weren't for the church, the city's guilds would have probably long since kicked those freeloaders out. As for other inciting elements... It should be fine as long as we don't give them time to prepare since we are the ones who get to set the pace and context, and the general citizenry isn't all that radical."

Ilias Kreuz was probably partly to thank for that. Being utterly indiscriminate in their anti-monster terrorism made just about everyone resent them and their methods, serving to deradicalize the average populace.

"Besides, we'll be there if anything does happen." I cracked a small smile. "And considering they were willing to tolerate an abomination like Amira..."

...Or maybe they did lynch her and just gave up eventually when they realized it didn't stick.

"...Fair points. Very well. By the way, we have incoming."

"Seriously?" I groaned and then paused, giving Alice a questioning look. "You're not gonna disappear?"

She shrugged. "Not like this is going to end in a fight anyway."

Before I could ask what she meant, I heard a voice from the distance. "Misterrr!~"

I turned and stared incredulously at the dog girl running up to me. "Pochi?"

She stopped right in front of me. "I've been looking for you, mister!" She said with a beaming smile, her tail making its best hummingbird impression.

"Err... sorry, but I'm afraid we just finished eating, so there isn't any food." Saying no to that face was almost enough to cause me physical pain.

But against my expectations, her smile didn't falter. "That's fine! I'm not hungry anyway since you stuffed me with your meat just yesterday."

"Uh..."

"It was so big and thick..." She said dreamily. "At first, I wasn't sure if I could fit all of it, but I managed to take the entire thing like a good girl!"

"R-right... good job," I praised, tentatively giving her a pat on the head.

"Wait, you've been packing meat this entire time!?" Papi shouted, her foe vanquished and already forgotten. "No fair, I want some too; pull it out!"

Instead of answering her, I turned back to Alice with a pained sound escaping my mouth. "Will the innuendos eventually stop if I ignore them long enough?"

"If by 'eventually' you mean until after you die of old age... likely still no." There was no smile, no joking tone; she was entirely serious.

"Come on! I won't even bite; I'll just lick it to make the juice come out!"

"Nope!" I threw up my hands and started walking. Last straw? More like an entire bale of it. "That's it, conversation over! I'm going to Iliasburg; anyone who wants to follow, feel free to do so!"

A look over my shoulder a few hundred meters later confirmed that they indeed followed me... all of them. Another one to the pile; at this rate, I would be arriving in Iliasburg with an entire fun-sized army.

The way back would take significantly shorter due to not having to explore an entire mountain range in the process; only a few hours of walking should see us arriving at Iliasburg before dusk... but as much as I wish I could say that the rest of the trip was uneventful without any random encounters... it would be a lie.

I massaged the bridge of my nose as the little ones crowded around a short blond sheep girl lying in a ditch by the road.

"Is she dead?" Gob poked her cheek with a stick she found along the way, resulting in a mighty snore that belied the girl's small stature.

Pochi whimpered while holding her nose. "Her breath smells..."

"More like dead drunk," Teeny concluded. "And yet she still managed to avoid barfing all over herself," she said, shooting a narrowed look around her. The other bandits strategically avoided her gaze as though she was a Medusa.

"Sheep girls are notorious alcoholics, given the opportunity," Alice chimed in. "Though I am curious as to just how she managed to obtain any in the first place."

I suppressed a tired sigh and decided to enter the conversation, if only to make it end more quickly. "She might be bartering some of her wool with the merchants of Iliasburg. Just because she can't get in doesn't mean that others can't meet her halfway. Either way, we should probably do something about this before someone or something comes along that considers her an easy snack... or EXP."

I held up a hand, forestalling the suggestion I knew would come. "And no, we are not taking her with us. Any more monsters and the citizens of Iliasburg might think they're being invaded... again."

"Indeed, just openly leaving her by the road like this would be quite risky. In that case..." Alice picked her up none too gently and lobbed her into some nearby greenery so that she was hidden from view. It wasn't the most elegant solution, but I suppose...

My eyes widened as I took a closer look, and I slowly craned my head around to stare at Alice in disbelief. "Did... you just throw her into a patch of poison ivy?"

Her self-satisfied smile quickly crumbled. "She may be weak, but she is still a monster; something to that extent should not affect her... too much... probably."

"And maybe that way, the lesson will stick at least," Teeny added ruthlessly.

I silently shook my head at the two snakes and walked over to where the lamb was somehow still slumbering. Pushing past the ivy, thankful for the fact I had gloves on me, I stuck some Antidote Grass under the collar of her sweater. If she had any luck, it might even help with the inevitable hangover.

Without exchanging any further words, I resumed the march for Iliasburg, quietly wondering if it was possible to use this world's version of shadow clones to take extra naps. It might be worth trying to learn ninja arts, just in case. The ground beginning to look awfully comfy probably wasn't a good sign. If only Meditation could also fix an empty social battery...

I spent the next hour or so silently, only occasionally hearing in on the chatter behind me. Their conversation eventually turned to what jobs they might get in Iliasburg, and I have to admit, the idea of a dragon entertaining professional firefighter as a career option got a snort of laughter out of me.

Alice, unlike the girls behind me, was also conspicuously quiet. "Worried?"

She looked away. "Of course I am. What kind of ruler would I be if I did not worry about my subjects? However... my concern lies not solely with them. What happens later today will likely set a precedent that will determine in which direction the human-monster relations in this region develop for decades." Sheesh, way to pile on the pressure, Alice.

"Part of me wants to just let all of this resolve naturally out of fear that my actions may only result in making matters worse and then change my future course according to the outcome... but there is also the ever-mounting frustration of sitting on the sidelines, doing nothing, yet again."

I scratched my cheek. "I mean, if you want to help, I suppose you could go on ahead and tell Miss Sutherland about what we're planning to do." Granted, at the pace she picked up news, she may very well manage to reach the city plaza before we do either way, but there was no reason to take unnecessary risks.

"Why her, of all people?" She asked curiously.

I shrugged. "Affluental and has a lot of pull as the head of the hostelry guild, on good terms with us and annoyed at the church due to having to let Heroes stay for free even if they are utterly useless, looks like she has a soft spot for children... Do I need to keep going? I probably could think of more."

"I see." She let out a breath. "I suppose it does beat thinking of a few dozen more worst-case scenarios." She shook her head and gave me a strange look. "...I don't understand." And then she was gone.

"...Huh? Hey, you can't just leave on a line like that!" I shouted, but as one might expect, the empty air held no answers for me. "Ugh, whatever." I turned to the gaggle of little monsters behind me. "Come on, let's not keep the Monster Lord waiting for too long," I said, getting a round of enthusiastic nods in response.

"Hey, uh... Luka?" Papi called out barely half an hour later. "My claws kinda hurt."

My feet stopped, and I took a look at her. She didn't seem very in pain, but I did recall one of her claws scraping against the cave floor earlier, and they might not really be suited for long treks through the countryside either.

"Alright, come here; some Healing Herbs should fix that easily enough."

She shuffled a bit. "Um... they don't hurt that bad."

Hmm? Was she acting tough? No, in that case, she probably wouldn't have said anything to begin with. A dislike for medicine, then? Though, unlike some more advanced healing options, it's not like you had to eat the herbs or anything. Wait... was she...

I gave her a very unimpressed look. "You just want a ride, don't you?" Her only answer was a light blush. With a sigh, I crouched down with my back toward her. "Fine, get on."

She crashed into me with enough eagerness to almost bowl me over. "Gahaha, yes! Go, my mighty steed, let's beat up any mean Heroes in our way!"

I couldn't stop a chuckle as I lifted her up; somehow, she'd managed to find something even more backward than a dragon firefighter.

A few minutes later, Gob clamored for her turn, then Pochi, then Vanilla. And though Teeny didn't, she eventually got peer pressured into it anyway. Giving a piggyback to a snake girl was... a curious experience and not an entirely simple affair, but she did seem to ultimately enjoy herself.

And thus, the final hour of my way back to Iliasburg consisted of five little girls taking turns with me.

Oh, great, now I'm doing it too. I meant taking turns riding me.

...Oh god, that actually made it worse.

Longingly, I looked up at the distant form of the city. I could only hope I'd get there before I lost the last scrap of my sanity.