"We know about that, sweetie. Shan-shan did explain his circumstances to us before we formed the Dandelions a good few years ago."

Lairs nodded, still managing to hold up the proper act in front of a young soldier.

"No, you don't understand. with how he is now... Sorry, but since you aren't Sloth soldiers, you cannot experience the benefits of the buffs that we get just by being near him..."

The young soldier sighed, sounding as if he was looking at something amazing.

"But that's not just it - by simply being in his proximity, it feels like someone is watching over us... As if he is watching over us... Not like the avatar of sloth... but, like, like a guardian, or a worried parent..."

The young soldier fidgeted and his voice started sounding a bit hoarse as if they were about to cry.

"You can't even begin to imagine, how terrible it feels to know that we've lost a general like him before he could achieve his true potential..."

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Wait a fucking second! Shan-shan never mentioned THAT! Fucking, what?! He was supposed to be fucking general?!"

The sudden revelation was enough of a shock to completely shatter Lairs's kind-spoken persona.

"No, wait! When you say general, you mean a like a fucking leader or just some...?"

Lairs's ears twitched as she asked the young soldier, moving her hands as if she wanted to physically make the right words come out of her mouth.

"Um... I mean, the general of the army, the highest position in the Sloth territory aside from the avatar of sloth."

The young soldier sniffled and explained, a bit taken aback by the mage's sudden outburst.

"Fucking...! But that would make also make him a fucking noble, wouldn't it...?!"

Lairs shook her head in disbelief.

"Um... ye-yes. He is. I mean, he was. Until he deserted and got disowned by the Sloth family."

The soldier confirmed.

"Fuck me! Did any of you knew about that?!"

Lairs gasped and looked at the other two, but both Uresha and Rotte shook their heads with utterly shocked expressions.

"Shan-shan! Why don't you fucking say something!"

Lairs looked at the rat-faced man surrounded by the young soldiers.

"Don't you fucking try to act dumb! We know that you can fucking hear us! You're like fucking nine feet away and have your fucking detection skills active!"

She exclaimed, very much moved, but still minding how loud she got - the presence hiding skills only blocked the sounds up to a certain level of volume, after all.

"Lairs, you're scaring the kids."

The rat-faced man sighed without even glancing back at his companions, fully focused on what was going on inside the mist surrounding them from every direction.

"Don't pull fucking kids into this talk, Shan-shan! Why the fuck did you hide from us that you were a fucking...!"

"Raa!"

"...!?!"

At that moment, the long-clawed wolf let out a short, cautious bark, causing the elven mage to flinch and look around cautiously.

"Yes, I've noticed it too."

Shanks stopped and nodded at the wolf.

"Everyone, get into defense position, be ready to retreat at my command."

He commanded and all the young soldiers listened to him without a moment of hesitation forming a proper formation.

"There's either a throne or a cherubim camping right by a few of our missing supply crates... damned thing seems to be collecting them for some reason."

Shanks scoffed annoyed, using his detection skills to continuously check the surroundings.

"...tsk..."

He clicked his tongue and looked around.

"If anyone got the quest about defeating the highest order angel-class monster, raise your hand."

He added.

The young soldiers looked at each other, but no one ended up coming forward.

"...we might be in trouble... but don't panic."

Shanks said breathing out slowly.

"Shanks... could you explain what is it about? What throne or cherubim?"

Uresha fidgeted nervously, worried over her husband's behavior.

The rat-faced man looked at her and made a sour expression.

He started playing with the silver wedding ring on his finger, and it took him a good minute before he responded.

"The two I mentioned are angel-class monsters. Humanoid type. Usually between sixteen and twenty-four feet tall. Two sets of arms, three faces, one normal, two on each side of its head. Big wings. They can and will fly, but mostly prefers to follow their prey on foot. Use fire skills to create flaming swords that move according to their will. While they cannot match a titan-class's physical strength, there were cases of a seraphim - the strongest angel-class of the highest order - chasing off a close combat type titan-class by using the long-range fire skills. All angel-class have the highest MDF out of all the known monsters and are far smarter and far crueler than humans. But the ones from these parts have been exposed to the confusing mist for too long, and mostly reverted back into savage beasts, just like all the other monsters living here. The problem is, this one seems to have retained enough intelligence to set up a trap."

The indifferent delivery of the book definition of the monster, followed by a tired sigh and an annoyed comment, caused the Dandelions to shudder.

"How do you know that? Don't tell me you have such good memory that you remember all the things they taught you here thirty years ago?! But that would mean that you also remember that time I...!"

Rotte gasped looking slightly terrified for some reason.

"It's not like that."

Shanks shook his head, cutting Rotte off before the warrior could blab out his secret.

"You heard the kid. When I escaped, I got disowned and the avatar of sloth sealed basically all of my skills. Well, you remember how I was called over to see the higher-ups before we departed?"

The rat-faced man asked and smirked.

"We've made a deal. Some of my hidden affinities and old skills got unsealed so that we could complete the retrieval quest using as little resources as possible."

He explained.

"One of them is a skill that acts as a proxy in connecting me to the system's core. That's one of the perks of being the direct descendant of the Sloth family - Sophia - knowledge of the system."

Shanks shrugged his shoulders looking back in the direction of the angel-class monster.

"...our monster is acting odd... it's just sitting by the crates... oh! It stood up!"

Shanks's eyes widened.