Vur tilted his head. “Gluttonous Gourmet club?”

“That’s right,” the dog said and stood up on its hindlegs. Its front paw tapped against its chest in what it thought was a reassuring manner. “I’m the leader of the Gluttonous Gourmet club. You can call me Sir Selddup.”

Stella poked her head out of Vur’s chest. “You?” she asked. “You’re the leader?”

“Why?” Sir Selddup asked, his furry face contorting into a scowl. “Are you looking down on me because I’m a dog?”

“No,” Stella said and shook her head. “It just doesn’t seem very leaderly of you to eat here.”

Sir Selddup snorted. “What would you know?” he asked. “Angelo is the only chef capable of bringing out the true flavors of reptile meat. It’s not my fault he refuses to become my personal chef and chooses to work here instead as a mentor. As the leader of the Gluttonous Gourmet club, I don’t mind lowering myself to eat good food. Besides, it’s not like pride does anyone any good; it can’t even be eaten.”

Vur took a seat beside the white dog, sitting with his legs crossed. “Do you know Ashley?”

Sir Selddup snarled, his lips drawing back to reveal his teeth. “There’s a lot of Ashleys, but if you’re talking about the Light Lord, I know her.” He squinted at Vur. “In fact, she told me about you. It’s very rare for her to recommend someone to join my club. Because you have her recommendation, there’s just one thing you have to do to join.”

Vur yawned and scratched his chest. “What is it?”

“It’s very simple,” Sir Selddup said and withdrew a black box from his root bracelet. “This is an audio recorder. All you have to do is say, ‘the Light Lord is a terrible pet owner, and her brain has more holes than a cheese grater,’ and I’ll let you join the Gluttonous Gourmets.”

Vur raised his head, angling it to the side. The hostess from earlier was approaching with a steaming, metal bowl. An awkward smile appeared on her face as she glanced around. “Excuse me, sir, would you like to eat at a table?” she asked, her body turning towards an empty seat nearby.

“No,” Vur said. Table? What kind of dragon used tables? Without Tafel or Lindyss around, he didn’t have to care about manners and all that. Vur raised his left hand, and a gust of wind sucked the metal bowl out of the hostess grip. It flew into Vur’s waiting fingers, and he placed the bowl down on his calves. As if he were eating from a bag of chips, Vur dipped his hand into the bowl of steaming meat and grabbed a piece. He brought it up to his mouth and stuffed the whole piece inside.

Sir Selddup gulped and stared at the bowl of food resting on Vur’s legs. He turned his furry head towards the hostess and barked at her. “Another bowl for me too!”

A dark expression appeared on the hostess’ face, but when she recalled how the dog’s tail had expanded and crushed someone, who was still lying on the ground in a heap, she put her best business smile on and nodded. “Right away,” she said and turned around before walking away as fast as she could without running.

“This is good,” Vur said and licked his lips, his tongue lapping up the sauce around his mouth. “What is it?”

“It is good, right?” Sir Selddup asked, his face beaming as if he were the one that had been complimented. “I didn’t expect the person Ashley recommended to actually have an appreciation of food. Most people won’t even try fermented alligator meat even though it’s a delicacy.” Sir Selddup gulped again as he watched Vur stuff another piece of meat into his mouth. “Even without Ashley’s recommendation, I would invite you to join my club, but I suppose I wouldn’t be down here on the same floor as you if it weren’t for her. Right, I still have to record you insulting her to let you in.”

“Let me try some,” Stella said and flew down from Vur’s chest. She dipped her finger into the sauce and brought it up to her nose. She recoiled at the smell before sticking out her tongue, tasting the reddish-brown liquid. Her eyes lit up, and she grabbed a small piece of meat with both her hands, almost falling into the bowl in the process. She turned her head towards the white dog. “You eat food like this every day in your club?”

“No,” Sir Selddup said and leaned to the side, looking past Vur towards the kitchen area. The hostess was talking an awfully long time to come back with his food. It had almost been a minute! The dog sat back down on its haunches and licked its lips. “A major part of the Gluttonous Gourmets is discovering new and delicious foods. Sometimes, the food is new but not delicious, you know what I mean? After we eat a new meal, we write down our thoughts and give it a thorough review. When we can’t find any new meals to try for the day, then we’ll go through our old reviews and eat things we gave five stars.”

Stella nodded as she chewed with a full mouth. She swallowed and let out a small belch. “I see,” she said. “So, you guys are like food critics? Do restaurants pay you to review their meals?”

“Even if they wanted to, we wouldn’t accept,” Sir Selddup said and shook his head. “Our reviews are classified, only viewable by members of the club. If everyone and their mamas knew where all the good food ingredients were at, wouldn’t we be shooting ourselves in the foot? If we published our reviews, dozens of ecosystems would definitely be destroyed, and we wouldn’t be able to eat those dishes again.”

“That makes sense,” Stella said and took another bite out of the piece of meat she was holding. It didn’t take much effort for her to rip a strip off with her teeth.

“So, are you joining or not?” Sir Selddup asked and held out the audio recorder.