Jealousy

Unable to refute Ren's words, everyone else could only glare at him and look away from the dead slave.

"Hey, where are all of you guys headed?"

Kio asked the remaining adventurers, as he didn't know much about this world.

Even though Fae invited him to her home, he still wanted to learn more about this continent, increasing his options in the future since he cant stay at her home forever.

"We're all heading towards the Omni Empire to the west."

The Omni Empire was located at the center of the Krichez Continent, with numerous towns and cities in their territory.

They were currently in the Aeon Kingdom, which was reduced to a single city and a few villages after all the repeated wars against the Omni Empire.

The next closest town was at least a few days away from their current location, but they had no other choice.

If they stayed here or in the surrounding villages, they were bound to encounter more of these zombies.

The adventurers then began to rummage through the dead bodies around them, searching for any valuable loot they could find.

Although Kio and the girls knew that it was the smart thing to do, since they were currently penniless in this world, they couldn't bring themselves to do the same as it was too disgusting and immoral.

As Kio resolved himself to at least grab a few coins, Kaori and Miyu were clinging tightly to his clothes, causing him to be unable to move.

Kaori and Miyu had been frightened by all the bloodshed and gore that just happened in front of them.

Aside from the sight of their parents' death, they had never been exposed to such a scene before, due to the relatively peaceful world they lived in previously.

They were both summoned after all the fighting at the plaza and slave building were over, so they were unaccustomed to the dangers of this world.

Luna managed to handle it a little better, since she had learned how to fight from a young age.

Her upbringing required her to fight wild beasts and monsters as training, so she was desensitized to the sight of blood and gore.

Aside from Kio and his party members, Luna didn't really care about the lives of other humans, especially after she witnessed how vile, shameless, and evil they could be.

"Sigh…"

Kio gave up on looting the dead bodies, as he turned around and patted the girls' heads, before bringing them in for a hug.

"Everything is fine now. As long as I'm here, nothing will happen to you two…"

Their shaking slowly stopped as they calmed down in his arms.

Luna had been standing close to them, observing their actions.

'Why do I feel so uncomfortable in my heart…'

As Luna had never felt jealous of anyone before, she wasn't used to this emotion.

"Mary, go stay with Kio's group for now ok?"

"Okay~"

After Mary walked away from him, Dan began to walk around the bodies, hoping to find something useful.

"Oho?"

He stopped beside the dead body of a fatter male, as something beside his waist caught his interest.

He knelt down a bit and picked up a small pouch, which had a bulge in the shape of a cube.

Inside of it was a small box, which looked similar to the one that Dan used to store all of his items from his store.

Although it was an Item Box, it was an inferior version that could only store 25 kg worth of items.

Rummaging through the Item Box, Dan took out some items for himself, before tossing it over towards Kio.

"Here, catch!"

"???"

As Kio realized what it was, he quickly asked Dan, "Why did you give such a valuable item to me? I can't accept such a gift for no reason."

"Just take it. You guys will need it since you just came to this world, right?"

Unable to reject his kindness, Kio decided to just accept it.

"Then, thank you. This would help a lot."

As Kio looked inside, he noticed a few coins and stones in it.

Putting aside the stones with unknown functions, he counted the coins and calculated it to be a total of 4 gold, 30 silver, and 10 copper coins.

Before he could say something, Dan managed to speak first.

"You have a few girls to look after, so just accept what's in there."

"Thanks. I will definitely pay you back for this favor."

"Ahahaha, alright."

After taking all of the stones and coins inside the Item Box, he stored them in his Inventory, since the Item Box could easily get stolen.

Next, Kio decided to take out some sweets, like candies, chocolate bars, and chips, and stored them in the Item Box.

He also placed some other nutritious food such as protein bars, dried fruit, and cereal in there.

Then, he passed the item box to Luna, who looked back at him with a confused face.

"???"

"Take it, Luna. You can have it and eat the snacks in there when you get hungry."

"B-but.."

"You look way too thin right now. I'm sure you would look a lot more beautiful if you weren't so malnourished."

"..."

Luna became embarrassed as she realized he had a point, since she was barely able to fill her stomach during her days as a slave.

Taking a peek inside, she became delighted at all the different kinds of food in there that she had never seen before.

She felt immense gratitude for Kio's care towards her health.

'Is this what it feels like to be taken care of by your partner?'

When she was younger, before getting caught as a slave, Luna had learned how to procure her own food, so she missed the feeling of being spoiled by somebody.

She couldn't remember the last time her parents or anybody else had treated her this well.

Looking at her gleeful expression, Kio had a smile on his face as he patted her head.

He remembered her request to deepen their bond yesterday, so he gave her a second option.

"Would you rather hold hands instead?"

Luna thought about it for quite some time, as she enjoyed both the head pats and holding hands.

Since she held his hand for the entire night yesterday, she told him, "This is fine for today."

"What about us?"

Kaori felt jealous of all the attention he was giving Luna.

She was his family, his sister, yet he treated Luna better than her, and even displayed it in front of her.

"Haha. Are you jealous, Kaori? I thought you asked me to 'stop acting so close' a few years ago. You even told me that all your friends called you a bro-con after they saw us one day."

As Kaori heard his words, she remembered what happened in the past.

...

They had always been together, going shopping, playing games, and eating meals together.

However, after one of her friends from school spotted her being so close with her brother, they all began to make fun of her, giving her weird nicknames.

That night, she went home and complained about it, crying in her brother's arms.

After he gently comforted her, she told him that they should stop acting so close in public, which eventually created a bit of distance between them.

…

Even though she was the one who suggested it in the past, she also missed being spoiled by him.

"B-but…"

Looking at her troubled expression, Kio knew she was conflicted about it.

Even though she wanted him to care about her, she was also too shy to directly express it because it had been a long time since they acted as such.

"Sigh… come here, Kaori."

Pulling her into his embrace, he gave her a hug and told her.

"You shouldn't worry so much about what others say about you. If you want me to dote on you, all you had to do was ask."

"..."

Kaori made sure he couldn't see her face before she nodded, since she knew it must be deep red right now.

"Kaori, I'll teach you and Miyu how to use Inventory once we have time, okay? That way, I can let you store some snacks to eat whenever you want."

"Mmm, sure."

Kaori nodded as she was still in his arms.

She felt glad for voicing out her frustration, since it felt like the distance between them had shortened a bit.

At the edge of his view, he noticed Miyu with a conflicted facial expression.

But as soon as he looked at her, she turned around and chatted with Mary.

"?"

Kio was confused about her reaction, but he decided to ignore it since he already had his hands full with Kaori and Luna.