Gotta go play

Dea-kun brought back some cute girl.

Is he cheating on me!? I braced myself for a second, but apparently not.

"So anyway, it seems her homeland is being attacked by a dragon."

"I see. You really are kind, Dea-kun."

I patted his head approvingly. A dragon demanding a sacrifice… that's so classic it actually gets me a little excited.

"Well then, shall we go check it out? This village of yours?"

"Eh, for real, Anego?"

"I was just waiting for Dea-kun's tournament to wrap up anyway. Besides, if we leave things alone, some innocent girl is going to end up as a sacrifice, right?"

"As expected of you, Onee-san. I knew you'd say that."

Dea-kun praised me, but my motives weren't that noble.

I mean, what a waste. If you're just going to feed them to a dragon, give them to me instead, right? The Goddess would be way happier having them make socks than becoming dragon chow.

Not that I'd say any of that out loud. Not the kind of thing that helps your favorability rating.

"But of course, it won't be free."

"Eh, ah—"

"That's right. It wouldn't be fair to do this for nothing. You should properly pay for the special skill of being able to negotiate with dragons."

"—Yes, of course…"

The robed girl looked like she wanted to say something, but snapped her mouth shut when Dea-kun backed me up. We squeeze every last drop of compensation out of people, that's how we roll!

"Oh, about the payment. We have enough money for now, so any unwanted Divine Artifacts or socks will do."

"Eh, so-cks? Um, Divine Artifacts or socks… ah, I must've misheard. Sorry."

"No, you heard right. Well, there are various conditions though."

"… ?? Huh? Huh…???"

The robed girl had giant question marks practically floating over her head. She's got a cute face too, and her chest looks sneakily big, so there's plenty to hope for when it comes to her socks' value.

If I deliver her socks as a matching set with the yet-unseen sacrifice girl's, the Goddess would probably be thrilled.

"Oh right. Maybe I should invite Misha too?"

"… Come to think of it, she just sort of settled into our base at some point. Is that okay?"

"Well, she's a pet. I already gave her a key and everything."

Misha, owner of the butt the Goddess loves most. With that typical carefree nature of cat beastkin, she'd somehow won herself the pet slot at our base.

She'll instantly show her belly to Arthur, the senior pet, putting her firmly at the bottom of the pecking order, yet she sees Dea-kun and Aishia as beings to be protected while constantly challenging me and Mashiro-san to fights. That's the kind of pet she is.

Incidentally, she offers her "butt" as rent, and the Five Elders are all busy researching it. (She also still thinks they're fake Five Elders and is getting played.)

"… Um, well, if possible, just Miko-hime-sama and Dragon-sama alone… it's a hidden village, so inviting too many people…"

"What? A hidden village? Now I absolutely have to go."

"Onee-san really does love this kind of thing. Me too."

"There's quite a few of those, y'know? Oh, wanna go to the Dragon Village sometime? You could beat them all into submission and stand at the top, Anego."

The Dragon Village. That does sound tempting… though there probably aren't any cute girls there. Arthur did say dragons in this world don't transform into humans.

"Ah… but if it's only the Miko-hime, then I can't go, can I?"

"… Ugh… f-fine! Your attendants can come along too…!"

"You heard her! Good for you, Dea-kun!"

"Yes!"

"In this case, does 'attendant' mean Dea-kun-chan or Anego?"

Hahaha, let's not ask such tactless questions, Arthur. Words sure are tricky!