Ren's Offer

*Cough*

"Ahem. You girls sure look cute after a bath. Especially you, Kaori."

Kaori rolled her eyes as she heard his words.

She knew his praise was mainly directed at Luna, but she decided to forgive him since he promised he would spoil her more.

"Luna, I'm glad those clothes fit you. Riko only passed me clothes that were intended for Kaori and Miyu."

Aside from the dirty slavery rag, Luna only had the clothes that Kio passed her yesterday, so he was glad that her size was similar to the two girls.

Kio couldn't allow her to wear the same dirty clothes again, especially after they finally got a chance to take a bath.

The girls didn't seem to mind sharing their clothes either, as they knew Luna didn't have anything else to wear.

'Well, I never did tell them that all of those clothes are theirs…'

With a clean body and new clothes, Luna looked absolutely stunning.

As Kio stared at her, he thought she could even be a top model back in his world.

Luna's glossy silver hair, smooth pale skin, light purple eyes, and rosy lips would definitely cause many males to have vulgar intentions towards her.

As he saw her lips, he remembered that it was slightly cracked when they kissed this morning, so he passed her a lip balm.

"???"

Seeing her confused expression, Kio opened the lip balm and applied it on her lips.

This meticulous action combined with his previous stares had caused her to blush intensely.

Seeing how Kio couldn't take his eyes off her, Dan walked over and patted his shoulder.

"Ahahaha. Don't forget what we just talked about."

After saying that with a smirk on his face, Dan walked away to compliment his daughter, so Kio turned his focus back onto Luna.

"You look so much cuter after taking a bath."

"T-thanks…"

As she replied to him, Luna looked down towards the ground, with her hands on her cheeks.

'Why am I feeling so shy… even if I did decide on Kio as my partner, I don't know why I'm feeling like this…'

Looking over towards the other girls, Mary was wearing dark brown trousers with a simple white shirt.

Since she was still a little young, Mary couldn't fit into any of Kaori or Miyu's clothes.

When he glanced over at his sister and Miyu, they wore identical short jeans, and matching cardigans over a white t-shirt.

Kaori's cardigan was black, while Miyu's was beige.

Although they saw Kio's infatuated look earlier, Kaori decided to just observe for now, since it's an undeniable fact that Riko had died.

Besides, if Kio really loved Riko, Kaori thought that Luna wouldn't be able to interfere anyway once they revive her.

Unfortunately for her, she wasn't present at the time when Dan had suggested the idea of a harem to Kio, otherwise she would have complained about it.

Fae had worn her simple green tunic and skirt before leaving to find her fellow elves.

As the girls had finished wearing their clothes, it was now Kio, Dan, and the male elves' turn to clean themselves.

When Kio undressed and entered the lake, he could still smell the residual shampoo smell from when the girls bathed a few minutes ago.

'What am I doing, I'm not a pervert.'

Shaking his head, he tried to erase the thoughts that occupied his mind for a brief moment.

…

After the guys finished cleaning, they all returned to the others who were sitting down on the plains close to the lake.

Saotome and the three remaining slaves had washed their bodies at the lake with Ren, giving the adventurers a feast for their eyes.

Fae didn't bother to share her private bathing location with Saotome and the slaves.

As Ren noticed Kio's group coming back, his eyes instantly landed on the girls, especially on Luna's alluring body and lovely face.

Lust overwhelmed him as he began plotting on how to steal her away.

'No matter what, I have to be the first one to taste her, before Kio does it.'

With that thought in mind, he called out to them.

"Oi, Kio."

"???"

"I just remembered, you don't have a set of armor for yourself, right?"

"So what?"

"Well, didn't you think it was dangerous back then, fighting those zombies without armor?"

"Yea? What's your point?"

"How about I offer you one of my spare set of steel armor?"

"..."

"Are you interested?"

"What's the catch?"

"Oh? It's nothing much, and I'm even willing to trade at a loss. A set of steel armor for your cheap slave."

"No."

"Ahaha, I knew you would accep- Wait, what?"

"I said no. I'm not trading."

"Why? Don't you need the armor to keep yourself safe?"

"..."

"How about just for 1 night? A set of brand new steel armor for lending me your slave for 1 night, isn't that worth it?"

"Fuck off. I'm not trading Luna for anything."

"Haaah???"

As Luna heard their whole conversation, she was initially worried over what Kio would do.

She didn't want Ren to be her master, as she absolutely detested him.

After she heard Kio's refusal, she felt relieved and blessed to have him as her master and partner.

She knew other humans would probably accept the offer, as their greed had no limits.

As Ren became more irritated at Kio's refusal, he took out his spear and pointed it towards Kio.

"You should think carefully about my offer. If you refuse it one more time, I won't be polite anymore."

As Kio was about to move his hand to grab something on his waist, Luna reacted first.

"SCRAM!!!"

"Ughh!"

"Kyaah!"

Luna used her skill [Dragon's Roar], which had reverted back to level 1 due to her seal.

Even though Ren was wearing a set of steel armor, it was useless against her skill which bypasses armor, causing him to bleed from his eardrums.

As he was feeling dizzy, Ren knelt down with his hands on the floor, panting from the pain.

'That fucking slave, I'll teach her who's boss later.'

As Ren was incapacitated at the moment, Kio and the rest walked away from him.

Glaring at their backs, Ren started to plan his revenge.

'I'll fucking ruin all three of those girls in front of you once I get the chance…'

…

After leaving the confrontation, they all sat in a circle on the grass, taking a lunch break as some of their stomach rumbled earlier.

"Thanks for earlier, Luna."

"Mmm…"

Leaning on his shoulder, Luna felt happy to help him earlier.

When she was still in the cage, she had witnessed many humans treating slaves like disposable objects.

Even the slave owner kept some of his favorite voluptuous slaves in his own room, unleashing his lust on them every night.

She was glad that her body was too young to his liking, otherwise she would've turned out like all the others that he had violated.

Kio took out a bottle of lemon tea and passed it to her, after he unsealed the cap.

"Here, drink this. Just in case you have a sore throat from earlier."

"..."

Luna pecked him on the cheek before taking the lemon tea from him.

As he noticed Dan staring at them with a big grin on his face, Kio threw a small package of beef jerky at him.

"What's this?"

"Try it. I bet you're gonna love it so much more than your dried meat."

Tearing the plastic open, Dan took out a small piece and tasted it.

"Holy shit! These things taste 10x better than the dried piece of crap I ate yesterday!"

"See? I knew you would love it."

"Hahaha."

Everyone laughed as they enjoyed seeing Dan's reaction.

After enjoying a few more snacks, they all stood up and got ready to leave.

The other adventurers were already preparing to move, as did Ren and his girls.

Fae and the other elves have been waiting for a while already, although they didn't want to interact with any of the other humans around them.

Along the way to the next town, they encountered a few groups of beasts and monsters, such as boars, snakes, and goblins.

As Dan noticed Kio's sword was chipped and damaged, he took out a steel short sword of decent quality and passed it to him.

"I can't take something this valuable for free."

"Who said I'm giving it to you? I want it back after we reach the town."

"Haha, alright."

"Now go fight those monsters. Since one of your requests was to receive training, you better not expect me to go easy on you."

Yesterday night, when Dan promised Kio some favors, aside from joining Kio's party, he also agreed to teach him a bit of the basics regarding swordsmanship.

Since Dan didn't think it was a big deal, he decided to train Kio whenever they have time.

Dan also gave a few wooden spears to the girls, and taught them how to defend themselves in case something happens.

Since Kaori and Miyu didn't have a class yet, and he didn't know Luna's class, Dan wasn't able to give them much advice aside from small techniques for self-protection.

Dan didn't have the [Inspect] skill to check their classes, but he was informed about Kaori and Miyu not having a class from Kio.

Kio also mentioned that Luna's class is a secret, and even though Dan was a bit curious, he decided not to pester them about it.

He mainly taught Kio the basic offensive and defensive postures, where to place your center of gravity, as well as some basic sword moves.

As Kio was learning these things while fighting weak monsters, he made a lot of mistakes, such as not paying attention to his surroundings, having an incorrect posture, and occasionally making large swings that would leave him wide open to counterattacks.

Luckily for him, the monsters he faced were pretty weak, and Dan was always there to prevent him from getting any serious injuries.

Aside from training, they also managed to harvest a few herbs around the forest as Dan was familiar with some of them.

They managed to pick up some blue and white herbs, where the blue herbs were able to relieve pain and the white herbs could cure mild poisons.

As this repeated for a couple of hours, they managed to reach a fork in the road as the sky was turning dark.