As for the Favor Crest among those five skills, which Fati had been deliberately ignoring,
His mind stirred, and he inconspicuously called up his own status panel, locking his gaze on the skill column.
While Fati was immersed in thought, in the kitchen, Jeanne felt that burning gaze behind her disappear and quietly breathed a sigh of relief.
For some reason, being watched so intently by Fati always made an inexplicable wave of shyness and nervousness rise in her heart.
‘What’s wrong with me…
I’m just being looked at…’
The Holy Maiden fell into a small bout of distress.
However, at this moment, Fati had no time to pay attention to the girl’s subtle little movements.
His attention was completely drawn to the strange linkage between his and Jeanne’s’Skills’.
His gaze swept across the panel and instantly locked onto the target:
Favor Blessing
Offer a beautiful blessing to the favored one, granting protection to members of the same Familia; The more opposite-sex members in the same Familia and the higher the intimacy, the stronger the protection effect;
…This skill description seems to say nothing, yet says everything.
Jeanne’s Favor Crest is undoubtedly the aura effect or linkage product generated by his own Favor Blessing skill!
For a long time, he had been unable to fully understand the operational mechanism of this skill.
The reason was simple:
First: He didn’t have a Familia.
The skill clearly stated “granting protection to members of the same Familia.” Without a Familia, where would the protection come from?
Second: Again, because he didn’t have a Familia, he had no way to test it at all.
Thinking of this, Fati suddenly felt a cold sweat of lingering fear.
‘What if, what if that [Invitation] hadn’t summoned a female companion…
wouldn’t I have crashed and burned on the spot?!’
‘Fortunately, it seems the system’s hidden screening mechanism perfectly matches my…
uh, core demands…’
Now he understood; the mystery was finally solved.
Comparing his Favor Blessing with Jeanne’s Favor Crest, how could Fati not understand the implicit meaning behind it?
“Tch, who are you looking down on?
Am I that kind of person?
An all-female Familia or whatever…”
He said that, but his heart was filled with wild joy:
“As expected of my system, it really knows me well.”
…After the housework was finished, the two went back to their respective rooms early.
One took advantage of the recovery period to race against time to study the newly acquired Magic and skill combinations, restructuring his combat mode.
The other, having experienced the massive ups and downs from death to rebirth and then joining a Familia within a single day, was already mentally exhausted and fell asleep almost as soon as her head hit the pillow.
By the pillow, the open common language textbook was unconsciously brushed aside…
The next morning, sunlight poured down, the trees were lush, and the morning dew sparkled like bright pearls with a unique light.
“Creak—”
Jeanne pushed open the window and stood before it.
She raised her hand to tuck a stray strand of golden hair behind her ear, squinted slightly, and let the morning breeze, carrying the fragrance of grass and trees, gently brush against her cheeks.
She took a deep breath and stretched her body toward the dawn.
“Whew…
so comfortable…”
This sense of peaceful and harmonious daily life made her tense soul feel soothed, bringing a sense of unprecedented relaxation and ease.
Jeanne enjoyed this sense of daily life immensely.
Just then, there was a slight movement in the yard.
She looked toward the sound and saw Fati holding a watering can, leisurely tending to that small “garden.”
Sensing her gaze, Fati turned his head to look.
Their eyes met.
He showed a row of neat white teeth and greeted her with a bright smile:
“Yo, good morning, Jeanne.
How did you sleep last night?
Are you used to it?”
For some reason, Fati’s hearty smile reminded her of yesterday’s somewhat burning gaze.
Her cheeks flushed slightly, and she nodded imperceptibly:
“Um…
very peacefully.
It’s been a long time…
since I slept so deeply.”
Fati chuckled and said:
“It’s good that you’re used to it.
Once I’m done serving these little cuties, I’ll prepare breakfast.”
Having just moved into someone else’s house and then “reaping without sowing,” Jeanne felt a bit guilty and quickly spoke up:
“Bre—breakfast, let me prepare it?”
“You prepare it?”
Fati raised an eyebrow, his tone gentle but with a bit of teasing:
“Let’s talk about that in a while.
To cook, you have to get familiar with the kitchen first, right?
I don’t want to see the Holy Maiden in a fluster on her first morning, getting all tangled up with a spatula.”
As if foreseeing her own potential awkwardness, Jeanne bit her lower lip and replied with a bit of a huff:
“Then…
then, alright.”
…Breakfast was sweet and spicy beef pancakes full of the local style of the Sword-Making City, paired with a rich milk corn chowder and refreshing side dishes.
As a meticulous man, Fati naturally took Jeanne’s taste preferences into account.
In addition to these local specialties, he also specially toasted soft bread and prepared jam, butter, as well as orange juice, milk, and coffee.
In his impression, French breakfast wasn’t that important, and in that region, it was also called a’small meal’.
Most people, under normal circumstances, just threw something together to get it over with, or even just finished with a cup of coffee.
But he didn’t want to be sloppy, so he used the ingredients available at home to carefully put together this table.
“Eh?
You know the taste of my hometown’s food?”
At the dining table, as soon as Jeanne sat down opposite him, she was surprised to find those familiar dishes.
“Who do you think I am?”
Fati pushed a glass of warm milk in front of her:
“They’re all on the sweet side.
Eat up and taste my cooking.
If the jam, butter, or coffee doesn’t suit your taste, we can change brands when we go shopping later.”
Jeanne looked steadily at this man who was currently taking large bites of a pancake, appearing somewhat “rugged” yet incredibly attentive; a warm current quietly welled up in her heart.
This feeling of being properly cared for brought her an unprecedented sense of stability and warmth.
“I’m starting now.”
She said softly, picking up her knife and fork…
This seemingly simple breakfast gave Jeanne a huge appetite.
Under Fati’s disbelieving gaze, she actually finished nearly two-thirds of the food on the table!
“How can that flat stomach of yours hold so much food?
Could it be…
this is also a manifestation of talent?”
As a “Talentless Person” who could only barely get by by relying on cheats, Fati felt the chasm between himself and a gifted person up close for the first time.
As everyone knows, whether one can eat or not is a very probable way to judge an Adventurer’s potential.
Clearly, Jeanne belonged to the exceptionally gifted category.
Being told that, Jeanne’s cheeks flushed red again.
“I—I don’t know why I suddenly became so capable of eating…”
Hearing her answer, Fati was thoughtful:
“It should be the favor stimulating your potential.
Your body is instinctively taking in a large amount of nutrients to make up for the deficit that wasn’t fully developed before.”
“Is that so?”
Jeanne’s eyes were still filled with a sense of vacancy.
“Well, let’s just understand it that way.
It should be something like that, I guess?”
Fati nodded, though he wasn’t actually sure himself.
Don’t ask; if you do, the answer is just the unknowns of the Lower World…
Breakfast over, the two tidied up the dishes in tacit agreement.
After a quick wash, they headed out together.
The two strolled leisurely through tree-lined alleys, where the chirping of cicadas and birds rose and fell in turn.
After a few turns, they soon merged into the crowd on the main road.
Passing through the bustling residential area, Fati led Jeanne onto Adventurer Street with practiced ease.
Along the way, the “country girl” who was seeing so many demi-humans for the first time couldn’t stop marveling.
“Incredible, there are actually so many races from myths and legends…”
“Elves, Dwarves, Beastmen, Amazons, Dwarves, Humans…
this city is practically a melting pot of races.”
Seeing Jeanne’s wonder at everything new, Fati couldn’t help but recall how he felt when he first “awakened.”
He, too, had been overwhelmed by the impact of this bizarre and colorful otherworldly realm.
This constant shock from the exotic atmosphere and fantasy setting had taken him several days to slowly adjust to.
Even for a long time afterward, he would occasionally feel a sense of surreal detachment.
Finally, Fati concluded that this was likely the unique mental state of a transmigrator…
Walking side-by-side with the young woman, Fati softly answered the doubts that occasionally surfaced in her mind.
“Fati, is the rest of the world like this too?
Um, I mean…
this kind of multi-racial coexistence…”
Facing Jeanne’s “I’m curious” look, the corner of Fati’s mouth twitched upward almost imperceptibly.
“Of course…” he intentionally dragged out his tone, “…not.”
Seeing Jeanne’s focused expression, he continued to explain:
“This city’s full name is ‘The Center of the World, Labyrinth City, Orario’.”
“Because of the Dungeon’s existence, and because this is the core production site for Magic Stone Products, Adventurers, merchants, and nobles from all over the world are drawn here like magnets.”
“It is precisely this gathering that has created the unique sight of multi-racial coexistence before your eyes.”
“In other places, like ordinary villages or towns—especially in settlements dominated by us humans—it’s difficult to see other demi-humans at all.
Races like Elves, who live deep in the forests, are even rarer.”
“In other corners of the world, the various races generally…
stay in their own lanes and don’t bother one another.
You understand what I mean, right?”
Fati’s phrasing was diplomatic, but Jeanne instantly understood the unspoken meaning behind his words.
Putting herself in those shoes, as a human, even members of the same race constantly slaughtered each other over various stances, let alone different races.
Conflicts over faith, culture, habits, diet, interests, land, and so on would inevitably lead to chaos.
Thus, Jeanne wasn’t at all surprised to receive this answer.
“I see.
Then the existence of Orario must be called a miracle…”
“A miracle?
Perhaps.”