The restaurant was loud and alive — bards performing in groups, voices overlapping from every direction. Elsa had never eaten in an environment like this before.
Back at the Bedford household, meals had always been taken in quiet. Sali frequently had matters to attend to and missed them entirely, which meant she generally ate alone under the watchful attendance of servants.
At the Light Eagle Corps, things were livelier — meals with her squad or the other mercenaries had a certain energy to them. But it was still only mercenaries. The base was inconvenient to travel from, and the captain-level members had effectively become nobles of the Royal Capital by reputation. When they went out to eat, they chose places that suited people of standing.
A loud, crowded dining hall like this was, genuinely, a new experience.
"The ingredients here come in fresh every day from the Gourmet Zone. The presentation isn't particularly refined, but the flavor is absolutely first-rate," Luluwo said with enthusiasm. "And tonight it's the elven chef Kuripa cooking. You're in for something special."
Elsa studied the menu for a considerable length of time before settling on a dish called Glowing Egg Fried Rice and a Hot Spring Happiness Egg.
"Two servings of cocoa sponge cake as well — cut from a Caste Leo," Tami told the waiter, then turned to Elsa with a smile. "When we first met, you stole my chocolate. You like cocoa, right?"
Elsa's face went slightly pink. She'd been completely out of supplies that day, hungry past the point of restraint. Before she could say anything in her own defense, Luluwo cut in.
"I want cake too. Extra-rich cocoa version for me."
"Double-concentration cocoa sauce on mine," Belto said, pushing his glasses up with a smile that appeared specifically in the presence of sweets.
Mira, Ais, and Aim made identical requests without hesitation.
So the entire Skyrim Group was — not a cocoa group, but an enthusiastically committed sweet-tooth group?
While the food was being prepared, Luluwo and the others treated Elsa as though she had always been one of them and launched freely into their day's intelligence. A remarkable amount of information that would ordinarily have fetched a good price was handed over as casually as small talk. The complete lack of guardedness toward her was strange — and at the same time, unexpectedly relaxing.
The intelligence was genuinely entertaining.
Someone had attempted to poison Wolnir, intending to grind him down slowly. They dragged the attempt out too long and were crushed to dust by consecutive Divine Wrath.
A necromancer had tried applying the high-level necromancy spell Command Undead to the Overlord. The outcome had been, predictably, miserable.
Someone else had sent in a pack of canine beastmen, reasoning that their bloodline ability increased tooth damage against bone — with the goal of having the group literally eat Wolnir away piece by piece.
In the end, every single canine beastman had been lured away by skeleton warriors tossing dung pots, and had charged off in such a cheerful frenzy that it bordered on comedy.
There was even one person — a true creative thinker — who had awakened the Farron Undead Legion and attempted to herd them directly into Wolnir's boss room.
If Wade hadn't noticed immediately and sealed the fog gate in time, the plan might genuinely have worked.
One thrilling, absurd, entertaining piece of news after another drifted through the air of the table.
When the mood took them, they broke into roughhousing — Luluwo pinching Tami here, swatting Belto there, maintaining absolutely no trace of a captain's dignity and seeming entirely at peace with that fact. The chaos at their table blended seamlessly with everything happening around them.
The fireplace crackled. Adventurers at nearby tables laughed and argued. The bard's accordion floated through amplifying magic and wound itself between the smell of good food. Everyone in the room was shedding the weight of the day at full force. In that moment, this restaurant was the happiest place under the night sky of Liurnia of the Lakes.
The Mana absorbed by the Dungeon kept climbing.
Watching it all, Elsa found herself thinking of her own team. Compared to this, she realized her members never quite let themselves go fully when they were with her. Probably the weight of her captain status kept them at some distance, even in relaxed moments.
"Captain, we've been stuck in Endless Reincarnation for two days. Are the blessings we're farming actually going to be worth it?"
"Don't worry. Just believe in me the way I believe in you."
From their conversation, Elsa gradually pieced together why the Skyrim Group had been absent from the widely publicized assault on Wolnir over the past few days.
After fighting him once and concluding they couldn't win as they were, they had quietly retreated to the Endless Reincarnation roguelike in the Great Tomb area to grow stronger. Everyone knew that clearing Endless Reincarnation produced Proofs of Battle, which could be accumulated and exchanged for various rewards — including blessings with permanent effects.
The specific blessing Luluwo had identified after their first encounter with Wolnir was this one:
[Favor of the Dead: When fighting undead enemies, they will go easy on you.]
It had appeared before people like Leon and the Sword Saint and was generally considered one of the cheaper options — something most people who entered Endless Reincarnation would come across eventually. Its effect was exactly as described: when deepened sufficiently, undead opponents would occasionally hold back. In actual combat this meant attacks that would occasionally miss, damage that would occasionally drop. The trigger rate wasn't high, so people tended to regard it as mediocre.
The moment Luluwo had seen the Catacombs of Carthus, however, this blessing had come to mind immediately. In a fight against an Overlord, the margin for error was vanishingly small. One mistake, and you were dead. A blessing with a modest trigger rate could still meaningfully improve that pitiful margin — and in a fight like this, meaningfully was enough.
After farming the blessing, they had consulted Darrick and the other Farron Guards for advice, then entered the Painted World "Wolf Knight" — from which every member emerged with a Wolf Ring Replica.
[Wolf Ring Replica]
When actively activated, greatly increases the body's toughness. A resilient body and will cannot be interrupted by attacks.
Beyond that, to address the specific threat of Wolnir's sword, they had located something in the underground labyrinth of Liurnia of the Lakes:
[Uplifting Aromatic Recipe]
A technique belonging to the perfumers who participated in the wars during the Shattering, serving as soldiers.
Consumes magical power to invigorate the spirit, increase the strength of those nearby, and generate a one-time shield that greatly reduces damage taken.
This aromatic's morale-raising effect is so potent that those accustomed to it become genuinely fearless in the face of death — which is what made the perfumers exceptional battlefield commanders.
The effect was genuinely impressive to read. Unfortunately, the required crafting component — the perfume bottle — was a Sein Dungeon drop with a low rate. Between all of them, the Skyrim Group had no more than a handful of Uplifting Aromatics total.
Listening to all of it, Elsa couldn't help feeling quietly impressed. As expected of a strategy group — the moment they identified what they needed, they went and got it without hesitation.
Still. Could these things actually defeat Wolnir? Everything they had described was oriented toward reducing his damage output. What about actually hurting him? If their attacks couldn't meaningfully wound the Overlord, damage reduction alone wouldn't produce a victory. In Elsa's estimation, even the strongest among them — Luluwo — wasn't quite at Eliphis's level.
Surely they had something she hadn't imagined yet.
"I still can't believe it was Leon's group that found the most critical piece this time," Tami said as the food arrived, sighing between bites. "If not for what they discovered, we probably never would have figured it out in our entire lives."
"I'll let him have this one," Luluwo said, turning her head away with textbook tsundere energy.
"Who could have guessed that the fearsome Overlord would have that kind of relationship with the Abyss — and that it was only through a stolen holy relic that he—"
What kind of relationship? Stolen what?
Elsa was listening with absolute focus, but at precisely that moment the waiter arrived to serve the food and redirected Luluwo's entire attention in one motion. The atmosphere shifted instantaneously from professional intelligence exchange to pure, unapologetic food enthusiasm. The gear change was almost physical.
With things going this way, pressing further felt awkward. Just then the waiter placed a covered dish in front of Elsa and gestured for her to open it.
And suddenly — every person in the restaurant was looking at her.
W-what's going on? Is there something wrong with what I ordered?
She stiffened, caught off guard.
Tami's expression held a hint of anticipation. "Go ahead, open it."
What was wrong with everyone?
Elsa frowned and lifted the lid off the Glowing Egg Fried Rice.
A flash-bang detonated. The fried rice erupted in glittering special effects that briefly covered every set of eyes in range.
When the light faded — where had Elsa gone?
"Hiss—"
She had relocated to the far corner of the restaurant in the span of a single breath, drawing a sharp inhale.
"Hahahaha!"
Laughter spread across the entire room. Extremely satisfied, everyone turned back to their meals. They never got tired of watching people react to the glowing dishes for the first time.
Elsa stayed in her corner for a considerable while before Tami coaxed her back to the table. Cautiously, she scooped up a small spoonful of the golden fried rice and placed it in her mouth.
"Mmm!"
The next second, her armor exploded outward.
Fortunately, she was wearing thick clothes underneath.
"Why is this fried rice so delicious?!"
Not only had her armor given up, but her eyes had begun involuntarily forming hearts. Her legs twisted together with something embarrassingly close to shyness, her whole body trembling.
This rice hit harder than a high-concentration Blood Recovery Potion.
Once she came back to herself, she didn't stop. She ate with focused, dedicated intensity, happiness written across her entire face.
Laughter rose around the table. The atmosphere grew warmer, louder, more comfortable — and somewhere in the middle of it all, Elsa found herself on the verge of falling a little in love with this absurd, magical dungeon.
By the time the fried rice was nearly gone, she slowed down and began actually savoring it rather than simply consuming it.
Luluwo and the others circled back to the intelligence discussion.
"Leon's group is already challenging Wolnir, right? Captain, we can't afford to fall behind."
"Losing to Leon doesn't matter. As long as we get there before the Light Eagle Corps."
A key phrase.
Elsa didn't look up, but the moment she heard Light Eagle Corps, Eliphis surfaced in her mind without being summoned.
And the moment she thought of Eliphis, something that felt like respect and devotion began welling up on its own — quiet, automatic, as though it had been waiting there.
She remembered his sapphire-blue eyes. When he activated his unique talent, those eyes would flicker with a red glow.
That red glow passed through her thoughts for a fraction of a second, and suddenly a clear idea formed: gather more intelligence from Luluwo here, then bring it back.
That was it. That was the right thing to do. She had already refused the commander's request once today, and that had been too willful. She needed to contribute something to repay him.
Guilt settled quietly in her chest.
"Um—" She opened her mouth, just about to speak.
"Your Hot Spring Happiness Egg. Please enjoy it while it's warm."
The waiter placed a white, perfectly fluffy happiness egg in front of her.
In the end, the food won.
She tapped the shell open with her spoon, wrapped a crispy toasted breadstick in a generous sweep of golden, half-cooked egg liquid, and put the whole thing in her mouth in one bite.
[Happiness Egg: After eating, happiness fills the entire body. Even the most vicious and hardened person will become kind and cheerful.]
A wave of happiness spread outward from her stomach and washed through every part of her, lifting her emotions to somewhere more positive than they had been in a long time. Every negative feeling dissolved quietly in its wake.
Her eyes cleared. Became transparent.
The faint red glow disappeared.
And a thought formed — one that would have seemed strange to her mere moments ago, before the egg.
Why… was I being so obedient toward Eliphis again?