Lily seemed to frown slightly and mumbled a few indistinct words, possibly due to the sound of everyone talking.
Only after smelling Rhode's scent did she relax her brows, let out a silly giggle, and continue to sleep soundly on Rhode's chest.
Everyone exchanged glances, covering their mouths and chuckling softly.
"Do you want to talk to her?"
Finn seemed to have already prepared his answer to Rhode's question.
"Neither of us is mentally prepared right now, and... the past life is over; we live in the present."
"I won't shirk my responsibilities, but what I hope to establish is a sibling relationship between [Finn] and [Lily], not based on other factors."
Laila cleared her throat, reminding him.
"If the past life is real, then you two should be older sister and younger brother, oh~"
Finn simply pretended not to hear that sentence.
"Entrusting Lily to you is the best choice right now. I trust you... By the way, regarding Soma Familia's inheritance..."
Rhode raised a hand to interrupt.
"I took half of the Divine Wine for research; the rest is yours. After all, you'll have to deal with all the troublesome matters like communicating with the Guild and eradicating all smuggling channels."
Finn swallowed the distribution plan he had prepared, shrugging helplessly.
"You're truly the first to treat our Loki Familia as mere errand-runners. But this time, it's fine; leave it to us!"
"If there are any further developments, I'll share them with you at any time."
Rhode was not interested in this, merely nodding casually, then left the base with Laila and Lily.
Standing at the entrance was a tall, beautiful woman exuding an aura of exhaustion.
Her blue hair was cut short to her neck, and she had a neat and intelligent face.
Her slender limbs were equipped with gauntlets and metal boots, focusing on close combat, making her look quite professional.
"Hello, Rhode, I'm Shakti Varma, I've heard much about you~"
Beside her, arm in arm, was a charming young girl, whose bright, watery eyes were unblinkingly scrutinizing Rhode.
Noticing Rhode's gaze, she playfully made a 'V' sign beside her cheek.
"That's right! I'm A Di Varma, the sister of the upright and amiable Sister Shakti! Ta-da!"
Seeing her sister's innocent and pure demeanor, Shakti said, "Don't talk with strange sound effects," but a gentle, doting smile appeared on her lips.
The Staff of the Elephant God and the Poem of the Elephant God, two excellent young female talents.
Rhode smiled as he greeted the two pretty young girls, but in his heart, he secretly pondered the possibility of luring them away.
At this moment, he had already begun to plan for the future establishment of his own independent force.
Unlike Astrea Familia, with whom he currently associated as companions, this force would be an autocratic team with him as its absolute core, implementing his will and handling various miscellaneous tasks for him.
He couldn't always rely on Loki Familia to clean up his messes, and Finn's words had reminded Rhode of this.
Although he had long harbored such intentions, he was now merely accelerating these plans.
However, if he wanted to simply change Familias, he would need a new Grace to maintain everyone's abilities.
Unless he could also master the ability to activate Grace, he would at least need a mascot...
Shakti was an excellent Beast Tamer, with combat skills among the best in current Orario, and even more rare, she possessed leadership and management talents!
But precisely because of this, born into a military police family and now having grown into a Captain, Rhode would find it quite difficult to lure her away...
And A Di beside her... the pure and natural aura she exuded was almost as strong as anyone in Astrea Familia!
She would be perfect as a partner and girlfriend, but extremely unsuitable as a subordinate.
Unable to come up with a good plan for a while, Rhode regretfully temporarily gave up this idea, chatted briefly with the two girls, and waved goodbye.
After Rhode and his group left, A Di leaned forward, still gazing far into the distance at Rhode's retreating figure.
Shakti frowned slightly, her expression a bit tense.
"A mysterious guy. For some reason, I always feel an inexplicable sense of crisis when facing him... even though I'm a higher-ranked adventurer."
A Di, however, shook her hair, revealing a brilliant smile.
"It's alright, Rhode isn't a bad person!"
Shakti didn't understand why her sister was so certain.
"Do you know him?"
"Not at all!"
"Then you..."
"Because he smells like Ryu. Ryu's friends are all good people!"
Shakti's mouth twitched slightly, and she covered her forehead.
"You really do say some things that I find hard to comment on, don't you..."
However, from a certain perspective, it was indeed hard to refute. Being in a Familia of justice and being recognized by the most fastidious Elf, then even if his actions were somewhat extreme, there seemed to be no need to worry about his character.
Shakti was actually a bit curious about Rhode, but she always felt that if she got too close to him, she would lose something important, and a sense of caution unconsciously arose in her heart.
She secretly reflected on her attitude, but at the same time, she couldn't help but feel relieved.
From his demeanor, he seemed to want to keep his distance from us.
That's good. With A Di's personality, if she faced someone of that caliber, she might be completely led astray.
A Di, who had never been interested in men, would probably also keep her distance from him.
However, just as she was thinking this, she suddenly heard A Di clap her hands loudly.
"That's right, since we're all Ryu's friends, it's not okay for us not to be friends with each other!"
Shakti's eyes widened with a sudden premonition, and then she indeed heard A Di say:
"Hehe, I've decided! When I have time, I'll definitely invite Rhode out to play!"
Her light blue hair swayed cheerfully, and the adorable girl's eyes sparkled, her smile as bright as a flower.
Shakti, however, had a crestfallen face. She wanted to stop her but didn't know what to say, eventually only able to slump her shoulders powerlessly.
Hmm, I hope my feeling is wrong...