Seeing my serious expression, Linia dared not smile, and she and Prusena shivered as they replied,
"No! Boss, it was Zanoba himself who challenged us. During the challenge, we had to bet our most important things, and he bet this doll. It wasn't that we snatched his doll."
"Later, we won against him, and after he gave us the doll, we disliked how realistic it looked, meow. It looked a bit like an item that curses people, so we broke it. We didn't want to be cursed, meow."
...That's different from what Rudeus said. I turned to look at Rudeus and Zanoba.
"Was this doll lost to them by Zanoba? Didn't they snatch it from you?"
Zanoba seemed a bit embarrassed.
"At that time, this prince had just arrived at this school, and because of my natural divine strength, I was a bit arrogant. I lost the competition because they ambushed and ambushed me. I had no choice but to lose the Roxy doll to them. I absolutely did not intend for this to happen."
"The point isn't how you lost. If it's something you truly value, you shouldn't use it as a wager!"
I looked at Rudeus.
"Rudeus, if Zanoba lost the match to those two, then I don't think this matter is their fault anymore."
"But Dorin, this is the Roxy doll, it's my—"
"Rudeus, listen to me first. Whether it's your love for the doll or your faith, these are our personal matters. We can't force others to share the same ideas as you. Something that seems very important to you might be worthless to others.
The point is that we cannot use physical means to force others to have the same mindset as you just because of different ways of thinking.
From the Beast Race's perspective, wasting food is an insult to the gods, but they wouldn't violently attack someone in the cafeteria for not finishing their food.
I think this whole thing is problematic from the moment Zanoba used the Roxy doll as a wager. Of course, if you truly worship Roxy, then you shouldn't have sold her doll either.
Furthermore, Linia and Prusena shouldn't have smashed the doll in front of Zanoba. This is an insult to people with different hobbies. If you don't love it, don't harm it."
Rudeus was somewhat speechless by my words, while Zanoba was trembling slightly, seemingly realizing his mistake.
I returned to Linia and Prusena and said to them,
"The greatest truth in this world is that the victor is king, and the vanquished is a bandit. Truth is spoken to the weak.
The strong don't need to reason with you. The fact that you two were defeated by Rudeus and them today is your own problem. They were already gentlemen.
If you were defeated by bandits in the wild, your fate would probably be ten times worse than today.
In future training, I will also hone your practical combat abilities. You only know how to do two-on-one all day. If I made you two fight Zanoba one-on-one,
You probably wouldn't win either. I'm ashamed to be your Big Brother; you're really embarrassing me!"
The two of them drooped their heads, ears, and tails like defeated roosters, looking wronged.
I turned to Rudeus and said, "Come find me tomorrow afternoon; I'll have a surprise for you then."
Then I left with the cat and dog.
As for how Zanoba apologized to Rudeus after I left, that was no longer my concern.
After leaving Zanoba's dormitory, the cat and dog followed behind me, looking a bit dispirited.
AI Model: gemini-3.0-flash
I felt like what I just said was a bit too harsh. After all, although Rudy is a bit of a coward, his combat strength is still very high.
If he really got serious with his magic, I estimate it wouldn't be easy to beat him.
Glancing back at the cat and dog, I turned my head and said in a moderate voice, "We're having a barbecue at our house today, do you want to come over and try some?"
I don't know which keyword triggered their nerves, but the two of them were like they'd been fully resurrected, each hugging one of my arms, incredibly happy.
"Boss, Boss, is it true? Is there grilled fish, meow?"
"I don't know if there is, but grilled fish is indeed delicious. How about we go buy one later and try it?"
"Great! Boss, I love grilled fish the most, meow!"
"Boss, I want some too. I want to eat grilled chicken legs and wings, nano. It's even better with some honey, nano."
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