In every operation, Rowan would pay extra attention to one thing, and that was to find the source of the strange feeling he felt.
Soon, he realized what was wrong with the situation. Due to the large number of children, the amount of food they stole was not small. Under such circumstances, it was impossible for the owner to not notice. This was what Rowan had been most worried about all this time. Once the magus found out, how would he treat them?
However, after days of theft, not only did the owner not react, but the food placed in the kitchen also changed from bread, fruit, and milk to dried meat, dried fish, and pickled vegetables in addition to the aforementioned items. To put it simply, there was more food that could be eaten without cooking.
There was only one explanation for this, and that was that their actions had been discovered a long time ago! The food they had stolen had been specially prepared by the magus. Otherwise, there wouldn't have been so much dried food in the kitchen. In the beginning, there hadn't been much bread.
After realizing this fact, Rowan became somewhat restless, and even the delicious food no longer tasted good. He now only hoped that his guess was wrong, and that his inference was just overthinking it.
However, once suspicion arose, it was difficult to dispel it. This was the case for adults, and it was also the case for relatively simple children. Perhaps the children's symptoms wouldn't be so serious, but Rowan couldn't help but overthink things. Too simple a person would have starved to death on the side of the road.
Perhaps because the matter was too serious, Rowan couldn't make up his mind, so he found a time to gather all the children and tell them about his discovery. Perhaps the children were limited by the breadth of their knowledge and the accumulation of experience, so they weren't sensitive enough to many things. However, this didn't mean that they were idiots. As long as someone pointed out a lead, they could naturally find more evidence.
The conclusion was that there was a high possibility that they had been discovered.
"So, what are we going to do?" one of the boys asked a stupid question.
At this time, the children were divided into two groups. One group looked at Rowan, who had raised his suspicions, and the other group looked at Ezio, who had led them into a ditch. However, the two children didn't have any good ideas. Ezio even thought that he was lucky and said, "Maybe it's just your misconception, boss. We haven't been discovered yet."
"That was your original home, wasn't it, Ezio?" Rowan voiced his other theory.
As soon as the words left his mouth, the boy's face fell. Rowan knew he had guessed correctly. He asked, "Why did you leave your home, young master of a rich family?"
Ezio gritted his teeth and decided to come clean. "That's not my home. It's different from what all of you think. I'm just an orphan, and I'm staying in that place with Grandpa. "
"What's going on?" That was the question on most people's minds.
Since Ezio had decided to confess, he didn't hide anything. Instead, he told all the children about his background. Anyway, it was not complicated. He was just an orphan on the snowy mountain. First, he was adopted by the black dragon. Then, together with the black dragon, he was brought home by a mage.
No one in that family had hidden these things from him. It was also because he understood that he did not belong to that family that Ezio longed for more love and care. Their actions were all in the hope of attracting attention. Unfortunately, his actions only led to a beating, so he chose to leave the house.
Faced with such a truth, the children all stood on Ezio's side and cursed with righteous indignation. Rowan, on the other hand, was still rational. He didn't care about the grudge between Ezio and the mage. He was more concerned about the fate of all the children here. So he asked, "Based on your understanding of the mage, what do you think he'll do?"
"Hmm, continue to ignore us?" Ezio said hesitantly.
Faced with such an uncertain answer, Rowan felt that he couldn't rely on Ezio anymore. So he said, "Take me to see the mage. With you leading the way, we should be able to see him. "
"Why?" Ezio asked bitterly. This was also what most of the children were thinking.
Rowan explained, "Since the mage didn't stop us from stealing the food, it means that he has good intentions, or some other purpose. No matter what he's thinking, it's better to ask him face to face than guess. Knowing what he wants to do is better than worrying about not knowing what will happen. "
Rowan's words convinced most of the children. But Ezio still said stubbornly, "Maybe they really don't know. If we take the initiative to come to them, it'll be like walking into a trap. "
Pressing down on Ezio's cheeks, Rowan said domineeringly, "I don't care about that. Anyway, the matter with the mage has to be solved, or I won't be able to sleep well. Since you're the one who started it, you have to go. "
Letting go of Ezio, who had been brutally abused, Rowan looked at the other children and said, "If you want to go, I have no objection. But I don't know what will happen after seeing the mage. It might be dangerous, or even dangerous, and I will go. And I will definitely go. If I can come back alive, I will tell the others what happened. As for you, make your own decisions. Don't be influenced by others, and don't influence others. According to Ezio, the mage isn't easy to get along with. Actually, it's dangerous to appear in front of him. "
After the matter was settled, the children, who didn't have much of an opinion yet, agreed with Rowan's approach, except for the swearing Ezio.
It was just that Rowan had neglected the children's ability to take action, or rather, they didn't have the patience to wait. After making the decision to meet the mage, the children, who had nothing else to do, swarmed around Rowan and Ezio and went to the mage's house together. Everyone went, not a single one left behind.
However, after leading a large group of children and walking noisily on the street, Rowan and Ezio both felt regret. Usually, when they moved around in the lower street and the neighboring areas, they didn't feel anything because it was a bustling downtown area, or because they walked in the shadows in the middle of the night.
But the place where the mage lived, other than the outskirts of the Holy City of Estale, was a relatively quiet and high-class area with few people. The people who lived here were either rich or noble. This was the information that Rowan had found out after he had stolen the bread a few times and had grown suspicious of the culprit.
It was strange to go to the mage's house in the middle of the day. Apart from the fact that there was no place to hide during the day, there were few people around and it was relatively quiet. The noisiest group was none other than the army of children.
If the children who followed them all knew what they were doing, it wouldn't be a big deal. But there were a lot of them who wanted to join in the fun, and some of them came to admire the place that gave out free bread every day. Of course, they wouldn't admit that they were just gluttons who wanted to steal a few more pieces of bread. The children who really knew what they were doing and what would happen to them were probably only one or two out of ten.
Rowan and Ezio didn't want to be so conspicuous and ostentatious.
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