When Arianthe dropped a worm into the tin can, Swan made a disgusted expression again.

“Look at this, Swan! Look here! There are many! I found the worm kingdom!”

“Can’t we just live in peace?”

“No!”

With a spoon in hand, Arianthe began to catch worms at an alarming speed, filling the tin can. Now Swan reached the point where he couldn’t even look at the tin can or Arianthe.

As she raised her head, the sky was unbelievably blue and clear.

“But, Arianthe… Why on earth are you catching these?”

Arianthe, engrossed in worm catching, looked at Swan as if to say, “Don’t you know?”

“I’m going to use them as chicken feed! But before that, I’ll show them to Vainty.”

Poor Vainty. He might faint. Swan thought.

“Isn’t it disgusting?”

“No, not at all! How cute are they! Wanna see?”

Suddenly, Arianthe grabbed a worm with her little finger and held it out. Swan, barely managing to push the tin can away with his foot—because he didn’t want to touch it—shook his head vigorously.

“I’m okay. I’ll… pass.”

A cute sound of tongue-clicking was heard.

“Sailoruss would have said it’s cute.”

Swan raised an eyebrow.

“Really?”

“Yes, that’s right! Sailoruss would have said it’s cute!”

Arianthe shouted. Because of that, the dirt that was on the spoon’s tip flew onto Swan’s shirt. It was better than the worm bouncing off, but still, considering it was part of the worm kingdom… it wasn’t a great feeling.

“Arianthe, what on earth is this?”

Unexpectedly, Arianthe and Swan, both startled, widened their eyes at the sudden voice. Arianthe, standing up with a spoon covered in dirt, laughed loudly.

“Sailoruss!”

Sailoruss, who ran towards Arianthe, embraced her with a smile.

“I didn’t know I’d come!”

“I really didn’t know! I really had no idea at all! How did you suddenly come?”

“I came to play with the kids. You know that small door over there? We went down there and bet on who could run the fastest. Look, over there.”

Only then could Arianthe see other kids running from a distance.

Complaining about glasses, Lucian, followed by Blushing and biting his lips, running Chrony. Umbrose, struggling with his side that kept cramping from eating too much lunch, was holding it while running.

“What about Sisi?”

“Don’t you see? At the back there.”

Completely uninterested in running, Sisi was stuck at the very end, and Mabu, deliberately moving at Sisi’s speed, was speaking in an absurdly slow manner. Arianthe, shaking both hands towards her friends, ran over giggling.

Sailoruss, watching Arianthe’s back with an adorable look, shrugged his small shoulders.

“Hello, Swan.”

Perhaps because the greeting was late, there was a somewhat awkward atmosphere. Swan also awkwardly returned the greeting.

“Hello, Sailoruss.”

“What were you guys doing?”

Swan looked down at the tin can. Worms eager to escape from the cold and unfamiliar world to the warm kingdom were visible. He spoke while carefully avoiding their feet.

“Arianthe and I were… um… looking for chicken feed.”

“Feed? Is it that?”

“Yeah…”

Swan answered listlessly. Suddenly, Sailoruss exclaimed, “Wow!” while carefully examining the tin can.

“Did you two catch all of these? I’ve never seen so many worms. Oops, they’re escaping.”

“Actually, Arianthe caught most of them… But aren’t you grossed out?”

“Well, I used them often when fishing. So, it’s not that gross. Why? Couldn’t you catch them because you found them disgusting?”
At that moment, for some reason, Swan felt an inexplicable reluctance to tell the truth. It was fine in front of Arianthe, but he couldn’t say that he couldn’t touch the worms because they were disgusting in front of Sailoruss… Although he didn’t know what it meant.

In fact, Sailoruss was also experiencing a situation similar to Swan’s. Although he had occasionally gone fishing with skilled servants who could swim well and touched worms, honestly, he had never seen so many gathered like this in his life.

Seeing the wriggling inside the tin can, he felt a strange sensation at the back of his neck, but Swan didn’t want to be caught doing that!

At that moment, Arianthe approached, dragging the hands of the tired children running around. Then, with an excited attitude, she showed the tin can to everyone.

“Look at this! I caught them! Amazing!”

Chrony screamed and ran away, and Umbrose ran into the bushes. Soon, unpleasant sounds were heard… Lucian, who was relatively better, but still not in a good state, complained, “What is this? Ugh, they’re popping out! Did the giant mole king appear? Why did you catch so many of these?”

Arianthe casually replied, “There’s no giant mole. I’m going to give these to the chickens.”

Before that, she had also knocked out Vainty. Swan muttered to himself, feeling sorry for poor Vainty…

“Chickens eat other bugs too. Understand?”

Sailoruss said with a twinkle in his eyes.

“Like grasshoppers.”

As he added, Chrony, who had been running away, turned green.

“I hate grasshoppers too! They’re too gross and big!”

“Can chickens eat grasshoppers?”