Hypocrite seemed to sense my gaze. He turned his eyes towards me as he cooked the meat. The petting motion of my hand paused and I coughed lightly in embarrassment. I not taking advantage of him while he sleeping...people pet animals all the time. Yeah... that's right! This is totally normal!
While I'm justifying my actions, Hypocrite and I make eye contact and maintain it with only the sound of the crackling of fire and Leopard's snoring in the background. I speak up,"What?" The silence was putting some kind of invisible pressure on me. It felt like I had to say something.
"...He seems comfortable with you."
Who...? Oh! Leopard? "Um, I guess? Isn't he friendly with everyone?"
"No... Only with people he trusts."
"I see..." The atmosphere regains it's awkward silence for a while.
"...In fact, it seems you've become quite friendly with everyone." Hypocrite speaks up.
Ah, looking back on it, I guess I have? But why is he asking about it now? Is he suspicious? I mean, I can't really blame him. From his point of view, I came from Manbun's territory, so it's natural to be suspicious of me.
"Even the Commander has a good impression of you..." He suddenly stands up and walks towards me. He crouches in front of the sleeping Leopard, looking down on me from above. With a scary expression, he narrates in a calm voice," I originally suspected you of being a spy for the enemy party, trying to get close to us and win our favor, and eventually sabotage. But I eventually ruled that out. One, you're too...inefficient to be a spy. And two, you're people aren't the type to do this. In the lower factions, sure, but they don't have the guts to copy us."
...Eh? I'm kind of lost and I think I just heard something out of place? "What do you mean by "copy"?" I ask with a bad premonition.
"It's what you think it means? What? They haven't told you? Then I really was right, if you were important, they would have told you something like this."
I feel a pain in my chest as he speaks and I'm starting to get a bad feeling. I...I'm not sure I want to know what's coming. I immediately blurt out,"Umm...the foods gonna burn..."
He looked at me with a blank expression before turning around and tending to the meat. I silently sighed in relief, thinking that would be the end of it, but he continued,"You must at least know of ********, right?"
Ah...I do...
Chair guy.