According to Adonis, he didn't feel comfortable with the current allocation of rewards, considering the circumstances surrounding the entire incident.
"Billy and Alicia were missing, and Rey went out to search for them. If it wasn't for his decision to seek the aid of Sir Ralyks, we would never have found them and even gotten rescued from the Dragon."
In essence, everyone had their own circumstances.
"I would have liked to give Rey my own share if it was possible, but… unfortunately I require resources for a particular endeavor of mine." Adonis slowly turned to Rey and bowed his head slightly.
"I hope you can forgive my selfishness, Rey."
The instant he did this, Rey swiftly raised both hands and waved them in an awkward attempt to dismiss the entire thing.
"S-stop it! There's no issue at all! I wasn't thinking of taking your reward, even if you offered. Haha… haa…!"
The awkwardness in the air lasted for a few more seconds as Rey and Adonis stared at each other, before both of them looked away with somewhat complicated smiles on their faces.
Rey had a flushed shade of pink on his face, as he was absolutely mortified by Adonis' suggestion.
As for Adonis, he had a relieved, but somewhat sad expression on his face.
"Thank you, Rey."
"S-sure…"
Once more, awkward silence took charge.
"Mhm… ahem…!"
Thankfully, it didn't last for too long. As soon as Grandmaster Conrsd cleared his throat, all attention returned to him.
"I understand your suggestion, Hero. If that is fine by everyone, we will split the rewards like that."
As attention was cast on the remaining five, they had a choice to make.
Accept or refuse.
"Of course, I have no problems with that!"
"It's cool."
"No big deal. It's not like we need that much money anyway."
"As long as I get my cut, I'm fine."
"I don't agree. Pfft! I'm just messing with you! Look at your faces. Of course, I totally support it!"
Belle, Trisha, Clark, Eric, and Justin respectively had what they had to say.
The latter's reaction was particularly troublesome, eliciting varying reactions from the parties involved.
A few people poked Justin while others chuckled a little.
However, none of them found his little attempts at comic relief to be annoying.
On the contrary; it was endearing.
A lot of the tension that wafted through the air had been reduced, and smiles covered the faces of those who were present.
"I'm glad you all agree. We already had compensation we wanted to give to the families of the deceased, so we will add the one percent to the initial sum." Conrad raised a brow and smiled softly.
"Is that fine?"
Without wasting much time, everyone responded in the affirmative.
"Understood."
**********
Conrad went on to talk about a few more things; most of them having to do with allocation of the other percentage of resources.
Unsurprisingly, Lucielle and Brutus were also recovering their own shares despite simply performing their sworn duties.
No one had any complaints, though. The reward was an inconsequential amount anyway, so it was pretty reasonable.
'This arrangement isn't too bad. It's pretty amazing what can happen when money starts flowing into your pockets.' Rey thought to himself.
The same Alliance that seemed on the verge of collapse not too long ago now seemed to have a bright future ahead of it,
It put a smile on his face.
'Now I can see why they had to send the deadweights away first. If they had stayed, most of them would just try to suck this Alliance dry of resources before ditching at the last minute.'
At least, with this arrangement, only the truly helpful ones would get rewarded.
"It took us nearly two days, but we have successfully stored the Dragon Corpse and have started processing it." Conrad added, bringing Rey back into the conversation taking place.
Apparently, the Dragon Corpse was being processed to make special items for all nine of them.
'Hehe… Sweet!' Rey found himself grinning even wider.
Monsters had special anatomies and qualities that made their parts extremely useful for things like armor and other kinds of equipment
'I'm sure the Dragon Commander's carcass will be even more useful than a regular Monster hide.'
It wasn't that Rey was lacking in Magic Items. In fact, he had a lot of them to spare; and he could probably get more if he wanted.
'The problem is that there's only so many Items you can stack at the same time.'
There was something known as 'Equip Limit'.
It wasn't a quantifiable thing, and everyone had their limits depending on Levels and other unknown factors—maybe talent of physiology.
However, this 'Equip Limit' made it impossible for a person to stack up more than a certain number of Items.
'My current limit is 30 Items.'
It was a reasonably high number, considering the fact that most people couldn't equip more than five.
Twelve was the current best record, and yet he had managed to exceed twice that amount.
Still, it felt a bit frustrating that he had the means to obtain more items, but even if he equipped them, their effects wouldn't stack after he successfully equipped thirty,
'I don't know when or how the limit will increase, so the best thing I can do is replace the weaker Items with stronger ones.'
Thus, he was looking forward to the Item he would get from the Dragon's corpse.
If it was something grand, he would use it in the stead of a less impressive tool.
'Besides, I'm pretty excited to see everyone else get stronger.'
He wasn't sure he could single-handedly topple down a Dragon Empire by himself.
'I need Adonis and everyone to get stronger. Of course, I won't get complacent too.'
During the incoming raid, he couldn't afford to be left behind and outdone by Adonis… or any other classmate for that matter.
'We should all grow strong. And I should grow stronger.'
They had to be ready for the war to come.
All of them.