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((The Monday Triple: page 2 of 3))
Hector spotted a much smaller Hun’Kui than he’d yet seen, presumably the innkeeper’s son. Hector couldn’t think of any other explanation for that body language--hiding behind the man’s leg and occasionally pestering him as if asking a parent for something.

Hector wondered what the kid was saying and asked Garovel to translate for him.

‘The kid’s hungry,’ the reaper told him privately. ‘Says he hasn’t eaten in... days.’

Hector blinked at that news. ‘Days?’

‘Well, it must be said, Hun’Kui don’t eat nearly as much as surface dwellers do. As I understand it, they have much slower metabolisms, because they don’t need to regulate their body temperatures like we do.’ A beat passed. ‘Or like YOU do, I suppose.’

‘So... you’re saying it’s normal for people down here to go that long without eating?’

‘...No. I think that’s still kinda abnormal, even by their standards.’

‘What did the dad say?’

‘Just to hold on a while longer.’

He frowned, but not ten minutes later, the innkeeper announced to the Rainlords that dinner would be served shortly, so Hector supposed he’d been worrying for no reason.

And by the time dinner did arrive, Hector was almost as curious as he was hungry. He’d forgotten to ask Garovel about it before, so he had absolutely no idea what to expect. With environmental temperatures like this, food from the surface would’ve been cooking itself, so what the hell did people eat down here?

Some kind of stringy, reddish-brown seaweed-looking thing, apparently. And a bubbling, porridge-y substance in a wavy, bowl-like shell.

‘...What is this?’ he asked Garovel, trying his best to keep an open mind.

‘That’s a romodendra.’

‘What is? This plant thing?’

‘Yeah. There aren’t many plants that can even survive down here, let alone actually GROW.’

‘Uh-huh...’