"Legoshi! We need to talk!" Louis felt way more comfortable in the presence of male hypercarnivores than he had in the presence of a female herbivore and that bothered him a bit. "I know the gist of the situation, Agata told me, but I still don't get why you're in front of me at this very moment."

"I knew you'd say that... did your foot act up after--"

"Enough about my foot." He scoffed. Louis was sick of everyone treating him like he was an invalid. Plenty of people lived productive lives with a lot less body parts than he had. "Do you seriously plan on using the Shishigumi's help to get information on this Melon?"

"Y-Yes. I'm responsible for letting Melon go in the first place. I want to capture him."

"Even if you capture that hybrid, there's no guarantee you'll have a happy future with YN. She could already be dead and devoured. Or maybe she's in love with the guy. You don't know."

Legoshi looked away from Louis, he didn't care for his opinion on it.  "Yeah. I'll keep that in mind... As for the Shishigumi, they'll be way more willing to help me if you stick around. So, could you introduce them to me?"

"Them?" Louis gave a chuckle. "They're lions! Nothing more."

"WAIT! You can't be serious. Indian lion, Congo lion, Maasai lion! We're not the same!"

"I know." Louis' face betrayed a smile. "Let me begin..."

"They're all addicted to silvervine, but they're good at what they do."

Dolph piped up. "Of course! We used to have 35 lions, but now we're the only ones left. You can think of us as crazy elites."

"Elites...?" Legoshi raised a brow.

"Yes. We've been exerting our meat appetite by working out our jaws. We get stronger every day. And it's all thanks to Louis." He held out a mangled piece of deer.

"That's one of my shed antlers!" Louis looked shocked.

"I figured we shouldn't keep this a secret anymore. Whenever we got a craving for meat, we'd all take turns gnawing on this. I can't emphasize how much of a blessing this was after Melon forbade us from eating meat... And I know this is a messed-up thing to say, but your antler was full of flavor and very tasty... Sorry we never told you."

After a deep breath, Louis looked up with resolution. "Let's just be on our way to Kopi Luwak... they'll know about Melon. It's best to walk there since the black market alley streets are so cramped."

"L-Louis..." Agata spoke up. "We're really sorry--"

"I can't hear you. Do you guys apologize when you eat delicious food now?" The red deer didn't even bother to stop.

"Thank you for the food!" All the lions bowed to Louis. Legoshi was impressed. Louis was a lion in deer's clothing and he lead the pride. For a moment, he saw what you had seen in him-- true admiration.