When Count Leon, disguised and keeping a low profile as he arrived aboard Murphy's Hammer under cover of night, saw his son, the latter was wearing a patient's gown in the airship's mess hall. He was wolfing down two meat buns at a time, under the horrified gazes of the four halfling chefs, as he devoured the late-night meal prepared for the entire ship.
At Fraser's side sat seven empty bamboo steamers, three large plates of fried rice that had been eaten clean, and a bowl of hot-and-sour fish soup with nothing left but the seasoning at the bottom.
It was enough food to feed a squad of five burly men. But one look at Brigadier Fraser's ravenous expression showed he was still nowhere near full. His inhuman appetite had certainly taught the halfling chefs a lesson.
Good grief, were Plantagenese all unparalleled gluttons?
Count Leon was startled by his own son, too.
On the one hand, that appetite really was astonishing.
On the other, was this the table manner your aristocratic upbringing had taught you? Eating like a starving man who'd just crawled out of a grave?
How utterly undignified!
Why not just drink your soup straight from the bowl like those barbarians?
Unacceptable!
Zero points!
The count tightened his grip on his cane and stepped toward his son, intending to speak with him, but the old butler at his side reached out and stopped him after only a step.
Old Huguenot kept his eyes fixed on the strange difference in skin tone on the young master's left arm. The danger sense of a golden assassin told him that the figure seated before them wasn't the familiar young Master Fraser, but a famished, primordial beast.
Danger!
"Something is very wrong, my lord."
The old butler said in a low