"What are you saying...?"
Hasn't he figured out that she doesn't have much of a concept of distance, whether too far or too close?
"It would be more surprising if I did."
Well, she does trust him, but not to not do anything reckless.
Since she's a cat now, it's okay to pet her. Well, she wouldn't mind either way.
Soldiers be like, "she turned into a cat, nothing strange."
"That was way too short!"
For a manga, that's perfectly acceptable. Don't want to delve too deeply into random and absolutely inconsequential stories that have no bearing on the plot whatsoever.
Plundering and instigating war are more or less the same. Defending against an invasion, however, is quite something else.