帰路についてくれた translation

Question

全員空気を読んで、立ち止まることなく帰路についてくれたのはありがたい判断だ。

The speaker told his friends to return home first without him, since there was something he has to do.

I'm confused about how to translate 帰路についてくれた.

帰路について (帰路につく): to go home (head home/on the way home).

くれた (くれる): to let one have, to give.

Thank you in advance for your kind guidance.

Answer 1

I'm confused about how to translate 帰路についてくれた.

Basically, the speaker is thanking the people for going home.

The problem with translating these kinds of Japanese phrases is that if you try to translate everything in a Japanese text into some kind of English equivalent, you end up with unnatural expressions. The person is already thanking the people for going home with the arigatai, so the meaning of the kureru in the above is already contained in whatever you used to translate that into.