Why does the Call to undefined method Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Relations\BelongsTo::stores() error occur?

Question

Laravel

There are two models: warehouse and branch.
A branch can have many warehouses. Accordingly, the Branch in the model has

public function stores(){
        return $this->hasMany('App\Store');
    }

At the warehouse:

public function branch()
    {
        return $this->belongsTo('App\Branch');
    }

But for some reason, if I call at the warehouse

public function getStoresOfParentBranch(){
        return $this->branch()->stores();
    }

Error Call to undefined method Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Relations\BelongsTo::stores()

Answer 1

Because it $this->branch()issues \Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Relations\BelongsTo, not the model

Answer 2

So no one causes a relationship. There are a lot of problems with this getStoresOfParentBranch method. From thousands of identical queries to the database to errors.
It's right to do so.
If the relation is called once, then we write immediately in the controller / template.
$store->branch->stores;
But NOT in the model.
If cycles or collections of json resources are planned, or simply > 1 relationship calls, then we first chain through with

Store::with('branch.stores')
    ->get();

and then use $store->branch->stores without queries to the database, no matter how many elements in the collection are. Although I would do it differently. But I will not ship. For starters, it's enough to get rid of getStoresOfParentBranch before it's too late.