LIGHTNOVELWORLD Chapter 46
“Something’s gone wrong, Arthur. The Witch is going to buy ingredients and cook.” “Master…?”
Upon returning to the lodging, Rosmas urgently informed Lucius.
She said let’s have something delicious in celebration of her promotion.
Thinking back, she never actually suggested going out to eat.
I never imagined it would result in her saying, “I’ll cook.”
“Witch, have you ever cooked?”
“No, never…”
Not even when she was in the village.
Not even during her travels.
Sorceress Bel never cooked.
She waved her hands as if repelled by the very idea of cooking and left all meal preparations to Arthur.
“So, you don’t cook at all?”
“Ah, no. That’s not it. Master… um, she doesn’t like to eat food itself.”
“Yes?”
“It’s more like, instead of having a meal, it’s part of prolonging her life…”
Sorceress Bel said,
– “By consuming food, I can break down what’s inside into mana and absorb it. That way, I don’t have any bodily functions. Hmph.”
The Witch’s meal was the absorption of mana from the food.
– “Having no bodily functions means…?”
– “It means you don’t need to go to the bathroom.”
– “Is that even possible?”
– “I developed it.”
– “De-develop it…?”
– “Yeah. A body that can absorb everything eaten as mana, even food from nature. Maybe ‘modification’ sounds more appropriate. Haha.”
She said that everything consumed is absorbed as mana, and impurities are burned away as mana in the stomach.
“She eats to stay alive.”
“……That can’t be right. She enjoyed the food we brought back every time. She seemed to enjoy it quite a bit.”
“That’s…”
Lucius recalled what the Witch had said.
“When she said… ”
– “If I’m alone, I can just not eat, but when I’m with others, it feels lonely to eat alone.”
That was simply the reason.
Even while grumbling that the mana obtained from food couldn’t even compare to that of a slime, Sorceress Bel always ate the same portion as Lucius, keeping pace with him during meals.
After Rosmas joined, it remained the same.
The Witch hardly ate.
“But now she’s going to cook? Arthur, have you ever seen the Witch cook?”
“No, I haven’t. I’ve always done the cooking.”
“Can we trust that?”
“……”
Lucius was deep in thought.
“I believe, objectively, that I am above average at cooking.”
Lucius was a hunter.
As a hunter, he was well-versed in handling the beasts he caught, draining their blood, and cooking them over a fire.
“Master left the cooking to me. I was worried at first, but she just ate whatever I brought, even if it was dried meat.”
– “The food my disciple makes is delicious. Keep making it often.”
And on the day he served her using his hunting skills, the Witch finished the meal prepared by Lucius without a second thought.
– “I can eat just a bit. You eat it all. Did you catch a chicken? I can just have the breast.”
– “Huh? Why the breast? I like the dry parts.”
– “Thighs? You can have both legs.”
No matter what Lucius prepared, the Witch ate it deliciously.
– “It’s food made by my disciple, so I can’t complain. This should be enough for a lifetime.”
Even though there were no proper spices or salt, the Witch ate Lucius’s cooking without a hint of complaint.
“Master ate my cooking without any complaints. It was just grilling meat, after all…”
“So you mean you’ve never actually seen her cook?”
“Yes.”
“…You know that’s usually a bad sign, right?”
Rosmas concluded based on her experiences, common sense, and prejudices.
“Usually, in these cases, the person who can’t cook tries to cook and ends up ruining it.”
“…Master is not that kind of person.”
Lucius shook his head seriously.
“Will we be able to eat properly for lunch?”
“I’m sure Master will make something delicious. I believe in her.”
“Arthur, your voice is shaking.”
“…Master would never lie about being unable to cook and saying she can.”
“What if she believes she can?”
“……Well, I guess I’ll just have to trust her once.”
Lucius had no choice but to believe.
“The innkeeper also allowed us to use the kitchen. Master can do anything. She can even cook using magic.”
“Then let’s go down and see for ourselves.”
“Go down…?”
“Yes. Are you worried?”
“Oh, no, not at all. I’m just… Master told me to wait until she finishes, so I will wait.”
“Are you going to die if the Witch tells you to?”
“That’s not what I mean! This situation isn’t that serious. And…”
Lucius frowned.
“If Master tells me to die, she must have some kind of countermeasure or know how to bring me back, so she would say to die. Master wouldn’t say such things lightly.”
“…Really, is the Witch that trustworthy to you, Arthur?”
“Yes.”
Lucius proudly thumped his chest.
“It was none other than Master who chose me as the Hero of the Holy Sword among countless people. Since she chose me, I will trust and protect her.”
“……Such a persistent person.”
Rosmas bit her lower lip, her fists shaking.
“…But I will say this clearly: if the Witch’s cooking is terrible, I will go down and cook myself.”
“Yes?”
“There may only be vegetables and fruits, but it would surely be better than burned steak or something unrecognizable. So…”
Knock, knock, knock.
There was a knock from outside.
Lucius cautiously opened the door, and the innkeeper stood outside, dazed, with a cart full of food.
“Uh, um, innkeeper…?”
“Enjoy your meal. Such a… enviable person…”
The innkeeper clicked his tongue while sizing up Lucius from head to toe.
Lucius was dumbfounded by the abundance of food stacked high in the wooden cart.
“W-what is all this?”
“A member of your party shared a recipe, and there was a good opportunity to learn on the side. Goodness. Someone with culinary skills worthy of the royal capital…”
“W-wait, the royal capital…?”
“Indeed. Unfortunately…”
The innkeeper’s eyes turned red, and he shook his head slightly.
“Oh, it’s nothing. Enjoy your meal… sniff.”
“…….Um, Master, why…?”
“She said to start eating without her as she’s making dessert. sniff.”
After the innkeeper left,
the two swallowed hard at the feast of food filling the table.
“Um, um…?”
“…This is better than going out to eat…”
A spread of food that could belong in a five-star restaurant.
“…….”
At the sight of the delicious-looking dishes, Rosmas clenched her fists.
“This is… too much…”
*
Cooking.
It is the ultimate act to satisfy one of the three basic human desires: hunger.
In the time when I was in the Demon World,
I was not fond of cooking.
But after realizing I could eliminate heroes through cooking, I began to learn it.
The catalyst was the extermination of a certain hero party.
It was when we had lit a campfire and were asleep.
One party member started frothing at the mouth and having convulsions.
The second party member was left utterly paralyzed, while the third went into a state of delirium, killing the second and committing suicide.
Then the fourth member, the porter, quietly scattered into the darkness.
The reason they died was because of food.
The porter was in charge of preparing meals and had poisoned the food meant for the party.
If two people had cooked together, someone would have caught the poison.
But the hero party left everything to the porter and spent their time laughing joyfully instead, ultimately falling victim to the enraged porter’s poisoning.
– “Oh?”
– “If I become the one in charge of cooking for the hero party, I can poison them easily!”
– “If I just add paralysis poison to the spices in the soup, I could take them all out? This is… great!”
Through this experience, I became a member of various hero parties and had quite a bit of fun with poisoning whenever the opportunity arose.
– “Hero! That guy put something in the food!”
– “Don’t lie! There’s no way someone who made such delicious food would do something strange! I’ll be the first to try, cough cough!”
– “Busted.”
– “Aaaah! Hero, Hero’s body?!”
– “Kahahah! I put in the transformation potion! The hero you loved is no more!”
– “That’s even better.”
– “……Everyone, attack!!”
Making delicious food resulted in them trusting me completely.
Even if there were those who doubted, if I just skillfully mixed in the poison or made it tasty, nobody noticed.
That’s how I improved my cooking skills while dismantling hero parties through food.
To avoid suspicion and because of the expectation that ‘this guy will surely make tasty food’, I practiced cooking to naturally receive the role.
One day, for Lucius’s party, I need to casually hint that I can cook in advance.
So later, I could feed them the drug without any doubt.
‘But I can’t cook the dishes from 500 years ago.’
While staying in Normans, I quickly borrowed a cooking book from the current era to learn the methods.
No matter how much time has passed, the basics of cooking haven’t changed much, and with the decline of culinary culture over time, maybe the dishes I make will become quite popular.
‘I have to be careful.’
Although Asydia doesn’t seem to think much of it, someone could very well notice, ‘Oh? This is the kind of meal that came out during the Demon King’s army captivity 500 years ago? The one making this must surely be connected to the Demon King!!’
So, I need to arrange the modern cuisine in my own style as much as possible.
Creeeak.
I stepped out holding the dessert and opened the door.
“What’s this? Why aren’t you eating? The food’s getting cold.”
“Master hasn’t come yet, so how can we eat?”
“You can eat first.”
“Um, Master.”
“Yes, what is it?”
“Master, how well can you cook…?”
It seemed Lucius sensed my culinary skills just from the aroma of the food.
Ah, could it be he’s…
‘Is he staging a protest because I didn’t feed him?’
If that’s the case, here’s a pre-prepared excuse.
“I once thought about setting up an inn and cooking in the kitchen after retiring. It’s an old story, though.”
“Eh?”
“I lost my sense of taste. I don’t have it anymore.”
This is true.
Because I’m Undead.
“So then this…?”
“The innkeeper confirmed the taste, and there shouldn’t be a big problem. He said it was good.”
“How can you cook without a sense of taste…?”
“Well, you see…”
“Because my hands remember.”