Chapter Sixty-three: Dungeon-Style Projection Mapping
For maximum deliciousness… I decided not to store the meat in the fridge but to leave it inside the vehicle to return to room temperature. It’s hard to grill it nicely when it’s still cold, after all. By the time we decide on today’s rest spot, it should be at the perfect temperature.
“Still, I’m glad the dropped meat was already properly aged…! I don’t have the confidence to butcher a whole carcass myself.”
“Oh, no need to worry about that, Rin. Butchering is something I can handle. Yes, butchering alone I can do.”
“R-Really…? Just where did you learn that…?”
“For a long-lived elf, a guardian of the forest, hunting is an essential life skill after all.”
Before me, unable to stop smiling even after deactivating the manifestation of the Camping Car, Mr. Xenon placed a hand on his chest with a courteous nod and playful wink.
…Whew…! Who said beauties only take three days to get used to?! Only those who can withstand a direct wink from a classic handsome blond, blue-eyed elf can make that claim!
Me? I couldn’t handle it! Uwaaah! My heart… My heart is in pain! I’ll die from an overly attractive party member!
Suffering significant damage to both my circulatory system and mental state, I managed to squeeze out a voice… and received a very straightforward answer… I see. Mr. Xenon is an elf after all. I kept gushing "handsome elf" but was too focused on the "handsome" part to remember the "elf" aspect…
Sorry for the stereotype, but even as a priest, I wonder if he’s also good with a bow…
“…Wait…? If you can butcher, doesn’t that extend to cooking as well…?”
“Don’t, Rin. That elf right there is the one who created the abomination known as ‘charred raw meat.’”
“Ah, the notorious contradiction I’ve heard about…”
“I’m not the only one. Ed, Aria, and even Ville, who acts all nonchalant, have all made that contradictory dish.”
When I wondered if being able to butcher meant he could slice and cook too… Mr. Ville shot Mr. Xenon a scathing side-eye with a low grumble. Ah… Mr. Ville was giving Mr. Xenon a look like he was an insect… They say food grudges are terrifying but to this extent…? What came from Mr. Xenon’s thin, well-shaped lips in response to Mr. Ville’s scornful gaze was another bombshell revelation.
Oh… I see… So everyone has attempted that contradictory dish at least once, huh… No wonder everyone was so desperate to make me the dedicated cook.
Could it be that butchering and cooking skills are different? There are similarities in "processing meat," but…? Well, since I can cook fairly well myself, I don’t really understand what it means to “not be able to cook”…
Hmm… Does everyone’s failure stem from the seasoning part? Or do they mess up some steps due to being unfamiliar with cooking? Well, there doesn’t seem to be any food alchemists…
If I figure out the cause, maybe I could help everyone learn to cook…?
…Oops… Now’s not the time to ponder such things. I need to stay vigilant…
Pushing such trivial thoughts to the back of my mind, I trudge through the endless grassland, relying on Ms. Aria’s scouting and my Survival.
“Still, this is a dungeon, right…? How can it be this vast…?”
“…Actually, I don’t think it really is that big… There seems to be an illusion magic and spatial magic in effect… We may not be able to proceed without dispelling them.”
“An illusion magic… Like the one the guild staff cast at the entrance? I can even touch everything…”
“It’s similar to that. I think it’s materializing the illusion just around us while hiding the entrance to another level and using spatial magic to create an infinite loop…”
“Essentially a single sheet-like space, with the edges connected into a ring or sphere of sorts…”
“Hmm… So we could walk endlessly but never advance, just loop back to where we started?”
“Normally, yes. Luckily we have Aria to prevent us from getting lost… But for first-timers, it would be extremely difficult.”
When I touched the grass at my feet, which was said to be an illusion, I felt the rough texture of the plant. However, trying to examine it with Survival yielded no information. Come to think of it, I hadn’t noticed before that Survival doesn’t react to illusory constructs. Makes sense, since it can’t identify something not truly present. So in essence, it’s making a vast room appear immensely larger… Like high-resolution, large-scale projection mapping, maybe?
Manipulating space is a novel concept to me, but having played RPGs with dungeons employing infinite loop gimmicks unless following specific routes, I can grasp the idea. Seeing through such an intricate illusion, while also detecting the spatial loop, would indeed be extremely difficult for first-timers. I got hopelessly lost in those RPG dungeons many times!
So what we need to do now is find and destroy whatever is projecting—or rather, generating—the illusion, as well as the source distorting space to maintain the infinite loop. It’s the only way we can dispel the illusion and spatial magic.
“Aria, can you sense any areas where mana seems to be concentrated or stagnating?”
“Mm… There are a few spots… If we strike those, it should work… I think.”
From Ms. Aria and Mr. Xenon’s exchange, it seems Ms. Aria’s enemy detection is picking up some reaction, so we may not need to blindly wander wasting stamina.
Still, it sounds quite difficult…!
For anyone wondering how to make a 'contradictory dish'- It means you're cooking with too high a temperature.
ReplyDeleteI've noticed that most of the people I know who can't cook have a misconception that higher temperature=faster cook time, but that's not how it works.
Especially if you don't let something like meat get to room temp first.