Chapter One Hundred and Fourty-Six: Dungeon Cooking
“First, we need to secure ingredients.”
“Should we go to the sutler?”
“I’ll procure them myself. I’m having trouble with the sutler’s representative.”
The sutler. This referred to the merchant handling logistics for this dungeon investigation team. In other words, it was the role that Isaac from the Gubert Trading Company had taken on without compensation to atone for the crimes he committed at the royal palace.
“I mean, he’s probably the one who set fire to my house.”
“Hey!? Tell me sooner! Why’s it being blamed on you, little Karen?!”
“I wonder why.”
Most likely, it wasn’t Isaac but his father, Eugene, who spread and steered the rumors. He might think he could talk Karen into anything later. Karen was also aware that she might be talked into going along with things depending on how Eugene spoke.
“…Should I take care of it somehow? This is a dungeon, so I can handle it any way I want, you know?”
With Sepl’s expression turning dangerous, Karen broke out in a cold sweat and replied in adventurer slang:
“Are you going to steal my prey? Uncle Sepl. That’s a super huge breach of etiquette for an adventurer, right?”
“Karen, you’re not an adventurer… But if you’ve got plans to deal with it yourself, then it wouldn’t be right for me to take that away.”
Seeing Sepl regain his composure, Karen sighed inwardly while feeling nervous. Adventurers were dangerous—inside dungeons, their boiling point was much lower than usual.
“First, let’s secure ingredients in the forest! Let’s go, Uncle!”
“Yeah!”
There were two types of monsters that appeared in the Mountain Foot Forest. Enhanced versions of the second-floor forest monsters, and D-rank monsters like goblins and orcs appeared. Sometimes, even C-rank monsters showed up. From this area, monsters suddenly became stronger, and while there had been ways to avoid or hide from them on the earlier floors, in this forest, encounters happened at such close range that escape was difficult. That’s why it was also said to be the watershed for whether E-rank adventurers could rise to D-rank.
Dangerous as the forest was, not only Sepl but also other adventurers who wished to observe the situation accompanied them, making the journey surprisingly comfortable.
“Oh, I found tomatoes!”
Breaking through the bushes, there were tomatoes bearing red fruit in clusters, truly at harvest time. There were no traces of insect damage on the leaves. No distorted shapes either. They were tomatoes that looked exactly like what she’d seen in her previous life, as if humans had carefully raised them with time and effort.
When Karen reached out her hand, her arm was grabbed. It was an unfamiliar female adventurer. She wore a familiar-looking suit of red armor.
“Ms. Alchemist, there’s a slime lurking there. Be careful.”
“Whoa, I couldn’t see it. Thank you for stopping me!”
When it was pointed out, there was a transparent slime at the base of the tomatoes that had camouflaged its color with the soil. Slimes existed on every floor. When Karen stepped back, the female adventurer pierced the slime’s core in one strike with the rapier she held. The slime melted into a gooey mess and eventually disappeared.
“It’s fine. As long as I get to eat your cooking.”
Saying this, the red-haired woman smiled brightly. She was probably a member of the Crimson Dancing Maidens who led this adventurer unit together with Gunther. While her heart pounded, thinking she might be under surveillance, Karen nodded.
“Leave it to me. I’ll serve you the most delicious and healthy dishes you’ve ever had.”
“Sounds great!”
Hearing Karen’s bold declaration, a young mage who was one of the adventurers who had followed along called out:
“If Sepl, who’s a drunkard old man but strangely picky about taste, is this excited, your cooking must really be delicious, right? Let me eat some too!”
“Of course! I’ll let everyone eat!”
“If there’s anything you need, should I go look for it?”
“Meat. I need meat. Kocco or boar-type monster meat!”
“Roger! I’ll go catch some!”
Whether because the dungeon expedition was so dangerous or because it was a noble commission, Karen hardly knew anyone there. In the first place, since she had almost no acquaintances of D-rank or above, it might have been natural.
While having a few acquaintances was one thing, the large number of high-ranking adventurers was fortunate for Karen. Since no one knew her face, even if there were adventurers among them who had heard the rumor about "an E-rank alchemist dragging down a B-rank trading company," no one would connect it to Karen. They would think it was someone else with the same name. E-rank alchemists, while being alchemists, were treated as apprentices in training. Like E-rank adventurers, they wouldn’t think someone like that would be in a place like this.
Perhaps drawn by the lively Karen and her group, adventurers kept gathering.
“What else?”
“Lots of oil!”
“Alright, shall we go pick a fight with a treant?”
“Anyone who can use water magic, come with us!”
Treants had ranks too, and weak treants couldn’t move from where their roots were planted. So the treants in the second-floor forest could be hunted by children if they were careful, but she’d heard that the seventh-floor forest treants could move. They should have become extremely troublesome monsters that threw oil-rich, easily flammable treant fruit while moving around.
Karen took a potion bottle from her pouch and offered it to the young adventurer who had taken leadership.
“Please use this if you get burned.”
“A healing potion? How much?”
“Since you’re getting me dangerous treant oil for my cooking, I’ll give it to you. You don’t need to pay even if you use it. But if someone gets injured, please use it on people from other parties too!”
“Got it, leave it to me.”
The good-natured young man nodded firmly and headed off to hunt treants with the water mages. From there, Karen collected every material she found: onions, peppers, eggplant, mushrooms, and more.
Along the way, she also discovered the poisonous mushrooms that had once affected Harald. Since they were delicious, Karen secretly collected these too. The condition for adventurers participating in this dungeon investigation team was D-rank or above. There were no adventurers among D-rank who had little magical power. So even if there was poison, it wouldn’t harm anyone’s body.
When Karen’s group finished collecting and returned from the forest to the cooking area, there was a giant pot and Gunther standing beside it with an exasperated expression.
“I heard you were doing something strange, but is this pot okay?”
“It depends on how many adventurers there are in total.”
“Oh, trying to figure out our forces, are you? I won’t fall for that trick.”
“It’s not like that, though!”
Since Gunther, the adventurers’ representative, had brought this pot, if making as much as this pot could hold wasn’t enough, that would be Gunther’s fault.
“I want one more pot!”
“A big one?”
“A small pot is fine too. I’m going to do some frying, but I’ll fry things little by little anyway.”
“Fried food, huh? That sounds good.”
Gunther’s eyes lit up. Adventurers often liked dishes that went well with alcohol.
“But will that really make cooking that can make the nobles groan with pleasure?”
“It will… probably.”
“Probably?”
“What I’m making is potion cooking that, for now, no one but me can make.”
Perhaps Harald had become able to make cooking potions outside by now. But since there were many things about ingredients she hadn’t taught him, currently, it was something only Karen could make.
No—even so, even if Karen taught Harald everything she could teach him, he probably couldn’t make it. She was restricted by the goddess from speaking about the biggest understanding needed to make that.
“First, we’ll tempt them with a delicious aroma, then show off by eating deliciously, and finally boast about the potion effects it carries.”
“What kind of effects does that potion have?”
“That’s a surprise for after it’s finished.”
When Karen first made this potion, she was F-rank, so the people of Ehlertt advised her to hide that she had this ability. If someone in a weak position had a valuable ability, there would be many who would want to steal it. Like the people from the Gubert Trading Company, for example.
But now Karen was a C-rank alchemist. She had climbed to a position where she was respected and revered. Though she didn’t really feel it. Now that she stood in a position befitting her abilities, Karen was finally allowed to demonstrate her true power.
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