Chương 32: Lauren

Cleaning up the seafoodmen after Skarn dies is super easy. Like crazy easy. I guess since he was a Leader type, he was keeping them mostly under control, because as soon as I get the notification of his death, they all start acting weird. Some of them run away into the water. Others charge me blindly. A lot of them actually start attacking each other. Specifically, the sharkmen start attacking all the other seafoodmen.

A single swing of my sword is enough to take care of almost all the ones attacking me, and it only takes, like, two minutes to kill all the other ones on land. Since I'm killing so many, there's a lot of mana entering my body through the sword, so I can basically use Snatch infinitely to catch the ones that are running away. Some of them still make it to the water, since I can't focus on all of them at once, but at least a hundred or so more die on land, and by the end, the beach is quiet again.

I'm not even out of breath either, since the sword is also recovering my body. This thing is super strong. Once they're all dead, I start storing them away. I conjure up half a dozen mana heads and just send them around to put everything in my Stomach. With the new Gluttony upgrade, the Stomach feels bottomless again, and even after storing up literally all of them, it doesn't even feel half full.

With all of them stored away, I turn to Skarn, ready to take a nice, juicy bite when something enters the range of my Food Sense. It's a human. With a sigh, I store Skarn in my Stomach for later. I pause as I reach for his trident, wondering how a broken soul weapon works, but to my surprise, as soon as I touch it, the sliced-off prong crumbles to dust. Weird.

"Soul Weapons typically regenerate from damage. Though they have to be bonded for that to work. I expect that once someone bonds with the trident, the missing prong will regrow."

"I see. Let's get that started now, then." Bond! Nothing happens.

"Dammit, not again!"

"Your hatred of water makes it highly unlikely that any water monster's Soul Weapon will be compatible with you."

"That's dumb."

"That's normal. Now put it away. You're about to have company."

"Right." I turn toward the village where the human is coming from. They're moving very slowly. Probably scared. I am a pretty scary cat. They should hurry up already though. I want to eat Skarn. I'm hungry. After another minute or so, they finally reach the edge of the village and stop. I can't see them for some reason. They're standing halfway behind a tree, peeking out at me, but despite Food Sense telling me exactly where they are, I can't see them.

"Stealth Skills." Yes, I was about to guess that. Well, they're not attacking, but they're also not moving, so this is getting annoying.

"Hey, I know you're there." The human flinches.

"Yeah, you. Behind the tree. I see you. What are you doing?" The human removes their stealth Skills and steps out, hands empty and in the air.

"My name is Lauren. I'm a gold-ranked Adventurer, and I was sent to delay or stop the expansion of the Leader type Named monster's Territory. May I know your name?"

"I am Princess Yona."

"You can't tell people you're a princess!" Watch me.

"Princess Yona, may I know what nation you hail from?" asks the other woman.

"Russia."

"Please stop. The point of a disguise is to not get caught." I know what I'm doing.

"R-Russia?" says the other woman.

"I don't believe I've ever heard of that nation."

"It's really far from here," I say.

"So, you're here to take care of the big fish dude? I just did that, so you're fine. You can go back now."

"Y-you did?"

"Yeah. Where do you think all this blood came from?"

"I thought that might be the case, but I was wondering what you did with the bodies?"

"Princess Yona the beautiful and powerful, please do not reveal your Gluttony Trait, or any of the Skills that have been influenced by it." Don't worry, I have a plan.

"I stored them. They're right here." I hold out my hand, palm down, and conjure a tiny little mana cat head where Lauren can't see it. From it, I summon Skarn, and his top half lands on the sand. It looks pretty convincingly like not Stomach of the Glutton, if I do say so myself.

"That was surprisingly clever." Surprisingly?

"Ah, I see," says Lauren.

"That is most definitely the Named monster. Thank you for slaying him. You have done this nation a great service."

"Yes, yes I have. That means you can go home now."

"It does…" she says.

"Would you like to come with me? I'm sure you'll be rewarded for your contributions."

"What kind of rewards?"

"Money. Items. I'm not sure exactly, but it will be worth your while." Hmmm… Rewards sound nice. But I am really hungry.

"Maybe later. I-" Suddenly, my stomach gives out a big growl. That's embarrassing.

"Are you hungry?" asks Lauren.

"Maybe."

"I have a cooking Profession. I could cook for you if you'd like."

"Yes," I say immediately.

"I would like. Give me food." Professionally cooked food? Yes please!

"Of course!" she says with a smile.

"Let's head west a bit though, so we don't get attacked in the middle of the meal. There's nothing worse than an interrupted meal."

"I completely agree," I say, stepping forward and unsummoning my sword.

"I hate it when people bother me while I'm eating."

"I was in the middle of a meal when I got the mission to come out here," she grumbles.

"Went through a long day, ordered a bunch of food, and before I even got halfway through, the Guild Messenger barged in and started panicking at me to come out and kill the Named monster."

"Oh man, interruptions in the first half of the meal are especially bad," I say.

"I once fired a guard after he made my food get cold by bothering me with something that wasn't even that important right when I started eating."

"Understandable," she says, nodding as she turns to walk back up through the village. Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings. Okay, I like her. She gets it. We walk back through the village along the road until we get to what I guess she deems to be a safe distance. The whole time, we talk about how annoying it is to have our meals interrupted. I think we're really starting to bond!

"If so, you can ask her to teach you how to cook, and then you can also get a cooking Profession." Oh yeah! Great idea! Once we stop, Lauren goes off into the woods to find some firewood. I use Snatch to help gather it as well, and soon, we have a good fire going.

"I've got a few kinds of meat in my spatial bag," says Lauren.

"Beef, lamb, pork, and venison. Any preferences?"

"Hmmm…" I say. That's a good question. If it's just ordinary meat, it probably can't compare to the seafoodmen. But then again, I have been eating a lot of seafood lately. Maybe this will be a good change of pace.

"Beef," I say.

"I haven't had any beef in a while."

"You got it!" She pulls out a metal tray and a cast iron pan, from a little leather pouch on her hip, as well as two giant steaks, a roll of butter, and some herbs and a little tin of mixed spices. I watch, mouth watering, as she prepares the meat. I don't know exactly what's in that tin of spices, since they're all mixed together, but it smells amazing. She sets the pan on a log in the fire while she prepares the meat on the tray.

Both steaks get a full dry rub of the spice mix, then sit for a minute as she tosses a wad of butter into the pan. Once the butter is boiling, she tosses the steaks onto the pan, and as they sizzle, the aroma of the spices fills the air around. She tosses the herbs in on top of the steaks, and in the butter beside them, then watches carefully as they cook. Throughout the entire process, I can sense her mana exiting her body and entering the food.

I'm not entirely sure what it's doing, but I hope it makes it taste better. I have noticed that the seafoodmen with the most mana also tend to taste the best, with the exception of the jellyfishwomen. After a minute or two, she flips the steaks over, and after a minute or two of that, she tilts the pan and pulls a spoon from her bag and starts splashing the butter onto the steaks.

Once she's satisfied, she takes the pan off the fire, pulls out two plates from her bag, and somehow uses her mana to float the steaks out of the pan and onto the plates. She passes me one plate, along with a fork and knife, and it takes all my self control not to just dig in right there.

"You're drooling." Shut up. I wipe my mouth, then poke the steak with the fork. Squishy, but not too squishy. A perfect blue, if I'm not mistaken. I cut it open and take a few seconds to bask in the glory of the perfectly pinkish red interior. Beautiful. I cut off a small bite and eat it. The flavor is… the best thing I've ever had. Even Flarn's meat isn't this good. The meat is perfectly cooked, so the texture is wonderful, and the flavors of the spices and herbs mix perfectly with the meat.

Neither overpowers the other, instead building on each other to make a perfect combination. It's a little spicy, a little sweet, a little salty, and very savory. After the first bite, I wolf down the rest. I have to force myself to eat slower to properly enjoy the flavor, but it's just too good to do that. And on top of all that, it even feels like it's trying to replenish my mana and energy, even though I'm already pretty much full on that. This is the best meal I've ever had. Was this really ordinary beef?

"You like it?" asks Lauren as I finish. She finished her food just as quickly.

"That was amazing!" I say.

"Do you have more?"

"You're still hungry?"

"Always!" She pulls out two more steaks and prepares them the same way. They're just as good as the first ones, if not better.

"Are these just regular steaks?" I ask when I finish.

"They're high-end cuts, but they come from ordinary cows."

"What's in the spice blend?"

"Trade secret," she says with a smirk.

"Can you teach me how to make food like that? I still need to pick my Profession."

"You haven't picked your Profession?"

"All my options sucked," I say.

"I was waiting until I got to a city somewhere so someone could teach me a better Profession, but if I can learn how to make food like this, I just want this!"

"Well, I guess I can teach you…" she says.

"But not for free."

"I'll pay," I say.

"I'm gonna get a reward for killing the Named monsters, right? I'll pay you from that."

"Works for me," she says.

"Wait, did you say mon sters? Plural?"

"Oh yeah, there was another one. I killed her too though, so you don't need to worry about it. Anyway, how about that teaching? We can start right now!"

"Actually, let's hold off on that for now."

"Why?"

"My profession is better suited for the kitchen, and half my Skills don't work out here. If I teach you now, you're more likely to unlock something like Campfire Cook. Let's head back to the city, and I can teach you at my house." She says "Campfire Cook" with just the right amount of disgust, as a Profession with such a lame name deserves.

"You have a house?" I ask.

"I'm a gold-ranked adventurer," she scoffs.

"Of course I have a house!"

"What does that mean, by the way?" I ask.

"What's a gold-ranked adventurer?" She stares at me for a few seconds.

"Right, I forgot you're not from here. In this country, we have an Adventurer's Guild where you can register as an Adventurer and get quests and rewards for slaying monsters and things like that. Being a gold-ranked Adventurer means that I've reached Tier 3 in both my Class and my Species, and that I've gotten enough achievements to reach gold rank, which is the third of six ranks. Well, seven, if you count Hero rank, but there haven't been any Hero rank adventurers in centuries."

"Third of seven doesn't sound very high," I say suspiciously.

"Yes, but it's in the top 10% of Adventurers," she explains.

"Platinum and beyond are rare, at least in this country. I've heard that people at that level are more common on the mainland though, but I guess you probably already know that."

"Yeah…" I say.

"So Gold is for Tier 3, and Platinum is after that?"

"The ranks are Bronze, Silver, Gold, Platinum, Mithril, Adamantium, and then Hero, which doesn't really count."

"So each rank corresponds to a Tier then?" I ask.

"Bronze for Tier 1, Silver for Tier 2, Gold for Tier 3, and so on?"

"Exactly, except Mithril and Adamantium are both two tiers each. Mithril is Tier 5 and 6, and Adamantium is tier 7 and 8, and Hero rank is for 9 and above." 9 and above? How many Tiers are there??

"Ten, not including Tierless," says Abby.

"After that, you enter the realm of divinity." Ten?! But my stats are already so high! What will they be by the time I get to Tier 10?

"Much, much higher. Assuming you make it that far. Do you want to make it all the way to Tier 10?" I dunno. Now that I know it exists, I'm kinda thinking about it. If Skarn's meat is as good as I think it's gonna be, imagine how good a Tier 10 monster's meat would taste! And with a Tier 10 cooking Profession? My mouth is watering just thinking about it.

"Would you like to register as an Adventurer?" asks Lauren.

"I think you might have to if you want to be properly rewarded for your efforts, even if it's just a formality."

"Yeah, I guess," I say.

"I don't see why not."

"What tier are you at, by the way?" she asks.

"I assume at least tier 3, since you took care of the Named monster so easily."

"Haha, yeah…" I probably shouldn't tell her that I'm only Tier 2 in my species and Tier 1 in my Class.

"Definitely not. There aren't many Titles as strong as yours, so it wouldn't be too hard to guess if she got suspicious."

"Great! Probably at least high Tier 3 too then. Especially since you took care of those Named monsters. I'm nearing the top of Tier 3 myself, and was getting ready to push for Tier 4 and Platinum. If you don't have a Party, you're welcome to join mine. Not that I have one, but I wouldn't mind going into Dungeons with someone competent."

"Dungeons? You have Dungeons?"

"That's what the Adventurer's Guild is built on. Raiding Dungeons, collecting monster loot and selling it… That's how it gets its money. Pretty much every major city is built around at least one Dungeon. Riverfork, which is where I'm from, has four of them, though I've mostly outgrown them at this point."

"I see." I focus my attention on my Stomach and locate the Dungeon Core that's still resting inside. If a Dungeon is enough to build a city around, I wonder how much a Dungeon Core is worth. I probably shouldn't let her know that I have a Dungeon Core either though.

"You're not as impulsive as I thought you were." Hey, you might know a lot about the System, but I am the expert on strategy. I know what I'm doing.

"Right… Strategy…" Shut up. Anyway, will Perfect Disguise let me fake my Tier?

"No, but Custom Namecard will. Speaking of which, you really need to change it. This woman isn't commenting on it out of politeness, but it won't be good if you walk into the city like that." No.

"If you don't mind me asking," starts Lauren.

"How did you end up here? As far as I'm aware, there aren't any beastperson tribes in this country, and the nearest ones on the mainland are far in the west. I'm not sure how you wound up way out here. I'm not complaining, of course, since you've helped to stop a potential disaster, but I'm just confused."

"It's a secret," I say.

"Fair enough," she replies with a shrug.

"... That worked?" Abby, Abby, Abby. You don't understand deception at all, do you, my dear Annoying Blue Box?

"Please stop talking like that." Well, now I'm gonna do it more.

"Well, there's a small town a bit further down the road where I've been staying," says Lauren.

"I need to head back to leave a note for the incoming reinforcements before we go to Riverfork, and the sooner, the better. And we can get some more comfortable rest there too."

"Okay!" I say. I've had enough sleeping in the woods. I would love a bed. I've done a lot tonight already, and now I've just had a nice meal. It sounds like the perfect time for a nap!

"And a perfect place to look over your new Class Upgrade options." Oh yeah! I almost forgot about that!

"Alright, then let me just clean up a bit, and we can head out," says Lauren.