Ch 170 -- Anti-Dwarf Secret Weapon
"Bakayaro-! You want us to make WHAT? No way! Get lost!" I left the shop as the door was slammed shut behind me. I sighed to myself, that was the fifth blacksmiths I had tried and, thinking back on it, the most polite in their response to my request. The others had been much ruder.
After leaving the Adventurers Guild I had gone to the blacksmith's quarter of Doran to ask someone to make a barbeque stove for me. I had tried one store after another with no luck, getting turned down time after time in the same way. I'd open the door, I'd be welcomed then asked "What kind of weapon or armour are you looking for?" When I started to explain, "Well, it's not a weapon I'm looking for but this kind of thing..." the conversation would end at that point. Abruptly.
When you think about forges and blacksmiths in stories, Dwarves are what comes to mind and sure enough, all five of the blacksmith's workshops I had tried were run by Dwarves, just as pig-headed and short-tempered as you might expect. Still, they didn't have to shout at me quite like that, did they?
Ugor-san had warned me that the blacksmith's workshops in this city were mostly dedicated to making weapons and armour and that the owners were stubborn. I had to agree with him now I had visited some of them myself. Still, they were blacksmiths so they should be able to make things other than weapons and such. So what could I do? Ask the God of Blacksmiths to intervene on my behalf? I thought sourly to myself, as if that boozehound would do anything... then inspiration struck. Ah, booze!
The blacksmiths workshops were all run by Dwarves apparently and of course, Dwarves famously like to drink, if the stories I had read back in my own world were true. If I bribed them with alcohol I bought from the Net Super... he he he, a taste of something strong should do it. I quickly ducked into an alleyway out of sight so I could open Net Super and buy some booze straight away.
So, I thought to myself looking at the Net Super's drinks display, what sort of alcohol would be best? It would have to be strong with a high alcohol content. Whisky then, I decided, a little would go a long way. I didn't drink much whisky myself but I plumped for a famous Japanese whisky, 700ml in a very recognisable square bottle. I held it in my hand, thinking about the effects of items from Net Super in this world. Would it cause a dramatic change to the drinker? I decided to Appraise it just in case.
[ Whisky ]
Alcohol from another world. Expensive.
Reduces stamina by 2% for approximately 5 minutes.
Oh, whisky causes a decline in stamina, not an improvement? That was the first time I'd seen something from Net Super do that, a 2% drop for five minutes. Was it because it was booze, or was it because being drunk reduces someone's status? I didn't know but I'd discovered something new about Net Super which was good. However it wasn't a big change and it didn't last long so I decided it would be fine. I headed for the next blacksmith's workshop along the street, bottle in hand.
"Excuse me-" I said as I opened the door.
"Hmm, a customer?" An elderly Dwarf with a short but sturdy-looking body turned to me and growled. "What d'you want?" Yeah, that's exactly the sort of friendly welcome I had come to expect. Now to see if my secret weapon would work.
"I want to place an order ..." I started to ask.
"Oh, what kind of weapon d'you want?" he immediately interrupted, same as all the other Dwarf storekeepers I had encountered today.
"Well you see, what I'm looking for isn't a weapon, but ... could you just listen to what I've got to say please?" The elderly Dwarf had frowned as soon as I had said I wasn't looking for a weapon.
"It isn't a weapon? Armour then?"
"Well no, but I would be grateful if you could listen to what I've got to say.'' I repeated.
The Dwarf's frown deepened and he crossed his thick arms. "I'm not doing anything right now so I'll listen to you. I won't make it if it isn't a weapon or armour but I'll listen." Hooo, this was the politest Dwarf I had run into all day!
"Yes, that's fine." I said. I brought out a piece of parchment I had bought in advance and started to sketch my idea of a barbeque stove, explaining as I went. "You see, it's about this size and I put charcoal in a drawer here. I'd want you to make a hole, maybe a pattern of holes in the side so it will burn better. The mesh on the top will be removable, I'd grill meat on it." The design I had drawn up was a lot larger than the simple charcoal grill on the food stall we had visited in the morning since, well, I had Fer and company to feed. As I finished pointing out the details the elderly Dwarf harrumphed.
"...Haa, get out, get out!" the Dwarf's face grew red as he shouted at me. "If the other Dwarves heard I'd made something like this for you I'd get laughed at, I'd never live it down. Try someone else!"
As expected, he wasn't keen on the idea. "I've already been yelled at and turned away at five other stores today." I told him.
"What, you went to five other workshops before you came to my place?" the Dwarf harrumphed again. "Slow learner, ain'cha? There's no place around here that will take your order to make that, that THING." Well, I knew that, the blacksmiths in Doran were only interested in making weapons and armour but I had my anti-Dwarf secret weapon in my hand. Would he be able to resist it?
"Changing the subject, do you like booze?" I inquired. The Dwarf threw his arms out, inviting inspection.
"Look at me. I'm a Dwarf, in case you hadn't noticed." He obviously didn't have a high opinion of my intellect. "Of course I like to drink, no question about it." he explained as if to a child. Well, I expected that answer but I wasn't totally sure, it was a good idea to check.
"Well you see I have something special here..." I got a cup from my Item Box and held it out along with the bottle of whisky to the store owner. "This is a very rare kind of booze, extremely strong. I was wondering if it might suit a Dwarf's taste." The Dwarf's eyes fixed on the bottle in my hand and I saw him swallow a couple of times. I definitely had his attention now.
"Why don't you try some?" I cracked open the bottle of whisky and poured a generous helping into the cup. I saw his nostrils widen as the sweet alcoholic fragrance wafted from the cup as I swirled it around. He took the cup and peered into it then he lifted it to his lips and threw the contents back into his mouth.
"Gaaah, wow!" he exclaimed. "This booze, it's..." he blinked, licking his lips. "It's the best-tasting booze I've ever drunk!" Hehehe, my anti-Dwarf secret weapon seemed to be working perfectly. Time to close the deal.
"This booze is not sold around here because it is made in a remote location of a small country far from here." The Dwarf's eyes remained fixed on the bottle in my hand. "I have some more of this booze, not much though. If you accept my order then I'd include five bottles of it as an extra along with the price in coins." The Dwarf didn't think too long about my offer, not surprising given the way he had reacted when he tasted the whisky.
"...Ten. Gimme ten bottles of this booze, separate from the actual price and I'll make that thing for you." He crossed his arms again, staring at me and the bottle in my hand. Yosh! The whisky was an outstanding success.
"I'll give you 10 bottles, then. As a thank you for accepting my order, please take this one." I handed the bottle over to the Dwarf who quickly poured another cupful and downed it as quickly as the first one.
"Haaaaah, really tasty. I can't believe this booze is so delicious." he muttered. I hadn't lied, it really was made in a remote location in a small country far away, in another world actually. I wasn't a connoisseur of whisky myself but it had been a popular best-seller for a long time so I had figured it had to be really tasty.
"How long will it take to complete?" I asked the Dwarf who was starting to pour himself another cup from the bottle. He stopped and looked down at my drawing before thinking for a few moments.
"Ummm, three days. Come back in three days and it'll be ready."
"How much will it cost me?"
"It's a pretty big thing, lemme see..." he thought for a few moments more then said, "About 350 gold coins, including materials." That much wasn't a problem for me and I nodded.
"Thank you, please go ahead with my order. I'll come back three days from now."
"Oh, don't forget the booze." the Dwarf added. It was clear what he thought was the most important part of the deal. Dwarves really did like to drink, as expected.
"Don't worry, I won't forget." I said as I left the store. Fer and Dora-chan were asleep outside and Sui-chan was in my shoulder-bag as usual, also asleep of course.
"Hey, let's go back to the inn." I said telepathically to Fer and Dora-chan.
"Nuuu... are you finished?" Fer said grumpily.
"Fuuuah, finally?" Dora-chan added, flying up from the ground.
"Sorry you had to wait. That's me finished for the day. We can go back to the inn now."
"I'm hungry, let's get back and eat." Fer was already up and moving as I peered up at the sky. Was it really that late? But the sun was definitely sinking towards the horizon. I had spent more time trying to find a blacksmith that would make a barbeque stove for me than I thought. Ah well, it was sorted now so as I followed Fer I started thinking about dinner. What meat was left in the Item Box, what was I running out of? There wasn't much Orc General left but I still had plenty of Bloody Horn Bull and Wyvern in stock plus a lot of Orc meat from the dungeon and elsewhere. I still had about half of the Giant Tarepo left and of course the Cockatrices and the Rock Bird Fer had caught recently. Cockatrice, now that gave me an idea, remembering something the Black Magic Cooking Stove salesman had said to me. Could I make use of the big oven of my Black Magic Cooking Stove? I was pretty sure what I was thinking of making would fit.
Tuesday 24 December 2019
Saturday 14 December 2019
Ch 169 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Ch 169 -- Ugor-san Gets Extremely Angry (Again)
We soon arrived at the Adventurers Guild. I had found two nice baskets in the general store and had placed the pound cakes in them, ready to hand them over to Ugor-san and Elland-san. As soon as I made an appearance the Guild's staff hurried off to fetch Elland-san without me having to wait or even ask for assistance. It was a bit unnerving for someone like me to be treated as a VIP like this. Elland-san soon made an appearance and we went up to the now-familiar Guild Master's office on the second floor.
Once we were seated Elland-san said "Please wait for Ugor-kun to arrive." Elland-san looked somewhat dispirited, he wasn't even trying to ogle Dora-chan like he usually did. I heard him mutter "I told him I could deal with this myself. I've done it before when he wasn't around..." No, I could understand Ugor-san's feelings, you would try to dodge out of doing your job or mess things up with your selfishness. Best to wait for Ugor-san to get here, Guild Master.
Shortly after the office door opened and Ugor-san hurried in. "Thank you both for waiting." he said, throwing a hard glance at the depressed Elf sitting behind the big desk before he took his own seat and produced a large sheet of paper.
"Let's get on with business, Mukouda-san." he said, "I would like to pay you for the dungeon goods you delivered to us yesterday. Well, the details are..." Ugor-san ran a finger down the paper as he read out the items I was selling to the Guild.
"First there are 125 Orc skins for 1000 gold coins then there are 63 Lizardman skins for 630 gold coins, 102 Ogre skins for 2040 gold coins, 113 Troll skins for 2486 gold coins, 88 Minotaur skins for 1,672 gold coins, 21 small Ogre magic stones for 315 gold coins, 23 small Troll magic stones for 460 gold coins, 20 small Minotaur magic stones for 380 gold coins, 7 small Giant Killer Mantis magic stones for 147 gold coins, 15 vials of Paralyze Butterfly paralysis powder for 75 gold coins, 20 Wild Ape furs for 160 gold coins and a small magic bag for 280 gold coins." He stopped to glance up and down the paper again before announcing, "That makes a total of 9645 gold coins."
He tapped the paper with a finger before saying "Because the amount is so large I'd prefer to follow the example of the Merchants Guild yesterday and pay you with white gold coins and large gold coins. Is that okay with you Mukouda-san?"
When I nodded Ugor-san got out a large lockbox and counted out 96 white gold coins, 4 large gold coins and 5 gold coins, arranging them in piles of ten on Elland-san's desk. "Please confirm the amount," Ugor-san said as he put the last coin down.
I leant forward and counted them, "White gold coins 1, 2, 3 …… (Omitted) …… 96, yes, plus 4 large gold coins and 5 gold coins. Yosh." I looked up and nodded. "Yes, that's correct." I started putting them away in my Item Box, rather regretting the absence of those utilitarian sacks I normally received payment in. Ah well.
"Lately we've been able to secure a large amount of skins and magic stones thanks to you, Mukouda-sama." Ugor-san said with a smile.
"...But getting the Vasuki's fangs, the Manticore's Poison Stinger, the Gustave's fangs and spine would have been better..." came a whisper from the other side of the big desk. Ugor-san's darkening face turned towards his erstwhile superior.
"Did you have something to add, Guild Master?" he asked dangerously.
"I didn't say anything." Elland-san muttered. Really, Guild Master, did you really expect Ugor-san to not hear that? I waited for the explosion to come but I was disappointed as Ugor-san shrugged it off.
"Well, that's okay." Ugor-san settled back in his seat. "I wanted to have words with you when you purchased the Earth Dragon materials without consulting with me. I might have demurred over the expense you incurred but, as it turned out you were right and the Dragon blood and liver quickly sold for more than I expected." He shrugged. "In fact that extra cashflow enabled us to buy more of Mukouda-san's dungeon items today than we would have normally been able to afford."
Elland-san perked up at Ugor-san's words. "Yes, that's right." He nodded enthusiastically. "I did tell you that, didn't I? And I was right, wasn't I?" An avaricious smile spread over his fine Elvish features. "So are you ready to give me a budget to get the Dragon Sword made from that Dragon fang now, as a reward?"
Uh oh. As soon as Elland-san said that a vein started to throb on Ugor-san's temple. Bad move Elland-san, you just made Ugor-san extremely angry (again). I didn't understand Elland-san's obtuseness, after all he worked with Ugor-san every day, surely he would have learned not to aggravate him like that? I could only congratulate Ugor-san for his patience in dealing with his blundering superior day after day.
"Guild Master," Ugor-san said, thin-lipped, "You convinced me that the Guild would benefit from possessing a Dragon Sword made from a Dragon's fang even though I was somewhat reluctant. But!" he raised a finger. "We only have the funds to spare at the moment to purchase the necessary materials. Getting the sword made will cost a lot more, money we don't have yet. You don't seem to realise that the Guild's finances are limited." He sighed. "We'll need to consult with the blacksmiths here in Doran to determine which workshop can actually make such a sword, how much it will cost and so on before we can even begin to figure out where the money to pay for it is going to come from. It won't be cheap, or soon." Ugor-san gestured, indicating the office we sat in and by extension the rest of the building. "It takes a lot of money to operate the Guild and we have to earn that money first and foremost. Fripperies like having a Dragon Sword made to satisfy one particular Guild member's selfish desires come well down the list." He fixed the deflated Elf with a hard stare. "Wouldn't you agree, Guild Master?"
Ooooh, Ugor-san's argument left nothing for Elland-san to rebut. Excellent work, Ugor-san.
"No, no, no, that's not what I said." Elland-san replied weakly, "I just-"
Ugor-san held up a hand. "I didn't say the Guild could never afford to have the sword made in the future, it's just that right now all we can do is solicit bids from some of the larger blacksmith workshops to get an idea how much it will cost us. Really, Guild Master, sometimes you..."
Ah, it sounded like Ugor-san was going to deliver yet another sermon and Elland-san was slumping in his seat in resignation. I didn't want to sit through this even though Elland-san deserved the stern talking-to he was about to receive. I decided that intervening before Ugor-san could get going would be a good idea, after all Elland-san had been helpful to me in his own Dragon-obsessed manner and right now he looked like he could use being rescued.
"Ahem, Ugor-san?" I interjected. Ugor-san stopped abruptly and turned to me.
"Oh, excuse me Mukouda-sama." He looked down sheepishly. "I can't help myself when the Guild Master starts acting like this. I'm sorry." I totally understand, Ugor-san.
"No, apart from that I have a gift I want to give to you, Ugor-san and you too, Elland-san." I put the baskets with the pound cakes inside on the desk in front of them. "Here you are." As they lifted the lids and peered inside I went on to explain. "I thought the assistance Ugor-san provided me at the Merchants Guild yesterday deserved a reward, and I'm indebted to Elland-san for disassembling the Earth Dragon. They're a sweet sort of a cake, please enjoy them."
"Oh, are you sure?" Ugor-san asked, peering into the basket in front of him.
"Yes, please accept them."
"Thank you very much for this gift." Ugor-san smiled broadly. "My wife and children really like sweets." It seems that my choice of confectionery as presents was not a mistake.
"I like sweet things too." Elland-san said. "I'm very happy to accept this, I'll have some of it with tea right away."
Ugor-san scowled. "Guild Master, what's with this 'right away' business? Do you really have time for tea?" The vein on Ugor-san's forehead started to throb again. Not a good sign. "Surely you're not going to stop work to indulge yourself? There's a lot for you to be getting on with after all."
Elland-san quickly closed the lid on the gift basket and sat back, waving his hands. "No, no, I didn't mean right now as in, well, 'right now'. That would be the wrong thing to do, Ugor-kun. After finishing work right now, that's what I meant of course ha ha..."
Yes, you should work hard, Elland-san. You've got a lot of things to do to get ready for your trip to the Royal Capital after all, but for us we were done for the day and it was time for us to leave the Adventurers Guild. However Ugor-san had mentioned blacksmiths and their workshops earlier when the subject of Elland-san's desire to have a Dragon Sword manufactured came up and that gave me an idea. Could a blacksmith here in Doran make a barbeque stove for me? When I asked Ugor-san about this he explained that Doran was a dungeon city and nearly all of the blacksmith workshops here specialised in weapons and armour.
"Can they make anything other than weapons?" I asked.
Ugor-san shook his head. "In my experience the best blacksmiths are single-minded and quite stubborn about what they'll work on. I can't say for sure, you'll have to ask around and see for yourself."
Ah, so that's how it is? Well I supposed I could go to a few workshops and negotiate with the smiths directly if I had to. With that I said my goodbyes and left the Adventurers Guild, following Ugor-san's directions to the blacksmiths quarter in the city.
We soon arrived at the Adventurers Guild. I had found two nice baskets in the general store and had placed the pound cakes in them, ready to hand them over to Ugor-san and Elland-san. As soon as I made an appearance the Guild's staff hurried off to fetch Elland-san without me having to wait or even ask for assistance. It was a bit unnerving for someone like me to be treated as a VIP like this. Elland-san soon made an appearance and we went up to the now-familiar Guild Master's office on the second floor.
Once we were seated Elland-san said "Please wait for Ugor-kun to arrive." Elland-san looked somewhat dispirited, he wasn't even trying to ogle Dora-chan like he usually did. I heard him mutter "I told him I could deal with this myself. I've done it before when he wasn't around..." No, I could understand Ugor-san's feelings, you would try to dodge out of doing your job or mess things up with your selfishness. Best to wait for Ugor-san to get here, Guild Master.
Shortly after the office door opened and Ugor-san hurried in. "Thank you both for waiting." he said, throwing a hard glance at the depressed Elf sitting behind the big desk before he took his own seat and produced a large sheet of paper.
"Let's get on with business, Mukouda-san." he said, "I would like to pay you for the dungeon goods you delivered to us yesterday. Well, the details are..." Ugor-san ran a finger down the paper as he read out the items I was selling to the Guild.
"First there are 125 Orc skins for 1000 gold coins then there are 63 Lizardman skins for 630 gold coins, 102 Ogre skins for 2040 gold coins, 113 Troll skins for 2486 gold coins, 88 Minotaur skins for 1,672 gold coins, 21 small Ogre magic stones for 315 gold coins, 23 small Troll magic stones for 460 gold coins, 20 small Minotaur magic stones for 380 gold coins, 7 small Giant Killer Mantis magic stones for 147 gold coins, 15 vials of Paralyze Butterfly paralysis powder for 75 gold coins, 20 Wild Ape furs for 160 gold coins and a small magic bag for 280 gold coins." He stopped to glance up and down the paper again before announcing, "That makes a total of 9645 gold coins."
He tapped the paper with a finger before saying "Because the amount is so large I'd prefer to follow the example of the Merchants Guild yesterday and pay you with white gold coins and large gold coins. Is that okay with you Mukouda-san?"
When I nodded Ugor-san got out a large lockbox and counted out 96 white gold coins, 4 large gold coins and 5 gold coins, arranging them in piles of ten on Elland-san's desk. "Please confirm the amount," Ugor-san said as he put the last coin down.
I leant forward and counted them, "White gold coins 1, 2, 3 …… (Omitted) …… 96, yes, plus 4 large gold coins and 5 gold coins. Yosh." I looked up and nodded. "Yes, that's correct." I started putting them away in my Item Box, rather regretting the absence of those utilitarian sacks I normally received payment in. Ah well.
"Lately we've been able to secure a large amount of skins and magic stones thanks to you, Mukouda-sama." Ugor-san said with a smile.
"...But getting the Vasuki's fangs, the Manticore's Poison Stinger, the Gustave's fangs and spine would have been better..." came a whisper from the other side of the big desk. Ugor-san's darkening face turned towards his erstwhile superior.
"Did you have something to add, Guild Master?" he asked dangerously.
"I didn't say anything." Elland-san muttered. Really, Guild Master, did you really expect Ugor-san to not hear that? I waited for the explosion to come but I was disappointed as Ugor-san shrugged it off.
"Well, that's okay." Ugor-san settled back in his seat. "I wanted to have words with you when you purchased the Earth Dragon materials without consulting with me. I might have demurred over the expense you incurred but, as it turned out you were right and the Dragon blood and liver quickly sold for more than I expected." He shrugged. "In fact that extra cashflow enabled us to buy more of Mukouda-san's dungeon items today than we would have normally been able to afford."
Elland-san perked up at Ugor-san's words. "Yes, that's right." He nodded enthusiastically. "I did tell you that, didn't I? And I was right, wasn't I?" An avaricious smile spread over his fine Elvish features. "So are you ready to give me a budget to get the Dragon Sword made from that Dragon fang now, as a reward?"
Uh oh. As soon as Elland-san said that a vein started to throb on Ugor-san's temple. Bad move Elland-san, you just made Ugor-san extremely angry (again). I didn't understand Elland-san's obtuseness, after all he worked with Ugor-san every day, surely he would have learned not to aggravate him like that? I could only congratulate Ugor-san for his patience in dealing with his blundering superior day after day.
"Guild Master," Ugor-san said, thin-lipped, "You convinced me that the Guild would benefit from possessing a Dragon Sword made from a Dragon's fang even though I was somewhat reluctant. But!" he raised a finger. "We only have the funds to spare at the moment to purchase the necessary materials. Getting the sword made will cost a lot more, money we don't have yet. You don't seem to realise that the Guild's finances are limited." He sighed. "We'll need to consult with the blacksmiths here in Doran to determine which workshop can actually make such a sword, how much it will cost and so on before we can even begin to figure out where the money to pay for it is going to come from. It won't be cheap, or soon." Ugor-san gestured, indicating the office we sat in and by extension the rest of the building. "It takes a lot of money to operate the Guild and we have to earn that money first and foremost. Fripperies like having a Dragon Sword made to satisfy one particular Guild member's selfish desires come well down the list." He fixed the deflated Elf with a hard stare. "Wouldn't you agree, Guild Master?"
Ooooh, Ugor-san's argument left nothing for Elland-san to rebut. Excellent work, Ugor-san.
"No, no, no, that's not what I said." Elland-san replied weakly, "I just-"
Ugor-san held up a hand. "I didn't say the Guild could never afford to have the sword made in the future, it's just that right now all we can do is solicit bids from some of the larger blacksmith workshops to get an idea how much it will cost us. Really, Guild Master, sometimes you..."
Ah, it sounded like Ugor-san was going to deliver yet another sermon and Elland-san was slumping in his seat in resignation. I didn't want to sit through this even though Elland-san deserved the stern talking-to he was about to receive. I decided that intervening before Ugor-san could get going would be a good idea, after all Elland-san had been helpful to me in his own Dragon-obsessed manner and right now he looked like he could use being rescued.
"Ahem, Ugor-san?" I interjected. Ugor-san stopped abruptly and turned to me.
"Oh, excuse me Mukouda-sama." He looked down sheepishly. "I can't help myself when the Guild Master starts acting like this. I'm sorry." I totally understand, Ugor-san.
"No, apart from that I have a gift I want to give to you, Ugor-san and you too, Elland-san." I put the baskets with the pound cakes inside on the desk in front of them. "Here you are." As they lifted the lids and peered inside I went on to explain. "I thought the assistance Ugor-san provided me at the Merchants Guild yesterday deserved a reward, and I'm indebted to Elland-san for disassembling the Earth Dragon. They're a sweet sort of a cake, please enjoy them."
"Oh, are you sure?" Ugor-san asked, peering into the basket in front of him.
"Yes, please accept them."
"Thank you very much for this gift." Ugor-san smiled broadly. "My wife and children really like sweets." It seems that my choice of confectionery as presents was not a mistake.
"I like sweet things too." Elland-san said. "I'm very happy to accept this, I'll have some of it with tea right away."
Ugor-san scowled. "Guild Master, what's with this 'right away' business? Do you really have time for tea?" The vein on Ugor-san's forehead started to throb again. Not a good sign. "Surely you're not going to stop work to indulge yourself? There's a lot for you to be getting on with after all."
Elland-san quickly closed the lid on the gift basket and sat back, waving his hands. "No, no, I didn't mean right now as in, well, 'right now'. That would be the wrong thing to do, Ugor-kun. After finishing work right now, that's what I meant of course ha ha..."
Yes, you should work hard, Elland-san. You've got a lot of things to do to get ready for your trip to the Royal Capital after all, but for us we were done for the day and it was time for us to leave the Adventurers Guild. However Ugor-san had mentioned blacksmiths and their workshops earlier when the subject of Elland-san's desire to have a Dragon Sword manufactured came up and that gave me an idea. Could a blacksmith here in Doran make a barbeque stove for me? When I asked Ugor-san about this he explained that Doran was a dungeon city and nearly all of the blacksmith workshops here specialised in weapons and armour.
"Can they make anything other than weapons?" I asked.
Ugor-san shook his head. "In my experience the best blacksmiths are single-minded and quite stubborn about what they'll work on. I can't say for sure, you'll have to ask around and see for yourself."
Ah, so that's how it is? Well I supposed I could go to a few workshops and negotiate with the smiths directly if I had to. With that I said my goodbyes and left the Adventurers Guild, following Ugor-san's directions to the blacksmiths quarter in the city.
Tuesday 10 December 2019
Ch 168 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Ch 168 -- I Want A Barbecue Stove
Next morning as we were walking along the street towards the Adventurers Guild, Fer suddenly wrinkled his nose and said "Nuuu, isn't that burning meat I can smell?" Flying alongside us, Dora-chan's muzzle twitched. "Yeah, I can smell it too."
I sniffed and sure enough there was definitely a smell of roasting meat in the air. Following the smell to its source led us to a food stall on the street near a general store. Fer and Dora-chan naturally headed towards the stall since food was involved.
"What the-" The ojisan behind the stall was surprised to see a big Wolf (Fer) and a tiny Dragon (Dora-chan) suddenly appear in front of him.
"Ah, sorry. They're my contracted monsters, it's fine." I explained quickly, much to the stallholder's relief.
"Oh, are they Tamed? I though they were real monsters. Hahaha..." Fer and Dora-chan were staring hard at the meat skewers cooking on the ojisan's stall and a moment later Sui jumped out of her bag obviously attracted by the smell. Sui is a Slime and doesn't have a nose but it seems she can smell things like other creatures. Of course she's not a normal Slime, she can grow into a Big Slime and make recovery potions and Elixirs and forge mithril items and use Water magic to pew-pew S-ranked monsters. Maybe ordinary Slimes couldn't smell things like she could, I had no way to know.
Anyway it was pretty obvious why Fer, Dora-chan, and Sui were lined up in front of the stall staring at the meat skewers... Didn't you guys eat your fill this morning before we came out? I sighed.
"So, do you guys want to eat some of this?" I asked redundantly.
"Umu" Fer muttered telepathically.
"Eat, eat, eat" Dora-chan chimed in.
"Eat-" Sui echoed.
It's unanimous then. "So how many skewers do you guys want?" A couple each, three maybe? They just finished a big breakfast--
"I can handle 30 of them." Fer said, his eyes still rivetted on the stall's grill.
"Hmmm, I want 15 or so." Dora-chan said.
"Sui can eat 30 too-" Sui added.
Boy, you guys can really eat. "Excuse me, I want 76 skewers." Thirty plus fifteen plus thirty and one for me. Yeah yeah, I know, I had just had breakfast as well but the smell of the charcoal-grilled meat was getting to me too.
Each skewer held 3 large-ish pieces of meat and cost 7 iron coins. I handed 6 silver coins to the ojisan to pay for the meat, adding a bit extra to compensate him for the nuisance value of having Fer and company camped out in front of his stall and preventing other customers getting near.
"Is that all right?" the ojisan asked after I told him to keep the change. "Thank you for that." He scooped all the cooked skewers, maybe fifty or so off the glowing grill onto a large wooden platter. "Here's the first lot. I'll cook some more for you right away but you can have these for the moment."
I got out some dishes from my Item Box and stripped the meat off the skewers into the dishes, about sixty pieces of meat for Fer, sixty for Sui and thirty pieces for Dora-chan. "Help yourself." I said and stood back as the Gluttonous Trio launched their classic frontal attack on the food in front of them.
"Is this Horn Rabbit meat?" Fer grumbled telepathically. "Compared to the meat you cook for me it's almost inedible. Still..." I noticed his jaws didn't stop moving though. Hey Fer, you smelled it being cooked and wanted to eat it, that's why I bought it for you isn't it?
"I gotta admit, this is nowhere as good as what you serve up for us." Dora-chan agreed. "It's not terrible but, well, it's tough and salty-tasting. The way it's cooked is good though, I can eat it okay." He had liked the smell too but like Fer the actual taste was a disappointment to him.
"The meat that Aruji cooks is the most delicious-" Sui-chan added. "This meat is a little tough but it's juicy and delicious-"
Thank you Sui-chan. I thought about the stall-holder's cooking technique, he was grilling the skewers over charcoal. The meat he was using must be cheap if a skewer only cost 7 iron coins but it was still not too bad grilled this way according to my three gourmands. What had Fer called the meat, 'Horn Rabbit'? I asked the ojisan and he confirmed it was Horn Rabbit, the most common meat sold from street food stalls in Doran. It was popular with customers because it was cheap, apparently.
It turned out the stallholder had only recently moved to Doran and he had just started selling skewers here today. "My first day," he said with a smile, "and I've sold so much already. It just shows opening this stall was a great idea."
Well, my Gluttonous Trio are big eaters and you shouldn't rely on us being your main customers but still, ganbatte stallholder-san.
"Here you are, the rest of your order is ready." The ojisan handed over another platter-full of cooked skewers. I stripped the meat from the skewers and served them out in the now-empty dishes on the ground -- thirty pieces of meat from ten skewers each for Sui-chan and Fer and fifteen pieces from five skewers for Dora-chan.
"Be careful because it's hot." I warned but my three contracted monsters were already digging in. Serving Fer, Sui and Dora-chan their portions left one skewer on the platter, for me to try. I bit into it, chewing hard. The only seasoning was salt but cooked over a charcoal fire it smelled wonderful and tasted... okay. I had gotten used to Wyvern and Orc General and even Dragon meat, the Horn Rabbit was not in that class, it was denser and didn't fall apart in the mouth the way the others did but, still, it was okay. I put that down to cooking the meat over a charcoal fire, it made it smell irresistible as the outside of the meat got seared from the intense heat. As I took another bite of Horn Rabbit meat and chewed it I thought to myself that Orc General meat, Bloody Horn Bull meat and Wyvern meat would taste wonderful if it was grilled over charcoal. Add in the various seasonings I could buy from the Net Super and they should taste even more delicious.
Ah, I want a barbeque stove. Barbequing meat like this is great, of course but after we left Doran we were heading for Berleean, a fishing port city and that meant seafood which is even better barbequed. I really needed a barbeque stove... if I had seen a barbeque stove in the Net Super I would have bought one already but they just weren't on sale there. Table-top stoves, yes but no barbeque stoves. The Net Super didn't offer big items like that, unfortunately.
Is a barbeque stove something that Sui could make? No, I didn't think so. She's only been able to make things I can show her, a knife, a sword, a mincing machine but I don't have an barbeque stove she could copy. I know what they look like and I could draw one and explain to her how it works but I doubted she'd be able to make it properly just from that. Besides I wanted a big stove, I'd have to cook a lot of meat at a time to feed certain hollow-bellied creatures I was acquainted with and could Sui-chan make something that large inside her? I regretfully put the idea of having a barbeque stove aside for the time being. Maybe I could figure out something later.
Fer and company seemed to have finished eating and my own skewer was finished too and we had things to do today so I tidied up the dishes, said goodbye and good luck to the ojisan and went into the general store next door to buy a couple of gift baskets before we headed off to the Adventurers Guild to receive the payment for the dungeon drops we were selling.
Next morning as we were walking along the street towards the Adventurers Guild, Fer suddenly wrinkled his nose and said "Nuuu, isn't that burning meat I can smell?" Flying alongside us, Dora-chan's muzzle twitched. "Yeah, I can smell it too."
I sniffed and sure enough there was definitely a smell of roasting meat in the air. Following the smell to its source led us to a food stall on the street near a general store. Fer and Dora-chan naturally headed towards the stall since food was involved.
"What the-" The ojisan behind the stall was surprised to see a big Wolf (Fer) and a tiny Dragon (Dora-chan) suddenly appear in front of him.
"Ah, sorry. They're my contracted monsters, it's fine." I explained quickly, much to the stallholder's relief.
"Oh, are they Tamed? I though they were real monsters. Hahaha..." Fer and Dora-chan were staring hard at the meat skewers cooking on the ojisan's stall and a moment later Sui jumped out of her bag obviously attracted by the smell. Sui is a Slime and doesn't have a nose but it seems she can smell things like other creatures. Of course she's not a normal Slime, she can grow into a Big Slime and make recovery potions and Elixirs and forge mithril items and use Water magic to pew-pew S-ranked monsters. Maybe ordinary Slimes couldn't smell things like she could, I had no way to know.
Anyway it was pretty obvious why Fer, Dora-chan, and Sui were lined up in front of the stall staring at the meat skewers... Didn't you guys eat your fill this morning before we came out? I sighed.
"So, do you guys want to eat some of this?" I asked redundantly.
"Umu" Fer muttered telepathically.
"Eat, eat, eat" Dora-chan chimed in.
"Eat-" Sui echoed.
It's unanimous then. "So how many skewers do you guys want?" A couple each, three maybe? They just finished a big breakfast--
"I can handle 30 of them." Fer said, his eyes still rivetted on the stall's grill.
"Hmmm, I want 15 or so." Dora-chan said.
"Sui can eat 30 too-" Sui added.
Boy, you guys can really eat. "Excuse me, I want 76 skewers." Thirty plus fifteen plus thirty and one for me. Yeah yeah, I know, I had just had breakfast as well but the smell of the charcoal-grilled meat was getting to me too.
Each skewer held 3 large-ish pieces of meat and cost 7 iron coins. I handed 6 silver coins to the ojisan to pay for the meat, adding a bit extra to compensate him for the nuisance value of having Fer and company camped out in front of his stall and preventing other customers getting near.
"Is that all right?" the ojisan asked after I told him to keep the change. "Thank you for that." He scooped all the cooked skewers, maybe fifty or so off the glowing grill onto a large wooden platter. "Here's the first lot. I'll cook some more for you right away but you can have these for the moment."
I got out some dishes from my Item Box and stripped the meat off the skewers into the dishes, about sixty pieces of meat for Fer, sixty for Sui and thirty pieces for Dora-chan. "Help yourself." I said and stood back as the Gluttonous Trio launched their classic frontal attack on the food in front of them.
"Is this Horn Rabbit meat?" Fer grumbled telepathically. "Compared to the meat you cook for me it's almost inedible. Still..." I noticed his jaws didn't stop moving though. Hey Fer, you smelled it being cooked and wanted to eat it, that's why I bought it for you isn't it?
"I gotta admit, this is nowhere as good as what you serve up for us." Dora-chan agreed. "It's not terrible but, well, it's tough and salty-tasting. The way it's cooked is good though, I can eat it okay." He had liked the smell too but like Fer the actual taste was a disappointment to him.
"The meat that Aruji cooks is the most delicious-" Sui-chan added. "This meat is a little tough but it's juicy and delicious-"
Thank you Sui-chan. I thought about the stall-holder's cooking technique, he was grilling the skewers over charcoal. The meat he was using must be cheap if a skewer only cost 7 iron coins but it was still not too bad grilled this way according to my three gourmands. What had Fer called the meat, 'Horn Rabbit'? I asked the ojisan and he confirmed it was Horn Rabbit, the most common meat sold from street food stalls in Doran. It was popular with customers because it was cheap, apparently.
It turned out the stallholder had only recently moved to Doran and he had just started selling skewers here today. "My first day," he said with a smile, "and I've sold so much already. It just shows opening this stall was a great idea."
Well, my Gluttonous Trio are big eaters and you shouldn't rely on us being your main customers but still, ganbatte stallholder-san.
"Here you are, the rest of your order is ready." The ojisan handed over another platter-full of cooked skewers. I stripped the meat from the skewers and served them out in the now-empty dishes on the ground -- thirty pieces of meat from ten skewers each for Sui-chan and Fer and fifteen pieces from five skewers for Dora-chan.
"Be careful because it's hot." I warned but my three contracted monsters were already digging in. Serving Fer, Sui and Dora-chan their portions left one skewer on the platter, for me to try. I bit into it, chewing hard. The only seasoning was salt but cooked over a charcoal fire it smelled wonderful and tasted... okay. I had gotten used to Wyvern and Orc General and even Dragon meat, the Horn Rabbit was not in that class, it was denser and didn't fall apart in the mouth the way the others did but, still, it was okay. I put that down to cooking the meat over a charcoal fire, it made it smell irresistible as the outside of the meat got seared from the intense heat. As I took another bite of Horn Rabbit meat and chewed it I thought to myself that Orc General meat, Bloody Horn Bull meat and Wyvern meat would taste wonderful if it was grilled over charcoal. Add in the various seasonings I could buy from the Net Super and they should taste even more delicious.
Ah, I want a barbeque stove. Barbequing meat like this is great, of course but after we left Doran we were heading for Berleean, a fishing port city and that meant seafood which is even better barbequed. I really needed a barbeque stove... if I had seen a barbeque stove in the Net Super I would have bought one already but they just weren't on sale there. Table-top stoves, yes but no barbeque stoves. The Net Super didn't offer big items like that, unfortunately.
Is a barbeque stove something that Sui could make? No, I didn't think so. She's only been able to make things I can show her, a knife, a sword, a mincing machine but I don't have an barbeque stove she could copy. I know what they look like and I could draw one and explain to her how it works but I doubted she'd be able to make it properly just from that. Besides I wanted a big stove, I'd have to cook a lot of meat at a time to feed certain hollow-bellied creatures I was acquainted with and could Sui-chan make something that large inside her? I regretfully put the idea of having a barbeque stove aside for the time being. Maybe I could figure out something later.
Fer and company seemed to have finished eating and my own skewer was finished too and we had things to do today so I tidied up the dishes, said goodbye and good luck to the ojisan and went into the general store next door to buy a couple of gift baskets before we headed off to the Adventurers Guild to receive the payment for the dungeon drops we were selling.
Saturday 7 December 2019
Ch 167 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Ch 167 -- A Thank-you Gift For Ugor-san
Everyone had finished eating but I still had more cooking to do. I wanted to build up a stock of ready-to-eat food, rice and assorted toppings of minced meat and the like to put away in my Item Box. I set pots of rice to cook on three of the burners of the Black Magic Cooking stove while I made a lot of meat sauce on the fourth. I heated up oil in a frying pan and stirred in minced Orc meat until it browned nicely then skimmed off the fat before I added soy sauce, mirin, sake, sugar and some grated ginger (the stuff from a tube was fine) and kept it at a low heat, stirring continuously until it was ready. I let it cool down before putting into a container and storing it away.
This is a super simple recipe, usable for all sorts of dishes, a topping for rice and as a side so having a good amount to hand was very convenient. The meat can be a mixture of beef and pork or just beef or chicken by themselves, it doesn't really matter. That done, I decided I had something else to do before I visited the Adventurers Guild tomorrow, to repay the kindness of Ugor-san. He had really helped me out a lot today, after all.
Without Ugor-san's intervention the jewellery I was selling would have been purchased for less than it was really worth. I'm not short of money thanks to Fer's efforts, not to mention Dora-chan and Sui too of course, but I don’t know much about gems and if Ugor-san hadn't said anything I would have accepted the first offer Adriano-san made. Even if Elland-san had been with me (that person seems to be useless except when it comes to Dragons) I suspect he wouldn't have spoken up like Ugor-san did.
I didn't know much about how the Merchants Guild in this world carried out their business but I could guess -- the phrase "Buy cheap, sell dear" from my own world probably existed in this world too so making a low offer to start with was just a natural thing for Adriano-san to do. I didn't think that a Merchant as skilled as he was had really made a mistake in his first offer, after all. If I knew what the items were really worth I maybe could have negotiated a better price myself but I didn't. Ugor-san knew what they were worth though. I decided that from now on I'd only sell items to the Adventurers Guild, it was safer that way.
Anyway, enough of that, I had to thank Ugor-san for taking care of me today. And what comes to mind for a thank-you present? Sweets of course. I had heard from Elland-san that Ugor-san has a wife and children so something like confectionery that the whole family can share would be even more pleasing.
My first thought was to choose something from the Sanke cake shop but I decided that wasn't something I could safely do, I didn't want the knowledge of my Net Super skill to leak out. So, something hand-made perhaps? Even though I've been cooking all my adult life (and, not to be boastful but I think I'm quite good at it), I've not made sweets much. As I strained to think of something appropriate my eye fell on the pound cake tins I had used for meatloaf.
"Ah, of course I've made pound cake before!" I remembered one of my part-time student jobs, working at a coffee shop which was famous for its delicious coffee and cakes. The most popular cake sets included chiffon cake, cheesecake and yes! pound cake too served up with their own-blend ground and filtered coffee. The cake sets were popular not only with female customers but also with old men. Me too, I should add even though I'm not female or old. Good coffee and simple handmade cakes go well together, that's all.
So, I made cakes working at that part-time job, pound cake, chiffon cake and the no-bake cheese cake too. It had been a while but I still remembered how to make them, well a simple version of a vanilla pound cake anyway.
I paused for a moment to think since all the ingredients would have to come from Net Super. What would be the status effects of eating a pound cake I made myself? I didn't think they'd be too dramatic even with Net Super ingredients. I decided I'd bake one and then use Appraisal on it and if it was too risky I'd not give it to Ugor-san. I knew the Gluttonous Trio would quite happily dispose of it for me, never mind sweet-toothed Deplorable-sama.
The recipe called for unsalted butter and sugar, eggs and plain fine flour, baking powder and vanilla essence. I already had eggs on hand so I purchased the other ingredients at the Net Super along with a whisk and a rubber spatula. At the coffee shop I had used an electric hand mixer but I couldn't use one here.
A pound cake is made by mixing flour and butter and eggs and sugar together, equal weights of all the ingredients. That's what made remembering how to bake it so easy. Baking powder made the pound cake fluffier like the cafe's own speciality version and a little vanilla essence sweetened the taste. Yosh, let's get started.
While the unsalted butter and eggs returned to room temperature I sifted the flour and baking powder together and lined the pound cake tin with a baking sheet before beating the eggs together in a separate bowl. I whisked the warm butter until it became runny, like very thick cream before adding the sugar bit by bit and continuing to whisk until the mixture became fluffy. It was time for the beaten eggs now which I fed slowly into the mix while I kept going with the whisk. Adding all the eggs in one go would be a mistake, it would make the mixture lumpy.
Finally I poured the sieved flour and baking powder into the mix and stirred it quickly and thoroughly with the rubber spatula. Once all the flour had combined it was ready to go into the oven. I spooned the finished dough into the pound cake tin I had lined with baking parchment, made a dent in the centre of the dough and then dropped the tin a few times on the table to displace any air bubbles.
A pound cake is baked for 40 to 45 minutes in an oven preheated to about 170 degrees. There's a trick, after about ten minutes of baking cut a slice in the middle of the top crust. This will make it look pretty when it's finished. Of course because I was using my Black Magic Cooking Stove I couldn't figure out the temperature properly so when the crust looked right I poked it with a bamboo skewer and confirmed it was cooked properly in the centre.
"Yeah, that looks okay..." I muttered as I took the tin out of the oven and tipped out the still-hot pound cake before wrapping it up in a clean cloth to let it cool down slowly. I'd leave it like that and unwrap it later to put on a plate for Ugor-san. Maybe I could get a nice basket with a lid instead though? Tomorrow perhaps.
I made another pound cake for Elland-san too although I wasn't sure he'd appreciate it. Despite Elland-san being, well, Elland-san he had helped me out a lot too, with the Earth Dragon disassembly and such. Ugor-san was married and had children so I was sure sweet things would go down well with them but Elland-san was single and presumably childless. Did Elves have a sweet tooth? Well, I'd find out tomorrow. What else... Oh, that's right. Appraise...
[ Pound cake ]
A pound cake made from different world ingredients. Increases magic power by approximately 1% for 5 minutes.
So the Net Super status boost would only be 1% for 5 minutes? That was insignificant so it would be fine to gift these pound cakes as I had intended. I'd hand them over when I went to the Adventurers Guild tomorrow to receive the payment for the items they had purchased from me. I could drop into a general store and buy baskets with lids on the way.
Everyone had finished eating but I still had more cooking to do. I wanted to build up a stock of ready-to-eat food, rice and assorted toppings of minced meat and the like to put away in my Item Box. I set pots of rice to cook on three of the burners of the Black Magic Cooking stove while I made a lot of meat sauce on the fourth. I heated up oil in a frying pan and stirred in minced Orc meat until it browned nicely then skimmed off the fat before I added soy sauce, mirin, sake, sugar and some grated ginger (the stuff from a tube was fine) and kept it at a low heat, stirring continuously until it was ready. I let it cool down before putting into a container and storing it away.
This is a super simple recipe, usable for all sorts of dishes, a topping for rice and as a side so having a good amount to hand was very convenient. The meat can be a mixture of beef and pork or just beef or chicken by themselves, it doesn't really matter. That done, I decided I had something else to do before I visited the Adventurers Guild tomorrow, to repay the kindness of Ugor-san. He had really helped me out a lot today, after all.
Without Ugor-san's intervention the jewellery I was selling would have been purchased for less than it was really worth. I'm not short of money thanks to Fer's efforts, not to mention Dora-chan and Sui too of course, but I don’t know much about gems and if Ugor-san hadn't said anything I would have accepted the first offer Adriano-san made. Even if Elland-san had been with me (that person seems to be useless except when it comes to Dragons) I suspect he wouldn't have spoken up like Ugor-san did.
I didn't know much about how the Merchants Guild in this world carried out their business but I could guess -- the phrase "Buy cheap, sell dear" from my own world probably existed in this world too so making a low offer to start with was just a natural thing for Adriano-san to do. I didn't think that a Merchant as skilled as he was had really made a mistake in his first offer, after all. If I knew what the items were really worth I maybe could have negotiated a better price myself but I didn't. Ugor-san knew what they were worth though. I decided that from now on I'd only sell items to the Adventurers Guild, it was safer that way.
Anyway, enough of that, I had to thank Ugor-san for taking care of me today. And what comes to mind for a thank-you present? Sweets of course. I had heard from Elland-san that Ugor-san has a wife and children so something like confectionery that the whole family can share would be even more pleasing.
My first thought was to choose something from the Sanke cake shop but I decided that wasn't something I could safely do, I didn't want the knowledge of my Net Super skill to leak out. So, something hand-made perhaps? Even though I've been cooking all my adult life (and, not to be boastful but I think I'm quite good at it), I've not made sweets much. As I strained to think of something appropriate my eye fell on the pound cake tins I had used for meatloaf.
"Ah, of course I've made pound cake before!" I remembered one of my part-time student jobs, working at a coffee shop which was famous for its delicious coffee and cakes. The most popular cake sets included chiffon cake, cheesecake and yes! pound cake too served up with their own-blend ground and filtered coffee. The cake sets were popular not only with female customers but also with old men. Me too, I should add even though I'm not female or old. Good coffee and simple handmade cakes go well together, that's all.
So, I made cakes working at that part-time job, pound cake, chiffon cake and the no-bake cheese cake too. It had been a while but I still remembered how to make them, well a simple version of a vanilla pound cake anyway.
I paused for a moment to think since all the ingredients would have to come from Net Super. What would be the status effects of eating a pound cake I made myself? I didn't think they'd be too dramatic even with Net Super ingredients. I decided I'd bake one and then use Appraisal on it and if it was too risky I'd not give it to Ugor-san. I knew the Gluttonous Trio would quite happily dispose of it for me, never mind sweet-toothed Deplorable-sama.
The recipe called for unsalted butter and sugar, eggs and plain fine flour, baking powder and vanilla essence. I already had eggs on hand so I purchased the other ingredients at the Net Super along with a whisk and a rubber spatula. At the coffee shop I had used an electric hand mixer but I couldn't use one here.
A pound cake is made by mixing flour and butter and eggs and sugar together, equal weights of all the ingredients. That's what made remembering how to bake it so easy. Baking powder made the pound cake fluffier like the cafe's own speciality version and a little vanilla essence sweetened the taste. Yosh, let's get started.
While the unsalted butter and eggs returned to room temperature I sifted the flour and baking powder together and lined the pound cake tin with a baking sheet before beating the eggs together in a separate bowl. I whisked the warm butter until it became runny, like very thick cream before adding the sugar bit by bit and continuing to whisk until the mixture became fluffy. It was time for the beaten eggs now which I fed slowly into the mix while I kept going with the whisk. Adding all the eggs in one go would be a mistake, it would make the mixture lumpy.
Finally I poured the sieved flour and baking powder into the mix and stirred it quickly and thoroughly with the rubber spatula. Once all the flour had combined it was ready to go into the oven. I spooned the finished dough into the pound cake tin I had lined with baking parchment, made a dent in the centre of the dough and then dropped the tin a few times on the table to displace any air bubbles.
A pound cake is baked for 40 to 45 minutes in an oven preheated to about 170 degrees. There's a trick, after about ten minutes of baking cut a slice in the middle of the top crust. This will make it look pretty when it's finished. Of course because I was using my Black Magic Cooking Stove I couldn't figure out the temperature properly so when the crust looked right I poked it with a bamboo skewer and confirmed it was cooked properly in the centre.
"Yeah, that looks okay..." I muttered as I took the tin out of the oven and tipped out the still-hot pound cake before wrapping it up in a clean cloth to let it cool down slowly. I'd leave it like that and unwrap it later to put on a plate for Ugor-san. Maybe I could get a nice basket with a lid instead though? Tomorrow perhaps.
I made another pound cake for Elland-san too although I wasn't sure he'd appreciate it. Despite Elland-san being, well, Elland-san he had helped me out a lot too, with the Earth Dragon disassembly and such. Ugor-san was married and had children so I was sure sweet things would go down well with them but Elland-san was single and presumably childless. Did Elves have a sweet tooth? Well, I'd find out tomorrow. What else... Oh, that's right. Appraise...
[ Pound cake ]
A pound cake made from different world ingredients. Increases magic power by approximately 1% for 5 minutes.
So the Net Super status boost would only be 1% for 5 minutes? That was insignificant so it would be fine to gift these pound cakes as I had intended. I'd hand them over when I went to the Adventurers Guild tomorrow to receive the payment for the items they had purchased from me. I could drop into a general store and buy baskets with lids on the way.
Thursday 5 December 2019
Ch 166 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Ch 166 -- Meatloaf
It was time now to make dinner for everyone. I had a lot of Orc and Bloody Horn Bull meat I had minced yesterday and I decided to use up more of it by making a meatloaf. It had been a long time since I had meatloaf and with all that minced meat to hand, well...
I could bake a meatloaf in the Black Magic Cooking Stove's oven while I cooked other things like rice on the top burners separately, very convenient. The meatloaf I made for myself wasn't much like a commercial product, it was a lot simpler but I liked the taste and it went well with rice. Yosh, let's get started.
To make things easier I bought most of the ingredients from the Net Super. I already had a good stock of onions, ketchup, Worcester sauce, red wine and bread crumbs but I needed other things like bacon, frozen mixed vegetables (this would save me a lot of washing, peeling and chopping), boiled quail eggs, regular hen eggs, butter and pound cake baking tins for the final product.
I washed some rice and let it soak before cooking while I got started on the meatloaf. First I dunked breadcrumbs in milk in a bowl then chopped up onions before frying them in melted butter in a frying pan. Once they became translucent I dumped in the frozen mixed vegetables and stirred them in to the accompaniment of a cloud of steam and sputtering. I added minced Bloody Horn Bull meat to the bowl with the milk-softened breadcrumbs then added the fried onions and mixed vegetables. I broke in some regular hen eggs and seasoned the mix with salt and pepper and a touch of grated nutmeg before kneading the mixture until it was consistent and a little sticky.
My recipe isn't much different from making hamburger patties really, the main change ups are the mixed vegetables and the boiled eggs and the way it was cooked. Once I had a large amount of the meatloaf mix ready I greased up the pound cake baking tins and lined them with strips of bacon. I added some of the meatloaf mix, spreading it evenly across the bottom of the tins and making sure there were no bubbles of air trapped. I added the quail eggs two by two across the bottom layer before filling the tins with the rest of the meatloaf mix, again making sure there were no trapped air bubbles. I folded the bacon protruding around the edge of the tins over the top of the mix and covered them with foil before I put them into the preheated oven.
Normally I'd bake a meatloaf like this at 200 degrees for about 30 minutes but the Black Magic Cooking Stove's oven didn't have a temperature setting so I'd just have to judge it by eye. Now for the rice. I lit the Black Magic Cooking Stove's burners and started boiling the clay pots full of washed rice and water while the meatloaf baked in the oven below.
Meatloaf is easy to cook, it's a large dish which I could easily monitor to prevent it burning. As the rice pots on the burners up top steamed away I opened the oven door and peered in.
"They may be ready soon..." I muttered to myself, poking a bamboo skewer in through the foil of one of the meatloafs to test it. When the juices that oozed out were transparent I took the meatloafs out of the oven and started making the sauce. I drained off the gravy from the pound cake tins into the frying pan then added butter, ketchup, red wine and chuno sweet sauce and simmered it.
I extracted the meatloafs from the pound cake tins (the bacon lubricated everything, better than baking parchment and, well, bacon!) and cut one of them into thick slices. Fer and Sui each got three slices while Dora-chan got two, placed on plates and covered in sauce. I reserved the ends for myself since I liked the crunchier drier pieces.
"Right, it's ready." I announced and as soon as the plates were put down everyone started eating.
"Nuuu, has this got vegetables in it...?" Fer asked telepathically as he consumed the meatloaf. "I can't avoid them, but I suppose it's tasty enough." Fer was an absolute meat supremacist but eating veggies was good for him and the others. With meatloaf, well, he couldn't avoid eating the mixed vegetables and leave them in his dish like he did on other occasions. I suspected he was objecting to the vegetables because he thought he had to uphold his position on meat-eating, nothing more. His jaws didn't stop even when he was complaining.
"I like this thick sauce. It's really delicious, isn't it." Dora-chan was becoming more discriminating about his food but I had to agree, the thick sauce works really well on the baked minced meat.
"Wow, there’s something in the middle. Is it eggs? Sui loves eggs." Sui was digging in to her portion enthusiastically. I'm glad you like eggs, Sui-chan. Maybe I could make Scotch eggs for you?
It had been a long time since I had made meatloaf, in fact not since I had been summoned to this world and I wasn't sure I had got the recipe quite right but it was the sort of cooking that didn't have to be perfectly prepared to taste good. Fer and Dora-chan were eating the meatloaf heartily and Sui-chan seemed to like it too. Well now, it was time for me to eat my portion...
It looked good, I could see two quail eggs peeping out of the sliced piece on my plate, sheer decadence. I covered it with the sauce and took a bite. Like Dora-chan said, the sauce was delicious. I could taste the red wine and the butter combining nicely with the rather dry minced meat and the mixed vegetables. I couldn't figure out what Fer was complaining about, the veggies made this dish.
Would a sauce like this work with hamburgers? I tilted my head, considering the possibility but I wasn't sure. It certainly suited the drier meatloaf, it would maybe be too much for juicier fried meat. The quail eggs tasted good too, they were an option I usually added for my own reasons just because it made the dish more luxurious. The bacon too, of course, there's no reason to wrap a meatloaf in it as I had but the extra salt was a sharp tasty treat.
""Seconds"" -- Fer and Sui-chan demanded more just as Dora-chan rolled over on his back, his little belly well-rounded from his own serving of meatloaf, declaring "I'm stuffed, I couldn't eat another bite."
The Black Magic Cooking Stove's oven was large enough that I had been able to make several meatloafs at one time so I could dish out more slices straight away rather than having to cook another meatloaf from scratch to meet the demand. The Black Magic Cooking Stove was so convenient, I was really glad I had bought it.
Fer and Sui were satisfied with just two more servings and then it was time for dessert, with supposedly-full-to-bursting-point Dora-chan demanding more "wobbly stuff". I opened up Net Super and got him his pudding, added strawberry shortcake for Fer and since Sui-chan was looking for something different this time round I chose millefeulle crepes for her.
The fact there's always room for dessert is a clear proof that, in this world at least, Justice prevails.
It was time now to make dinner for everyone. I had a lot of Orc and Bloody Horn Bull meat I had minced yesterday and I decided to use up more of it by making a meatloaf. It had been a long time since I had meatloaf and with all that minced meat to hand, well...
I could bake a meatloaf in the Black Magic Cooking Stove's oven while I cooked other things like rice on the top burners separately, very convenient. The meatloaf I made for myself wasn't much like a commercial product, it was a lot simpler but I liked the taste and it went well with rice. Yosh, let's get started.
To make things easier I bought most of the ingredients from the Net Super. I already had a good stock of onions, ketchup, Worcester sauce, red wine and bread crumbs but I needed other things like bacon, frozen mixed vegetables (this would save me a lot of washing, peeling and chopping), boiled quail eggs, regular hen eggs, butter and pound cake baking tins for the final product.
I washed some rice and let it soak before cooking while I got started on the meatloaf. First I dunked breadcrumbs in milk in a bowl then chopped up onions before frying them in melted butter in a frying pan. Once they became translucent I dumped in the frozen mixed vegetables and stirred them in to the accompaniment of a cloud of steam and sputtering. I added minced Bloody Horn Bull meat to the bowl with the milk-softened breadcrumbs then added the fried onions and mixed vegetables. I broke in some regular hen eggs and seasoned the mix with salt and pepper and a touch of grated nutmeg before kneading the mixture until it was consistent and a little sticky.
My recipe isn't much different from making hamburger patties really, the main change ups are the mixed vegetables and the boiled eggs and the way it was cooked. Once I had a large amount of the meatloaf mix ready I greased up the pound cake baking tins and lined them with strips of bacon. I added some of the meatloaf mix, spreading it evenly across the bottom of the tins and making sure there were no bubbles of air trapped. I added the quail eggs two by two across the bottom layer before filling the tins with the rest of the meatloaf mix, again making sure there were no trapped air bubbles. I folded the bacon protruding around the edge of the tins over the top of the mix and covered them with foil before I put them into the preheated oven.
Normally I'd bake a meatloaf like this at 200 degrees for about 30 minutes but the Black Magic Cooking Stove's oven didn't have a temperature setting so I'd just have to judge it by eye. Now for the rice. I lit the Black Magic Cooking Stove's burners and started boiling the clay pots full of washed rice and water while the meatloaf baked in the oven below.
Meatloaf is easy to cook, it's a large dish which I could easily monitor to prevent it burning. As the rice pots on the burners up top steamed away I opened the oven door and peered in.
"They may be ready soon..." I muttered to myself, poking a bamboo skewer in through the foil of one of the meatloafs to test it. When the juices that oozed out were transparent I took the meatloafs out of the oven and started making the sauce. I drained off the gravy from the pound cake tins into the frying pan then added butter, ketchup, red wine and chuno sweet sauce and simmered it.
I extracted the meatloafs from the pound cake tins (the bacon lubricated everything, better than baking parchment and, well, bacon!) and cut one of them into thick slices. Fer and Sui each got three slices while Dora-chan got two, placed on plates and covered in sauce. I reserved the ends for myself since I liked the crunchier drier pieces.
"Right, it's ready." I announced and as soon as the plates were put down everyone started eating.
"Nuuu, has this got vegetables in it...?" Fer asked telepathically as he consumed the meatloaf. "I can't avoid them, but I suppose it's tasty enough." Fer was an absolute meat supremacist but eating veggies was good for him and the others. With meatloaf, well, he couldn't avoid eating the mixed vegetables and leave them in his dish like he did on other occasions. I suspected he was objecting to the vegetables because he thought he had to uphold his position on meat-eating, nothing more. His jaws didn't stop even when he was complaining.
"I like this thick sauce. It's really delicious, isn't it." Dora-chan was becoming more discriminating about his food but I had to agree, the thick sauce works really well on the baked minced meat.
"Wow, there’s something in the middle. Is it eggs? Sui loves eggs." Sui was digging in to her portion enthusiastically. I'm glad you like eggs, Sui-chan. Maybe I could make Scotch eggs for you?
It had been a long time since I had made meatloaf, in fact not since I had been summoned to this world and I wasn't sure I had got the recipe quite right but it was the sort of cooking that didn't have to be perfectly prepared to taste good. Fer and Dora-chan were eating the meatloaf heartily and Sui-chan seemed to like it too. Well now, it was time for me to eat my portion...
It looked good, I could see two quail eggs peeping out of the sliced piece on my plate, sheer decadence. I covered it with the sauce and took a bite. Like Dora-chan said, the sauce was delicious. I could taste the red wine and the butter combining nicely with the rather dry minced meat and the mixed vegetables. I couldn't figure out what Fer was complaining about, the veggies made this dish.
Would a sauce like this work with hamburgers? I tilted my head, considering the possibility but I wasn't sure. It certainly suited the drier meatloaf, it would maybe be too much for juicier fried meat. The quail eggs tasted good too, they were an option I usually added for my own reasons just because it made the dish more luxurious. The bacon too, of course, there's no reason to wrap a meatloaf in it as I had but the extra salt was a sharp tasty treat.
""Seconds"" -- Fer and Sui-chan demanded more just as Dora-chan rolled over on his back, his little belly well-rounded from his own serving of meatloaf, declaring "I'm stuffed, I couldn't eat another bite."
The Black Magic Cooking Stove's oven was large enough that I had been able to make several meatloafs at one time so I could dish out more slices straight away rather than having to cook another meatloaf from scratch to meet the demand. The Black Magic Cooking Stove was so convenient, I was really glad I had bought it.
Fer and Sui were satisfied with just two more servings and then it was time for dessert, with supposedly-full-to-bursting-point Dora-chan demanding more "wobbly stuff". I opened up Net Super and got him his pudding, added strawberry shortcake for Fer and since Sui-chan was looking for something different this time round I chose millefeulle crepes for her.
The fact there's always room for dessert is a clear proof that, in this world at least, Justice prevails.
Monday 11 November 2019
Ch 165 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Chapter 165 -- French Fries
Adriano-san's request for a favour was... odd. It seemed that the city, indeed the entire Kingdom was suffering from a lack of new cuisine. Every restaurant and food-stall had the same limited and over-familiar range of cooked food on offer. Naturally the Guild Master of the Merchants Guild was being inundated with demands to fix this situation as profits were drying up and he had been at a loss until I arrived.
“You aren't from this country, Mukouda-sama, and you say you're good at cooking. We'd be very much obliged for any new recipes and such you could share with us." I stifled a smile at Adriano-san's readiness to exploit a chance statement from me to boost profits. He was proving that he had truly earned his position as Guild Master of Doran's Merchants Guild. "It would be excellent if any such food went well with alcohol too. We have a lot of Adventurers in this city, as you know and they do like to drink. Cheap too would be good."
Well, he had increased the purchase price for the jewels and such I had just sold to the Guild and if it was just a case of teaching them something simple then I didn't see why not. When I said so Ugor-san got up and said "This doesn't have anything to do with the Adventurers Guild so I'll leave the rest to you then, Mukouda-san. I have a lot of work to get on with and I've left the Guild Master unsupervised for too long, who knows what he's been up to..." before saying his goodbyes and heading off back to his duties.
I thought for a moment, what sort of food and cooking techniques could I teach them? “Food here is boiled or baked." I muttered to myself as Adraino-san sat patiently. "Whatever I choose will have to be done that way or at least in a similar way..." Seasonings, all they had here was salt, some herbs and maybe small amounts of pepper although that was a very expensive item and probably wouldn't suit the sort of dishes the Guild was looking for, not for lower-class inn dining rooms and taverns and food stalls on the city's streets. Could I use seasonings from the Net Super? Nope nope nope. It wasn't just that I needed to keep that particular Unique Skill a secret, I was the only source of such items and I'd be leaving Doran soon. And they wanted it to go well with booze, that meant something like an izakaya's offerings didn't it? Nibbles and such rather than complete meals, I supposed.
Ah, how about... “Adriano-san, do you have any fried foods?” I asked.
"Fried food? What kind of dish is that?" Adriano-san raised an eyebrow.
"It’s food fried in oil. Well, boiled in oil sort of." His puzzlement continued. How could I explain it to him? "Oil, you know..."
"Oil, yes I know about it but cooking... I don't get it." Adriano-san said. Oh, so they don't know about frying food? Then I had the perfect dish for him, thinking about it. Olive oil is the most commonly used oil in this world, grown over a wide area so it was readily available and the price was not too high. Doran wasn't that far from the sea so salt was a cheap commodity here too so what I was thinking of wouldn't cost much and it definitely would go well with the sorts of booze drunk in this world.
“There is one dish that I can think of," I said, "Would you like to watch me make it?" It would be easier to demonstrate how to make it rather than writing down the recipe on paper, I decided.
“Oh, thank you." Adriano-san's face lit up. "There are other Guild members who will want to see this, is it all right to call them?"
"That's fine..." I agreed. I looked around the elegant business meeting room we were in and decided it wasn't really the best place to set out a stove and start cooking, so after discussing my requirements with Adriano-san we moved out into a large atrium area behind the Merchants Guild building. I requested olive oil and salt as ingredients which the Guild immediately supplied. Yosh, time to go to work I said to myself as a group of Merchants gathered around to observe.
First of all, I took my Black Magic Cooking Stove out of my Item Box, to a chorus of comments from the watchers -- "Ooooh" and "That's a huge Item Box" and "A Black Magic Cooking Stove, that's the latest sort." I tried to ignore the comments as I got ready to make French fries. They're easy to make, cheap and as a thousand izakaya owners will tell you they go great with booze.
First off I needed potatoes. I got out a sack of potatoes which I had bought in a market in Doran before I went into the dungeon. I squinted at one of the potatoes, it wasn't exactly like the ones I could buy from the Net Super but it was close enough. Again going by what I had paid for them they were also cheap and common here, another requirement according to Adriano-san. I selected potatoes that hadn't sprouted and started to prepare them, explaining each step of what I was doing out loud to the audience.
"Right then, take potatoes like this, wash them well and wipe them dry. After that cut them like this." I sliced the potatoes into strips like regular French fries. "You can leave the skin on if they're clean." I held up a few other potatoes. "If they've sprouted like these ones then remove the buds, but it's best to peel the skin off in that case." Those ones I cut more thickly after peeling them. "Try different thicknesses and shapes, see what works best for you."
Although the olive oil wasn't too expensive it would take a while for me to heat up a pot of oil for deep-frying so I decided to just use a centimetre or so of oil in a big frying pan for this demonstration.
"So you put olive oil in a pan like this and bring it up to a medium heat then add the sliced potatoes and let them cook." I lit a burner on my Black Magic Cooking stove and started frying the potatoes as the audience watched my every move. Some of the more diligent Merchants were making notes as I proceeded.
"Once the oil starts bubbling and the potatoes float to the surface like this," I said, "remove them from the oil with a scoop and then increase the temperature so the oil gets really hot. Once it's ready," I plunged the half-cooked potatoes back into the bubbling oil with a satisfying sizzling sound. "keep frying them until they are crisp and brown, then remove them from the pan and drain off the oil. A quick shake of salt and they're done."
I added some more details as I prepared another batch of fries, explaining how they could check if the fries were cooked properly by taking one from the pan and breaking it in half. I said they could try using animal fat instead of olive oil, they could deep-fry sliced potatoes in larger pots rather than using frying pans and told them they should be careful against the risk of fire since the oil needed to be very hot for the second part of the cooking process.
"Now, please try them." I offered dishes of fries to the eager Merchants crowding around. "Be careful, they're really hot. Watch your fingers." They all sampled the fries, huffing on them before popping them in their mouths.
"Oh, the outside is crisp and the inside is soft and delicious."
"That salty taste, it's good. They will make people want to drink more beer."
“Oh yeah, these will definitely go well with ale.”
“And they're so cheap to make. Wonderful!"
"They're so easy to cook, I could put them on my tavern's menu today."
Generally the results of my efforts were receiving favourable evaluations but then again I've never heard of people who didn't like French fries. I repeated my earlier comments about trying different ways of cutting the potatoes and cooking them since I wasn't absolutely sure this world's potatoes were exactly like the ones I was used to but they weren't paying much attention to what I was saying, instead concentrating on the rapidly-disappearing servings of French fries. The smiles on their faces told me I had succeeded though.
"Mukouda-sama, I really want to thank you for teaching us about this wonderful dish." Adriano-san said as I put away the Black Magic Cooking Stove and tidied up. "Cooking food like that in oil, it just never occurred to me. The raw materials for this are inexpensive too and," he licked his fingers, "they will definitely make a great accompaniment to alcohol." He bowed gratefully. It was the only sort of food I could think of at short notice but it was good that everyone seemed to be happy.
“As a modest token of our appreciation," Adriano-san announced, "Doran's Guild will cover your membership fee and all taxes due to the Merchants Guild for the next year."
"Really?" I bowed in response. "Thank you for that, Guild Master." The renewal of my Guild membership and the taxes all paid just for showing them how to make French fries? Lucky. It wasn't until later that I remembered I had told Adriano-san that I had been thinking of allowing my membership of the Merchants Guild to lapse in favour of working as an Adventurer. Now, of course, I was committed to remaining a member of the Merchants Guild for at least another year. Ugor-san had described the Merchants Guild as 'sly old foxes' and I was beginning to see what he meant.
Fer and Dora-chan were snoozing on one side of the Guild's paved atrium, unconcerned with what I had been up to although Fer had kept one half-lidded eye on me when I started cooking. There was no meat involved on this occasion so he hadn't interrupted. As usual Sui-chan was still asleep in her bag slung over my shoulder. I nudged Fer and Dora-chan telepathically and they stirred into wakefulness. Time to go back to the inn and eat dinner, I told them.
"I'll take my leave now." I said to Adriano-san.
"Again, thank you very much Mukouda-sama." he said, escorting me to the Guild's front door and waving me on my way.
Adriano-san's request for a favour was... odd. It seemed that the city, indeed the entire Kingdom was suffering from a lack of new cuisine. Every restaurant and food-stall had the same limited and over-familiar range of cooked food on offer. Naturally the Guild Master of the Merchants Guild was being inundated with demands to fix this situation as profits were drying up and he had been at a loss until I arrived.
“You aren't from this country, Mukouda-sama, and you say you're good at cooking. We'd be very much obliged for any new recipes and such you could share with us." I stifled a smile at Adriano-san's readiness to exploit a chance statement from me to boost profits. He was proving that he had truly earned his position as Guild Master of Doran's Merchants Guild. "It would be excellent if any such food went well with alcohol too. We have a lot of Adventurers in this city, as you know and they do like to drink. Cheap too would be good."
Well, he had increased the purchase price for the jewels and such I had just sold to the Guild and if it was just a case of teaching them something simple then I didn't see why not. When I said so Ugor-san got up and said "This doesn't have anything to do with the Adventurers Guild so I'll leave the rest to you then, Mukouda-san. I have a lot of work to get on with and I've left the Guild Master unsupervised for too long, who knows what he's been up to..." before saying his goodbyes and heading off back to his duties.
I thought for a moment, what sort of food and cooking techniques could I teach them? “Food here is boiled or baked." I muttered to myself as Adraino-san sat patiently. "Whatever I choose will have to be done that way or at least in a similar way..." Seasonings, all they had here was salt, some herbs and maybe small amounts of pepper although that was a very expensive item and probably wouldn't suit the sort of dishes the Guild was looking for, not for lower-class inn dining rooms and taverns and food stalls on the city's streets. Could I use seasonings from the Net Super? Nope nope nope. It wasn't just that I needed to keep that particular Unique Skill a secret, I was the only source of such items and I'd be leaving Doran soon. And they wanted it to go well with booze, that meant something like an izakaya's offerings didn't it? Nibbles and such rather than complete meals, I supposed.
Ah, how about... “Adriano-san, do you have any fried foods?” I asked.
"Fried food? What kind of dish is that?" Adriano-san raised an eyebrow.
"It’s food fried in oil. Well, boiled in oil sort of." His puzzlement continued. How could I explain it to him? "Oil, you know..."
"Oil, yes I know about it but cooking... I don't get it." Adriano-san said. Oh, so they don't know about frying food? Then I had the perfect dish for him, thinking about it. Olive oil is the most commonly used oil in this world, grown over a wide area so it was readily available and the price was not too high. Doran wasn't that far from the sea so salt was a cheap commodity here too so what I was thinking of wouldn't cost much and it definitely would go well with the sorts of booze drunk in this world.
“There is one dish that I can think of," I said, "Would you like to watch me make it?" It would be easier to demonstrate how to make it rather than writing down the recipe on paper, I decided.
“Oh, thank you." Adriano-san's face lit up. "There are other Guild members who will want to see this, is it all right to call them?"
"That's fine..." I agreed. I looked around the elegant business meeting room we were in and decided it wasn't really the best place to set out a stove and start cooking, so after discussing my requirements with Adriano-san we moved out into a large atrium area behind the Merchants Guild building. I requested olive oil and salt as ingredients which the Guild immediately supplied. Yosh, time to go to work I said to myself as a group of Merchants gathered around to observe.
First of all, I took my Black Magic Cooking Stove out of my Item Box, to a chorus of comments from the watchers -- "Ooooh" and "That's a huge Item Box" and "A Black Magic Cooking Stove, that's the latest sort." I tried to ignore the comments as I got ready to make French fries. They're easy to make, cheap and as a thousand izakaya owners will tell you they go great with booze.
First off I needed potatoes. I got out a sack of potatoes which I had bought in a market in Doran before I went into the dungeon. I squinted at one of the potatoes, it wasn't exactly like the ones I could buy from the Net Super but it was close enough. Again going by what I had paid for them they were also cheap and common here, another requirement according to Adriano-san. I selected potatoes that hadn't sprouted and started to prepare them, explaining each step of what I was doing out loud to the audience.
"Right then, take potatoes like this, wash them well and wipe them dry. After that cut them like this." I sliced the potatoes into strips like regular French fries. "You can leave the skin on if they're clean." I held up a few other potatoes. "If they've sprouted like these ones then remove the buds, but it's best to peel the skin off in that case." Those ones I cut more thickly after peeling them. "Try different thicknesses and shapes, see what works best for you."
Although the olive oil wasn't too expensive it would take a while for me to heat up a pot of oil for deep-frying so I decided to just use a centimetre or so of oil in a big frying pan for this demonstration.
"So you put olive oil in a pan like this and bring it up to a medium heat then add the sliced potatoes and let them cook." I lit a burner on my Black Magic Cooking stove and started frying the potatoes as the audience watched my every move. Some of the more diligent Merchants were making notes as I proceeded.
"Once the oil starts bubbling and the potatoes float to the surface like this," I said, "remove them from the oil with a scoop and then increase the temperature so the oil gets really hot. Once it's ready," I plunged the half-cooked potatoes back into the bubbling oil with a satisfying sizzling sound. "keep frying them until they are crisp and brown, then remove them from the pan and drain off the oil. A quick shake of salt and they're done."
I added some more details as I prepared another batch of fries, explaining how they could check if the fries were cooked properly by taking one from the pan and breaking it in half. I said they could try using animal fat instead of olive oil, they could deep-fry sliced potatoes in larger pots rather than using frying pans and told them they should be careful against the risk of fire since the oil needed to be very hot for the second part of the cooking process.
"Now, please try them." I offered dishes of fries to the eager Merchants crowding around. "Be careful, they're really hot. Watch your fingers." They all sampled the fries, huffing on them before popping them in their mouths.
"Oh, the outside is crisp and the inside is soft and delicious."
"That salty taste, it's good. They will make people want to drink more beer."
“Oh yeah, these will definitely go well with ale.”
“And they're so cheap to make. Wonderful!"
"They're so easy to cook, I could put them on my tavern's menu today."
Generally the results of my efforts were receiving favourable evaluations but then again I've never heard of people who didn't like French fries. I repeated my earlier comments about trying different ways of cutting the potatoes and cooking them since I wasn't absolutely sure this world's potatoes were exactly like the ones I was used to but they weren't paying much attention to what I was saying, instead concentrating on the rapidly-disappearing servings of French fries. The smiles on their faces told me I had succeeded though.
"Mukouda-sama, I really want to thank you for teaching us about this wonderful dish." Adriano-san said as I put away the Black Magic Cooking Stove and tidied up. "Cooking food like that in oil, it just never occurred to me. The raw materials for this are inexpensive too and," he licked his fingers, "they will definitely make a great accompaniment to alcohol." He bowed gratefully. It was the only sort of food I could think of at short notice but it was good that everyone seemed to be happy.
“As a modest token of our appreciation," Adriano-san announced, "Doran's Guild will cover your membership fee and all taxes due to the Merchants Guild for the next year."
"Really?" I bowed in response. "Thank you for that, Guild Master." The renewal of my Guild membership and the taxes all paid just for showing them how to make French fries? Lucky. It wasn't until later that I remembered I had told Adriano-san that I had been thinking of allowing my membership of the Merchants Guild to lapse in favour of working as an Adventurer. Now, of course, I was committed to remaining a member of the Merchants Guild for at least another year. Ugor-san had described the Merchants Guild as 'sly old foxes' and I was beginning to see what he meant.
Fer and Dora-chan were snoozing on one side of the Guild's paved atrium, unconcerned with what I had been up to although Fer had kept one half-lidded eye on me when I started cooking. There was no meat involved on this occasion so he hadn't interrupted. As usual Sui-chan was still asleep in her bag slung over my shoulder. I nudged Fer and Dora-chan telepathically and they stirred into wakefulness. Time to go back to the inn and eat dinner, I told them.
"I'll take my leave now." I said to Adriano-san.
"Again, thank you very much Mukouda-sama." he said, escorting me to the Guild's front door and waving me on my way.
Thursday 31 October 2019
Ch 164 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Chapter 164 -- Sparks Fly
"Sorry to keep you waiting." Guild Master Adriano-san announced as he returned with the gem appraiser Ruslan-san following behind. "Well," he said after sitting down, "We'd like to buy most of the items you have offered us. The items are..."
The jewels that Adriano-san wanted to purchase were the smaller stones, the ruby, emerald, aquamarine, garnet, the two amethysts and the peridot as well as the two small diamonds and the two medium-sized ones. In addition he wanted the gold ingot, the diamond ring and lastly the Imperial Topaz. I got the impression that diamonds were popular gems in this world but the large yellow diamond that Ruslan-san had enthused over was not included in his list, probably because they simply couldn't afford to pay me a realistic price for it. The tanzanite necklace was also rejected, perhaps because it was unusual and hence would be difficult to sell on.
"I would like to buy these," he said, separating the items he had listed on one side of the cloth on the table. "Is that acceptable?" When I agreed, Adriano-san read out the price he was offering for each as Ugor-san and I listened closely.
"The small ruby is worth 180 gold coins, the small emerald 170 gold coins, the small aquamarine 140 gold coins, the small garnet 120 gold coins, the two small amethysts are each 80 gold coins so that makes 160 gold coins and the peridot is 110 gold coins." He separated each gem as he priced it, pushing it to one side of the cloth with a finger.
"The diamonds now, the two smaller diamonds are each worth 500 gold coins so that makes 1000 gold coins and the two larger diamonds are each worth 750 gold coins so that makes 1500 gold coins. As for the other items, the gold ingot is worth 300 gold coins, the Imperial Topaz is worth 1600 gold coins and I'd like to offer 680 gold coins for the diamond ring. That makes a total of 7460 gold coins." He looked up at me with a smile. "Is that agreeable to you, Mukouda-san?"
Jewellery is amazing, it’s expensive in this world too. 7460 gold coins for those? I looked at the gems on the cloth, coloured glass in pleasing shapes and they were worth, let me see, the price of eight Black Magic Cooking Stoves, or was that nine? I could understand large amounts of money better that way, somehow. I opened my mouth to agree but...
"Ehh, can I just interrupt here to say 'please wait a moment'?" Ugor-san broke in before I could say anything. “The purchase price you offered Mukouda-san seems a bit on the low side to me, Guild Master, especially for the Imperial Topaz and the diamonds." He sat back as Adriano-san's eyes locked on him.
"As the Deputy Guild Master of Doran's Adventurers Guild, a lot of information about the prices and rarity of assorted items Adventurers might wish to sell passes across my desk, including gems and jewellery. I try to make careful note of such things." He leaned forward and laid his finger on the Imperial Topaz on the cloth, mimicking the manner Adriano-san had touched it earlier as he sorted through the items he wished to purchase.
"For example, I've heard of the Imperial Topaz before today. It is one of the fabled 'Phantom Jewels', is it not?" Ruslan-san twitched at Ugor-san's words but Adriano-san's expression did not change. Ugor-san smiled. "Yes, with a name like that, one would expect jewellers to prize such stones above others for their rarity and desirability." Ugor-san moved the Imperial Topaz with his finger, as if to shift it over to where the unwanted large yellow diamond and the tanzanite necklace lay. Adriano-san tensed momentarily but quickly regained his calm demeanour and returned Ugor-san's smile with one of his own, if a rather tight-lipped one.
"And of course everyone knows that larger gemstones are more expensive than smaller ones." Ugor-san plunged in for the kill. "Isn't it a little strange that a 'Phantom Jewel' of this size and quality is worth, according to your good selves, only 1600 gold coins?"
Ugor-san lifted his finger from the Imperial Topaz, only to touch each of the larger diamonds in turn. "And the price you quoted for the diamonds, that seems strangely low to me. Diamonds are a very popular jewel due to their brilliance. Now these are very high quality diamonds from Doran's dungeon as Ruslan-san attested. I've not seen diamonds as large as these recovered from the dungeon before but to my certain knowledge smaller diamonds were sold for the price you are offering for these larger ones, 750 gold pieces each. How odd, I can't help thinking to myself."
O- oh, so that's how it is? Ugor-san really knew his stuff. If it had been Elland-san accompanying me to the Merchants Guild I suspect things would have gone differently. After all I had no idea at all what these gems were really worth, in this world or my own.
“Mukouda-san," Ugor-san turned to me, "you don't have to sell these gems right away, do you?" I nodded, following the Deputy Guild Master's lead. I wasn't troubled by any lack of money and I could hold on to these gems and other items indefinitely without having to turn them into cash.
“If that is the case, you can sell them to an Adventurers Guild in another city." Ugor-san continued. "Mukouda-san is a registered Adventurer after all, Adriano-san. It would be better for him to do that and get a fair price from his own Guild, don't you agree?" It was certainly something to think about...
"Please wait a moment." Adriano-san said, leaning forward eagerly. "Of course as you say, Mukouda-san is an Adventurer but were you aware that he is also registered in the Merchants Guild?" Ugor-san seemed surprised to hear that but of course I hadn't told him, or indeed anyone in Doran that I was a member of the Merchants Guild. Adriano-san, how did you know I was registered with the Merchants Guild? I had done that months ago and far from here, in another country. I could only think he had researched me and I marvelled at his thorough preparation before our meeting today. I could understand now why he was Master of the city's Merchants Guild.
“Yes, I’m registered with the Merchants Guild but I'm only iron-ranked, because I'm good at cooking and I thought at one time about setting up a food stall or maybe opening a small restaurant." I gestured behind me where Fer was lying on the luxurious carpet pretending to sleep with Dora-chan curled up on top of him, half-buried in his fur. "Now I have contracted monsters I mostly carry out Adventurer work." I sighed theatrically. "Really, I'm thinking of letting my Merchants Guild membership lapse since it's not of any real benefit to me these days." I added the last bit to support Ugor-san's efforts in dealing with Adriano-san. After all I owed a lot to the Adventurers Guild.
“That’s right." Ugor-san picked up from where I had left off, negating Adriano-san's temporary leverage in the battle of wits raging across the table. "If you’re going to take advantage of one of our Guild member's inexperience in selling such rare and sought-after items then I can only think to recommend he holds on to them for now and sells them elsewhere when he can get a better price." The Deputy Guild Master and the Guild Master traded smiles, sparks flying between them as they looked at each other. In the end Adriano-san was the one that capitulated. "Please wait a moment," he said before leaning over and whispering to Ruslan-san. I couldn't make out what he said but Ruslan-san nodded after a brief delay.
“Cough." Adriano-san looked like he was chewing a lemon, but rallied bravely. "I'm sorry. Regarding the purchase prices I mentioned earlier I would like to correct them a little. We will offer you 2100 gold coins for the Imperial Topaz, the two smaller diamonds are 700 gold coins each for a total of 1400 gold coins and the two larger diamonds are 1000 gold coins each for a total of 2000 gold coins. The diamond ring, we will increase our offer for that to 800 gold coins. I would like to buy all the items I listed earlier for a total of 9480 gold coins. Is that satisfactory?"
Oh, the price has increased significantly, but is it high enough yet? When I glanced over at Ugor-san he thought for a moment then nodded slightly which I took as a go-ahead.
"Yes, that price is acceptable." When I said that Adriano-san let out a long deep breath.
“That’s the payment you are owed then. However, since it's such a large amount can we pay you with white gold coins and large gold coins?" I had to think for a moment, white gold coins were worth a hundred regular gold coins, weren't they? I had never seen one before and rather looked forward to the experience, especially when it would be Adriano-san reluctantly giving them to me.
"Yes, that's okay." I agreed. Adriano-san stood up when I agreed and left the room. When he returned he was carrying a tray with piles of glowing coins. Glowing? I vaguely remembered that white gold coins were made from an alloy of Mithril so seeing them glow wasn't too surprising after all. The tray of coins was a more elegant method of delivering payment, usually when I received coins from the Adventurers Guild I got them in rough-woven hemp sacks.
Adriano-san counted the coins out onto the table before me, stacking them in piles of ten which was the usual way of making payments in this world. “That’s 94 white gold coins and 8 large gold coins, a total of 9480 gold coins." He swallowed again. "Please confirm the sum."
I looked carefully at the white gold coins, which sure enough had a glowing blue colour indicative of their Mithril content. My curiosity satisfied for the moment I counted the stacks of coins under Adriano's watchful eye -- 1, 2, 3... (omitted) ... 94 white gold coins and to one side there were 8 large gold coins. Yosh!
“Yes, I confirm the sum is as agreed." I pushed the cloth carrying the purchased items across the table in Adriano-san's direction then started putting the tanzanite necklace and the large yellow diamond back in my Item Box along with the coins from the table. Ruslan-san's eyes followed my hand holding the yellow diamond until it disappeared into my Item Box, his expression wistful but also strangely content. Adriano-san bundled up the cloth containing the gems and jewellery the Guild had purchased and handed it to Ruslan-san who hurried from the room.
“It was a pleasure doing business with you." I said to Adriano-san, getting up. It was time to return with Ugor-san to the Adventurers Guild and then from there go back to the inn. Dinner awaited.
"Likewise." Adriano-san said before he suddenly raised a finger. "Ah! Could I beg a moment more of your time, please Mukouda-san? A thought just struck me, you mentioned you were a good cook when you were explaining why you registered with the Merchants Guild. Could I ask you a favour...?"
"Sorry to keep you waiting." Guild Master Adriano-san announced as he returned with the gem appraiser Ruslan-san following behind. "Well," he said after sitting down, "We'd like to buy most of the items you have offered us. The items are..."
The jewels that Adriano-san wanted to purchase were the smaller stones, the ruby, emerald, aquamarine, garnet, the two amethysts and the peridot as well as the two small diamonds and the two medium-sized ones. In addition he wanted the gold ingot, the diamond ring and lastly the Imperial Topaz. I got the impression that diamonds were popular gems in this world but the large yellow diamond that Ruslan-san had enthused over was not included in his list, probably because they simply couldn't afford to pay me a realistic price for it. The tanzanite necklace was also rejected, perhaps because it was unusual and hence would be difficult to sell on.
"I would like to buy these," he said, separating the items he had listed on one side of the cloth on the table. "Is that acceptable?" When I agreed, Adriano-san read out the price he was offering for each as Ugor-san and I listened closely.
"The small ruby is worth 180 gold coins, the small emerald 170 gold coins, the small aquamarine 140 gold coins, the small garnet 120 gold coins, the two small amethysts are each 80 gold coins so that makes 160 gold coins and the peridot is 110 gold coins." He separated each gem as he priced it, pushing it to one side of the cloth with a finger.
"The diamonds now, the two smaller diamonds are each worth 500 gold coins so that makes 1000 gold coins and the two larger diamonds are each worth 750 gold coins so that makes 1500 gold coins. As for the other items, the gold ingot is worth 300 gold coins, the Imperial Topaz is worth 1600 gold coins and I'd like to offer 680 gold coins for the diamond ring. That makes a total of 7460 gold coins." He looked up at me with a smile. "Is that agreeable to you, Mukouda-san?"
Jewellery is amazing, it’s expensive in this world too. 7460 gold coins for those? I looked at the gems on the cloth, coloured glass in pleasing shapes and they were worth, let me see, the price of eight Black Magic Cooking Stoves, or was that nine? I could understand large amounts of money better that way, somehow. I opened my mouth to agree but...
"Ehh, can I just interrupt here to say 'please wait a moment'?" Ugor-san broke in before I could say anything. “The purchase price you offered Mukouda-san seems a bit on the low side to me, Guild Master, especially for the Imperial Topaz and the diamonds." He sat back as Adriano-san's eyes locked on him.
"As the Deputy Guild Master of Doran's Adventurers Guild, a lot of information about the prices and rarity of assorted items Adventurers might wish to sell passes across my desk, including gems and jewellery. I try to make careful note of such things." He leaned forward and laid his finger on the Imperial Topaz on the cloth, mimicking the manner Adriano-san had touched it earlier as he sorted through the items he wished to purchase.
"For example, I've heard of the Imperial Topaz before today. It is one of the fabled 'Phantom Jewels', is it not?" Ruslan-san twitched at Ugor-san's words but Adriano-san's expression did not change. Ugor-san smiled. "Yes, with a name like that, one would expect jewellers to prize such stones above others for their rarity and desirability." Ugor-san moved the Imperial Topaz with his finger, as if to shift it over to where the unwanted large yellow diamond and the tanzanite necklace lay. Adriano-san tensed momentarily but quickly regained his calm demeanour and returned Ugor-san's smile with one of his own, if a rather tight-lipped one.
"And of course everyone knows that larger gemstones are more expensive than smaller ones." Ugor-san plunged in for the kill. "Isn't it a little strange that a 'Phantom Jewel' of this size and quality is worth, according to your good selves, only 1600 gold coins?"
Ugor-san lifted his finger from the Imperial Topaz, only to touch each of the larger diamonds in turn. "And the price you quoted for the diamonds, that seems strangely low to me. Diamonds are a very popular jewel due to their brilliance. Now these are very high quality diamonds from Doran's dungeon as Ruslan-san attested. I've not seen diamonds as large as these recovered from the dungeon before but to my certain knowledge smaller diamonds were sold for the price you are offering for these larger ones, 750 gold pieces each. How odd, I can't help thinking to myself."
O- oh, so that's how it is? Ugor-san really knew his stuff. If it had been Elland-san accompanying me to the Merchants Guild I suspect things would have gone differently. After all I had no idea at all what these gems were really worth, in this world or my own.
“Mukouda-san," Ugor-san turned to me, "you don't have to sell these gems right away, do you?" I nodded, following the Deputy Guild Master's lead. I wasn't troubled by any lack of money and I could hold on to these gems and other items indefinitely without having to turn them into cash.
“If that is the case, you can sell them to an Adventurers Guild in another city." Ugor-san continued. "Mukouda-san is a registered Adventurer after all, Adriano-san. It would be better for him to do that and get a fair price from his own Guild, don't you agree?" It was certainly something to think about...
"Please wait a moment." Adriano-san said, leaning forward eagerly. "Of course as you say, Mukouda-san is an Adventurer but were you aware that he is also registered in the Merchants Guild?" Ugor-san seemed surprised to hear that but of course I hadn't told him, or indeed anyone in Doran that I was a member of the Merchants Guild. Adriano-san, how did you know I was registered with the Merchants Guild? I had done that months ago and far from here, in another country. I could only think he had researched me and I marvelled at his thorough preparation before our meeting today. I could understand now why he was Master of the city's Merchants Guild.
“Yes, I’m registered with the Merchants Guild but I'm only iron-ranked, because I'm good at cooking and I thought at one time about setting up a food stall or maybe opening a small restaurant." I gestured behind me where Fer was lying on the luxurious carpet pretending to sleep with Dora-chan curled up on top of him, half-buried in his fur. "Now I have contracted monsters I mostly carry out Adventurer work." I sighed theatrically. "Really, I'm thinking of letting my Merchants Guild membership lapse since it's not of any real benefit to me these days." I added the last bit to support Ugor-san's efforts in dealing with Adriano-san. After all I owed a lot to the Adventurers Guild.
“That’s right." Ugor-san picked up from where I had left off, negating Adriano-san's temporary leverage in the battle of wits raging across the table. "If you’re going to take advantage of one of our Guild member's inexperience in selling such rare and sought-after items then I can only think to recommend he holds on to them for now and sells them elsewhere when he can get a better price." The Deputy Guild Master and the Guild Master traded smiles, sparks flying between them as they looked at each other. In the end Adriano-san was the one that capitulated. "Please wait a moment," he said before leaning over and whispering to Ruslan-san. I couldn't make out what he said but Ruslan-san nodded after a brief delay.
“Cough." Adriano-san looked like he was chewing a lemon, but rallied bravely. "I'm sorry. Regarding the purchase prices I mentioned earlier I would like to correct them a little. We will offer you 2100 gold coins for the Imperial Topaz, the two smaller diamonds are 700 gold coins each for a total of 1400 gold coins and the two larger diamonds are 1000 gold coins each for a total of 2000 gold coins. The diamond ring, we will increase our offer for that to 800 gold coins. I would like to buy all the items I listed earlier for a total of 9480 gold coins. Is that satisfactory?"
Oh, the price has increased significantly, but is it high enough yet? When I glanced over at Ugor-san he thought for a moment then nodded slightly which I took as a go-ahead.
"Yes, that price is acceptable." When I said that Adriano-san let out a long deep breath.
“That’s the payment you are owed then. However, since it's such a large amount can we pay you with white gold coins and large gold coins?" I had to think for a moment, white gold coins were worth a hundred regular gold coins, weren't they? I had never seen one before and rather looked forward to the experience, especially when it would be Adriano-san reluctantly giving them to me.
"Yes, that's okay." I agreed. Adriano-san stood up when I agreed and left the room. When he returned he was carrying a tray with piles of glowing coins. Glowing? I vaguely remembered that white gold coins were made from an alloy of Mithril so seeing them glow wasn't too surprising after all. The tray of coins was a more elegant method of delivering payment, usually when I received coins from the Adventurers Guild I got them in rough-woven hemp sacks.
Adriano-san counted the coins out onto the table before me, stacking them in piles of ten which was the usual way of making payments in this world. “That’s 94 white gold coins and 8 large gold coins, a total of 9480 gold coins." He swallowed again. "Please confirm the sum."
I looked carefully at the white gold coins, which sure enough had a glowing blue colour indicative of their Mithril content. My curiosity satisfied for the moment I counted the stacks of coins under Adriano's watchful eye -- 1, 2, 3... (omitted) ... 94 white gold coins and to one side there were 8 large gold coins. Yosh!
“Yes, I confirm the sum is as agreed." I pushed the cloth carrying the purchased items across the table in Adriano-san's direction then started putting the tanzanite necklace and the large yellow diamond back in my Item Box along with the coins from the table. Ruslan-san's eyes followed my hand holding the yellow diamond until it disappeared into my Item Box, his expression wistful but also strangely content. Adriano-san bundled up the cloth containing the gems and jewellery the Guild had purchased and handed it to Ruslan-san who hurried from the room.
“It was a pleasure doing business with you." I said to Adriano-san, getting up. It was time to return with Ugor-san to the Adventurers Guild and then from there go back to the inn. Dinner awaited.
"Likewise." Adriano-san said before he suddenly raised a finger. "Ah! Could I beg a moment more of your time, please Mukouda-san? A thought just struck me, you mentioned you were a good cook when you were explaining why you registered with the Merchants Guild. Could I ask you a favour...?"
Wednesday 23 October 2019
Ch 163 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Chapter 163 -- The Merchants Guild Of The City Of Doran
Doran's Merchants Guild occupied a very fine building fronting on to the main street of the city. Ugor-san led me directly into the entrance where we were met by a stout Merchant who appeared to be in his late 40s, well-dressed and neatly groomed, the very picture of a prosperous citizen.
"I've been looking forward to meeting you," he said, waving his hand towards the hallway beyond the entrance. "Please be welcome." I looked behind me, was it okay for Fer and the others to accompany me? This wasn't the Adventurers Guild where they were familiar visitors. The Merchant added, "Follow me with your contracted monsters, if you please." The Merchant had noticed my hesitancy and quickly responded to it as you might expect of a high-ranking man of business. He led the way to a room in the back of the Guild's reception area with Fer and Dora-chan tagging along. This room was one like others in the corridor where I saw more people, presumably Merchants, discussing some kind of business around tables.
* * * * *
Once we were comfortably seated around a table in the room the Merchant spoke. "Firstly, let me introduce myself. I'm the Guild Master of the Merchants Guild here in the city of Doran. My name is Adriano. I'm glad to make your acquaintance."
I was impressed by the fact the Guild Master himself had come to meet with me. "I’m Mukouda, I look forward to working with you." I responded politely, keeping in mind that I was also a member of the Merchants Guild, if only the lowest rank and this man was effectively my superior.
Adriano-san turned to the Deputy Guild Master and bowed his head. "Ugor-san, I'm sorry for bothering you so many times over the past two days about this matter."
"No no, I understand your reasons.” Ugor-san replied rather stiffly.
"I'm glad you feel that way," Adriano-san smiled. For some weird reason the Gustave level boss monster we had fought in the dungeon suddenly came to mind. "Now can we get down to business?" He turned to me. "Ugor-san has informed us that you have gems and jewellery of various sorts to offer us, is that correct?"
"Yes I do." I said. Adriano-san sent an assistant out to fetch an appraiser, someone who was an expert in examining and valuing gems and the like. The fellow who entered the room after a few minutes was a grandfatherly type, in his 60s perhaps, with sharp eyes.
"Now, please show us what you have to offer, Mukouda-san." I started taking out the various gemstones we had collected in the dungeon.
"First, there's this ruby.” I passed the stone to the old man who screwed a loupe into his eyesocket before holding the ruby up to the light, examining it closely on all sides. It was the first time I had seen someone use a loupe in this world. Glasses and other optical devices seemed to be rare and expensive, I had noticed only a few wealthier individuals wearing spectacles here and there.
"It's a small stone," the appraiser muttered, "but it's a wonderfully deep red colour. A dungeon stone, I expect." He put the stone down carefully on a soft black cloth Adriano-san had laid on the table. It sounded like the old man knew his stuff, I decided.
"Well then, can you bring out the next one please?" he requested. I asked him if it wouldn't be easier for me to get all of them out at once but he demurred.
"No, it’s been a long time since I've had a chance to work with gems from the dungeon." he explained. "I must judge each stone with my full attention. Having them all lying in front of me would only be a distraction." That really sounded like he was taking a very professional attitude to his job so I complied with his wishes and brought each stone out one by one. He examined the smaller emerald, garnet and aquamarine gemstones, the amethysts and the peridot, commenting on each of them in turn before laying them down on the cloth on the table. However when I said "This is an Imperial Topaz" and handed the stone to the appraiser, I saw his eyes light up.
"An Imperial Topaz!" he said after a long time, turning the larger stone in his fingers in the light as he studied it through his loupe with great concentration. "I haven't seen this golden color for decades! This is very fine..." he said, "there are no flaws I can detect and the size is impressive." He put the Imperial Topaz down beside the others with some reluctance, as if he didn't want to let go of it.
"You seem somewhat excited, Ruslan-san." Adriano-san said, "Is this gemstone important?" Ah, so the appraiser's name was Ruslan-san.
"Yes. This is a big find." Ruslan-san said, resting a finger on the large yellow gem. "To start with there aren't many Imperial Topazes around, it's a very rare gemstone. The people that know of them are aware of their scarcity but they're very much in demand, regardless of the price. The colour of this example too, the red-tinged golden shade, that makes it even more attractive to possible buyers." He nodded. "Once word gets out that this stone is on the market there will be a lot of people interested in acquiring it."
Adriano-san leaned in to look at the Imperial Topaz, muttering to himself, "True, that clear golden color is very attractive.” I had no idea of the value of such things but if both these gentlemen thought that way it looked like the Imperial Topaz was very valuable. I still had more gems to be appraised so I continued with the sapphire and alexandrite, following up with the smaller diamonds. Ruslan-san was quite enthusiastic about all of them.
"Huhu, the quality of dungeon products is very different to regular gems.” he explained.
"Are they really so different?" I couldn't tell myself, of course.
"Yes. First, there are few flaws if any in gems collected from a dungeon and they have clear colours with no turbidity or distortion. They are always of the the highest quality in my experience.'' Ah, I thought they were only valuable since they were gems but it seemed that dungeon gems were higher quality and presumably worth more. I recalled that Ugor-san had said that skins from the dungeon were more highly prized than those resulting from monster subjugations -- was it something about Dungeon-san's methods of producing such items? I wondered.
"Next is a diamond ring from a treasure chest.” I took it from my Item Box and handed it to Ruslan-san.
"Huhu, these stones are already mounted in a ring." He turned the ring in his fingers, examining it closely though his loupe. "The design is a little old-fashioned but the diamonds are, again, very good quality.'' It seemed the dungeon didn't keep up with the latest fashion trends when it came to jewellery and the like.
"Next is a tanzanite necklace. This also came out of a treasure chest."
"Again this is a rather old design," Ruslan-san said as he examined the necklace. "But tanzanite is a rare gem. It has a slightly purplish blue that is different from a blue sapphire, a colour unique to tanzanite in my experience. Wonderful."
"And this is the last one." I said. I had held this gemstone back since I thought it was possibly the most valuable gem of them all. Of course I knew very little about such things but... "It’s a yellow diamond from a treasure chest we found on the 29th level.” I presented the large yellow diamond cut in a teardrop shape to Ruslan-san.
"Th-This is..." Ruslan-san took the stone from me with shaking fingers.
"R- Ruslan-san?" Adriano-san said, looking anxiously at his subordinate. Was Ruslan-san crying? The old man paused for a moment to wipe his eyes.
"I'm sorry, I was overcome for a moment." he said, fixing his gaze on the stone in his hands. "I'm an old man, I never expected to see something like this in the time I have left, that's all." He swallowed, then continued, his voice firming up as his professionalism came to the fore.
"First of all, there's the rarity of coloured diamonds. They're very uncommon to start with." Ruslan-san held the diamond up to the light, turning it this way and that. "Moreover, this stone has a strong even yellow tint and excellent transparency. The yellowish-golden shade is, like the Imperial Topaz, popular with many buyers and it will be in great demand." He hefted the large diamond in the palm of his hand.
"To add to that, the size is exceptional. Such large diamonds rarely appear on the market coloured or not, and the teardrop cut is also excellent, its shape is pleasing to the eye and the brilliant facets catch the light perfectly. The most skilled craftsman I know of could manage to cut a diamond like this, perhaps but no-one else." He put the diamond down beside the others gems on the table, his eyes remaining fixed on it, and sighed.
"I've been around gemstones and jewellery all my long life, I've seen and appraised many top-quality items. I can honestly say that I've never seen a gem as fine as this one before today." He pointed at the diamond. "In my expert opinion," he stopped and swallowed again, "and please don't think I'm exaggerating, this may well be the finest gemstone in the world." He looked up at Adriano-san and spoke firmly. "I, Ruslan personally guarantee this stone's quality."
...the finest gemstone in the world? What? I looked at the diamond lying on the cloth, trying to see what Ruslan-san saw in it. Sure it was big and yellow and glittery but, I scrabbled to comprehend, it was like a large piece of coloured glass to me, sparklier perhaps but... Looking up again I saw Ugor-san exchange a look with Adriano-san who nodded before standing up.
"So, please wait a moment, Mukouda-san, Ugor-san." Adriano-san said. "We'll leave you for a brief time to discuss what we wish to buy from you but I promise we'll return shortly." He gestured for Ruslan-san to follow him. The old man kept glancing back to the table and the gems littering the black cloth as he left the room trailing the Guild Master.
I started to say something about the gems to Ugor-san but he put a finger to his lips, glancing around the room. It dawned on me that anything we said here could well be overheard and it was likely Adriano-san would be briefed on the contents of our conversation before he returned. Instead we waited in silence until staff members of the Merchants Guild appeared to serve us tea.
I took a sip of the aromatic black tea and had to restrain myself from exclaiming out loud. It tasted wonderful, something like a Darjeeling and definitely not made from a tea bag. It was the sort of expensive tea you'd bring back from a trip abroad as a gift, something to butter up your boss or make nice with your in-laws. Ugor-san smiled over the rim of his own teacup, obviously amused by my reaction.
"The Merchants Guild always serve the finest tea, as you might expect.'' He took another sip. "Ahhh. This makes coming to this den of thieves almost worthwhile."
"Oh, is this the finest grade of tea?” I asked, taking another sip myself. It was delightful.
"Yes, it can only be harvested in the Doolin region of the Erman Kingdom. It’s called Doolin tea.”
Oh, is that so? I sipped some more Doolin tea while we waited for Adriano-san to return.
Doran's Merchants Guild occupied a very fine building fronting on to the main street of the city. Ugor-san led me directly into the entrance where we were met by a stout Merchant who appeared to be in his late 40s, well-dressed and neatly groomed, the very picture of a prosperous citizen.
"I've been looking forward to meeting you," he said, waving his hand towards the hallway beyond the entrance. "Please be welcome." I looked behind me, was it okay for Fer and the others to accompany me? This wasn't the Adventurers Guild where they were familiar visitors. The Merchant added, "Follow me with your contracted monsters, if you please." The Merchant had noticed my hesitancy and quickly responded to it as you might expect of a high-ranking man of business. He led the way to a room in the back of the Guild's reception area with Fer and Dora-chan tagging along. This room was one like others in the corridor where I saw more people, presumably Merchants, discussing some kind of business around tables.
* * * * *
Once we were comfortably seated around a table in the room the Merchant spoke. "Firstly, let me introduce myself. I'm the Guild Master of the Merchants Guild here in the city of Doran. My name is Adriano. I'm glad to make your acquaintance."
I was impressed by the fact the Guild Master himself had come to meet with me. "I’m Mukouda, I look forward to working with you." I responded politely, keeping in mind that I was also a member of the Merchants Guild, if only the lowest rank and this man was effectively my superior.
Adriano-san turned to the Deputy Guild Master and bowed his head. "Ugor-san, I'm sorry for bothering you so many times over the past two days about this matter."
"No no, I understand your reasons.” Ugor-san replied rather stiffly.
"I'm glad you feel that way," Adriano-san smiled. For some weird reason the Gustave level boss monster we had fought in the dungeon suddenly came to mind. "Now can we get down to business?" He turned to me. "Ugor-san has informed us that you have gems and jewellery of various sorts to offer us, is that correct?"
"Yes I do." I said. Adriano-san sent an assistant out to fetch an appraiser, someone who was an expert in examining and valuing gems and the like. The fellow who entered the room after a few minutes was a grandfatherly type, in his 60s perhaps, with sharp eyes.
"Now, please show us what you have to offer, Mukouda-san." I started taking out the various gemstones we had collected in the dungeon.
"First, there's this ruby.” I passed the stone to the old man who screwed a loupe into his eyesocket before holding the ruby up to the light, examining it closely on all sides. It was the first time I had seen someone use a loupe in this world. Glasses and other optical devices seemed to be rare and expensive, I had noticed only a few wealthier individuals wearing spectacles here and there.
"It's a small stone," the appraiser muttered, "but it's a wonderfully deep red colour. A dungeon stone, I expect." He put the stone down carefully on a soft black cloth Adriano-san had laid on the table. It sounded like the old man knew his stuff, I decided.
"Well then, can you bring out the next one please?" he requested. I asked him if it wouldn't be easier for me to get all of them out at once but he demurred.
"No, it’s been a long time since I've had a chance to work with gems from the dungeon." he explained. "I must judge each stone with my full attention. Having them all lying in front of me would only be a distraction." That really sounded like he was taking a very professional attitude to his job so I complied with his wishes and brought each stone out one by one. He examined the smaller emerald, garnet and aquamarine gemstones, the amethysts and the peridot, commenting on each of them in turn before laying them down on the cloth on the table. However when I said "This is an Imperial Topaz" and handed the stone to the appraiser, I saw his eyes light up.
"An Imperial Topaz!" he said after a long time, turning the larger stone in his fingers in the light as he studied it through his loupe with great concentration. "I haven't seen this golden color for decades! This is very fine..." he said, "there are no flaws I can detect and the size is impressive." He put the Imperial Topaz down beside the others with some reluctance, as if he didn't want to let go of it.
"You seem somewhat excited, Ruslan-san." Adriano-san said, "Is this gemstone important?" Ah, so the appraiser's name was Ruslan-san.
"Yes. This is a big find." Ruslan-san said, resting a finger on the large yellow gem. "To start with there aren't many Imperial Topazes around, it's a very rare gemstone. The people that know of them are aware of their scarcity but they're very much in demand, regardless of the price. The colour of this example too, the red-tinged golden shade, that makes it even more attractive to possible buyers." He nodded. "Once word gets out that this stone is on the market there will be a lot of people interested in acquiring it."
Adriano-san leaned in to look at the Imperial Topaz, muttering to himself, "True, that clear golden color is very attractive.” I had no idea of the value of such things but if both these gentlemen thought that way it looked like the Imperial Topaz was very valuable. I still had more gems to be appraised so I continued with the sapphire and alexandrite, following up with the smaller diamonds. Ruslan-san was quite enthusiastic about all of them.
"Huhu, the quality of dungeon products is very different to regular gems.” he explained.
"Are they really so different?" I couldn't tell myself, of course.
"Yes. First, there are few flaws if any in gems collected from a dungeon and they have clear colours with no turbidity or distortion. They are always of the the highest quality in my experience.'' Ah, I thought they were only valuable since they were gems but it seemed that dungeon gems were higher quality and presumably worth more. I recalled that Ugor-san had said that skins from the dungeon were more highly prized than those resulting from monster subjugations -- was it something about Dungeon-san's methods of producing such items? I wondered.
"Next is a diamond ring from a treasure chest.” I took it from my Item Box and handed it to Ruslan-san.
"Huhu, these stones are already mounted in a ring." He turned the ring in his fingers, examining it closely though his loupe. "The design is a little old-fashioned but the diamonds are, again, very good quality.'' It seemed the dungeon didn't keep up with the latest fashion trends when it came to jewellery and the like.
"Next is a tanzanite necklace. This also came out of a treasure chest."
"Again this is a rather old design," Ruslan-san said as he examined the necklace. "But tanzanite is a rare gem. It has a slightly purplish blue that is different from a blue sapphire, a colour unique to tanzanite in my experience. Wonderful."
"And this is the last one." I said. I had held this gemstone back since I thought it was possibly the most valuable gem of them all. Of course I knew very little about such things but... "It’s a yellow diamond from a treasure chest we found on the 29th level.” I presented the large yellow diamond cut in a teardrop shape to Ruslan-san.
"Th-This is..." Ruslan-san took the stone from me with shaking fingers.
"R- Ruslan-san?" Adriano-san said, looking anxiously at his subordinate. Was Ruslan-san crying? The old man paused for a moment to wipe his eyes.
"I'm sorry, I was overcome for a moment." he said, fixing his gaze on the stone in his hands. "I'm an old man, I never expected to see something like this in the time I have left, that's all." He swallowed, then continued, his voice firming up as his professionalism came to the fore.
"First of all, there's the rarity of coloured diamonds. They're very uncommon to start with." Ruslan-san held the diamond up to the light, turning it this way and that. "Moreover, this stone has a strong even yellow tint and excellent transparency. The yellowish-golden shade is, like the Imperial Topaz, popular with many buyers and it will be in great demand." He hefted the large diamond in the palm of his hand.
"To add to that, the size is exceptional. Such large diamonds rarely appear on the market coloured or not, and the teardrop cut is also excellent, its shape is pleasing to the eye and the brilliant facets catch the light perfectly. The most skilled craftsman I know of could manage to cut a diamond like this, perhaps but no-one else." He put the diamond down beside the others gems on the table, his eyes remaining fixed on it, and sighed.
"I've been around gemstones and jewellery all my long life, I've seen and appraised many top-quality items. I can honestly say that I've never seen a gem as fine as this one before today." He pointed at the diamond. "In my expert opinion," he stopped and swallowed again, "and please don't think I'm exaggerating, this may well be the finest gemstone in the world." He looked up at Adriano-san and spoke firmly. "I, Ruslan personally guarantee this stone's quality."
...the finest gemstone in the world? What? I looked at the diamond lying on the cloth, trying to see what Ruslan-san saw in it. Sure it was big and yellow and glittery but, I scrabbled to comprehend, it was like a large piece of coloured glass to me, sparklier perhaps but... Looking up again I saw Ugor-san exchange a look with Adriano-san who nodded before standing up.
"So, please wait a moment, Mukouda-san, Ugor-san." Adriano-san said. "We'll leave you for a brief time to discuss what we wish to buy from you but I promise we'll return shortly." He gestured for Ruslan-san to follow him. The old man kept glancing back to the table and the gems littering the black cloth as he left the room trailing the Guild Master.
I started to say something about the gems to Ugor-san but he put a finger to his lips, glancing around the room. It dawned on me that anything we said here could well be overheard and it was likely Adriano-san would be briefed on the contents of our conversation before he returned. Instead we waited in silence until staff members of the Merchants Guild appeared to serve us tea.
I took a sip of the aromatic black tea and had to restrain myself from exclaiming out loud. It tasted wonderful, something like a Darjeeling and definitely not made from a tea bag. It was the sort of expensive tea you'd bring back from a trip abroad as a gift, something to butter up your boss or make nice with your in-laws. Ugor-san smiled over the rim of his own teacup, obviously amused by my reaction.
"The Merchants Guild always serve the finest tea, as you might expect.'' He took another sip. "Ahhh. This makes coming to this den of thieves almost worthwhile."
"Oh, is this the finest grade of tea?” I asked, taking another sip myself. It was delightful.
"Yes, it can only be harvested in the Doolin region of the Erman Kingdom. It’s called Doolin tea.”
Oh, is that so? I sipped some more Doolin tea while we waited for Adriano-san to return.
Saturday 19 October 2019
Ch 162 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Chapter 162 -- Ugor-san Gets Extremely Angry
The next morning we arrived at the Adventurers Guild. As soon as we appeared at the receptionist's window the staff hurried off to fetch Elland-san. We were here to discuss the purchase of the item drops from the dungeon. I hoped the Guild Master had done his job properly after Ugor-san's upbraiding in the warehouse the previous day and it would all be sorted by now but, well, Elland-san... I sighed, if it wasn't possible to finish up today then I could come back tomorrow.
By the way, this morning I tried cooking the meat I had marinated overnight in the magic bag for breakfast. The Bloody Horn Bull's miso-yaki rice bowl was a great success and tasted wonderful.
I looked around the Adventurers Guild building as I waited. It was getting to be rather familiar territory but, well, we had conquered Doran's dungeon and I felt it was time to move on to the next city in our itinerary. All we had keeping us here now was the sale of the items we had collected in the dungeon and hopefully that would be completed today. I would cook a lot of food for the trip and then we would leave.
"Mukouda-san, welcome." Elland-san appeared, gesturing to the stair up to his office. "So, so, this way please."
Just then Ugor-san also appeared from behind Elland-san. "Ah, Mukouda-sama." he said. "I'll be assisting Elland-san today with the purchasing of your items." Elland-san shot him a look but said nothing more. So Ugor-san and Elland-san would be working together? Or was it that Ugor-san wanted to keep tabs on his unruly superior? Well, the Guild Master did have a track record of impetuousness... We followed Elland-san and Ugor-san up to the now-familiar Guild Master's room on the second floor.
* * * * *
"We will buy all the Orc skins, Lizardman skins, Ogre skins, Troll skins and Minotaur skins you have. We'll also buy all the Ogre small magic stones, Troll small magic stones, Minotaur small magic stones and Giant Killer Mantis small magic stones." the Deputy Guild Master Ugor-san said, reading from a piece of paper. "We also want to buy fifteen vials of the Paralyse Butterfly paralysis powder and twenty Wild Ape furs, and since you're offering a small magic bag for sale we'd like to buy that too."
It seemed like the leather skins used to make basic and intermediate Adventurer armour were always in great demand and short supply. I had been told that dungeon-drop skins were preferred for making armour as they were stronger than skins obtained from monster subjugations so the Guild wanted as many of the skins I had collected as they could afford.
As for the magic stones, Ugor-san explained that the smaller ones were easier to sell. The larger magic stones were individually much more valuable but there were fewer buyers for them in part due to their high price. That's why he was buying all of the small magic stones I had. I could see his reasoning, intending to turn a quick profit in the simplest manner rather than spend time and effort finding buyers for the larger stones after having to pay me significant amounts of money up front for them.
However, Ugor-san's practical intentions were not left unchallenged by...
"N-, no, Ugor-kun, the common items you listed earlier are fine of course, but, I think, shouldn't we buy some of the rarer items too?" Elland-san blurted out.
Ugor-san glared at him. “Guild Master," he said, controlling the obvious anger in his voice, "we discussed this matter THOROUGHLY yesterday and I've just given Mukouda-sama the list of purchases we agreed to. I don't think there is anything else, is there?"
Elland-san didn't waver though, despite Ugor-san's clear warning. "No, no, what we agreed about the skins and the magic stones, they'll make a big profit for the Guild, I understand that, but... joining the Guild is something someone only does if they have a dream, a desire to be an Adventurer." He gestured to the paper Ugor-san held, the list of items they wished to buy from me.
"Those drop items, they're not a dream. Mukouda-san's list had things on it an aspiring Adventurer would covet, like the Vasuki's fangs and skin, the Manticore's skin and its Poison Stinger and don't forget the Gustave's drops, all of them." The handsome Elf's face took on that look I had come to dread, that obsession he had with Dragons transferred to the items we had collected from Doran's dungeon. "My recommendation is that we purchase the Vasuki's fangs, the Manticore's Poison Stinger and the Gustave's fangs and spine." He smiled, the sort of smile that would make a woman's heart quiver. "And then after those there's Behemoth's skin to consider..."
Sadly for Elland-san that day his opponent was not a soft-hearted woman but a flint-hearted Deputy Guild Master who quickly reined him back before he could go further.
"Forget it." Ugor-san said bluntly. "Your fantastical plans to buy in those items would beggar the Guild, and all for a dream?" Ugor-san looked thoughtful for a moment. "Guild Master, tell me. It's just a coincidence, is it that the Vasuki's fangs and the Gustave's spine are both items used to make magical swords, correct? Someone more cynical than me might say that your intention to impoverish the Guild is just so you can indulge yourself."
Really? Is that what he's after? More magical swords?
“No, no, no, no, no, that's not true." Elland-san stuttered, waving his hands in denial. No, Elland-san, that's too much, it's just like saying "Yes, that's right, I admit it."
Ugor-san leaned forward, pushing home his assault on his superior. “The materials from Mukouda-sama's Earth Dragon you purchased, the sword you want to make from them, well, I agreed with those purchases because I know you, Guild Master. But no more, understand? One magical sword, your precious Dragon Sword is enough."
Elland-san stiffened and muttered something under his breath. No, Elland-san, don't push it any further, I begged him silently.
"Well, the person you are..." Ugor-san sat back again, eyeing the tense figure beside him. "Look, how much do you think it would cost to buy just one of the rare items you listed? It would come to half of the total purchase price of all the items we agreed to buy from Mukouda-sama, and there's a good demand for all of those items. And Behemoth's skin?" Ugor-san struck the table repeatedly. "We. Don't. Have. That. Much. Money." he said, "even if we spent all our purchasing budget for a year and more!"
"U- Ugor-kun, Uh... please don't get angry at me. I was just making a little suggestion..." Elland-san's face was red as he tried to deflect his subordinate's fury.
"No, it wasn't a 'little' suggestion, was it?" Ugor-san replied, "you really thought you could get away with it, didn't you?" Elland-san looked down and said nothing more.
“That's better, Guild Master." Ugor-san said after a few moments of silence. He turned to me and bowed his head. "Mukouda-sama, I'm sorry you had to witness that. Now, the items I mentioned earlier, we'd like to buy them from you, and nothing else." His eyes flickered sideways to Elland-san as he continued to address me. "Is that fine with you?"
“Yes, of course." I agreed hurriedly, trying to move things forward. "What should I do with those items? Do you want me to bring them out here?" The office was large but there were a lot of skins, hundreds of them and...
"No, we'll take the items from you in the warehouse because there are so many of them, and we'll want to check their quality and count them too, of course. That means we can't make payment until tomorrow, after that's all done." That seemed a sensible thing to do, after all they had a business to run. The argument between Elland-san and Ugor-san about the rare items they weren't buying from me had brought something else to mind though.
“Oh, before we go to the warehouse there's something I wanted to get your advice on, Ugor-san..." I told him I was aware that normally Adventurers were obliged to sell items and monsters exclusively to the Guild. However I had many more items from the dungeon to sell than the Guild could afford to buy from me, and in such cases I understood the Merchants Guild might be permitted to buy excess items from me directly.
“That's correct," Ugor-san said, "Adventurers are normally only allowed to sell materials and items to the Adventurers Guild but that's to protect the Adventurers in most cases. Adventurers are skilled with weapons and magic but they're no match for a seasoned Merchant when it comes to selling their goods, sadly. It's far too easy for those sly old foxes to trick and brow-beat our Guild members into receiving a much lower price than they should for what they're selling." He shrugged. "We don't care that much about small transactions, a monster skin or a magic stone here or there, that sort of thing we can usually overlook." I remembered Lambert-san's desire for a Black Serpent skin and his successful efforts to get me to supply him with one through the back door and looked away guiltily, but Ugor-san didn't seem to notice. "When the Adventurers Guild just can't afford to buy in such items, that's a much rarer situation where we don't enforce the rule, for obvious reasons." Ugor-san finished.
I see. Lambert-san had said the same sort of thing to me back in Carerina, about small transactions involving one or two minor items being overlooked. It seemed the two Guilds had an understanding on this.
"The Guild Master here was in a party that once nearly conquered the dungeon here in Doran before you arrived." Ugor-san went on. I had heard that before, of course. "They collected a lot of jewellery which the Guild didn't want to purchase and so the Merchants Guild were invited to make offers on the items."
Is that so? We had amassed a lot of jewellery in our dungeon exploration too and frankly I wasn't interested in keeping any of it. If I could find someone to buy it that would be great.
"In fact," Ugor-san said, looking at another pile of papers on the desk, "if you have the time we'd like you to go to the Merchants Guild soon, tomorrow maybe or even earlier? I'm sorry to push you but we've received a lot of requests from them to meet with you, to discuss purchasing items you brought back from the dungeon."
That sounded fine to me, the sooner I sold off those sorts of things the better. "Yes, I'll be happy to go there. In fact I can go later today, after we've been to the warehouse?"
"Really? Excellent, thank you for this. I'll take you over to the Merchants Guild after we've visited the warehouse." Ugor-san said with some satisfaction.
Elland-san broke his cowed silence. "W- wait a minute." he said. "I'll guide you over to the Merchants Guild, Mukouda-san. I really should go with him, Deputy Guild Master since I'm the Guild Master after all-"
Ugor-san interrupted. "What are you talking about? You have a lot of work to get through today to process the items Mukouda-sam is delivering to us. And how are your preparations to travel to the Royal capital tomorrow proceeding?" he asked acidly. Elland-san looked away guiltily. Ah, so he hasn't made any preparations at all. Ugor-san sighed. "I did tell you to start getting ready, but... Anyway, I'll take Mukouda-sama over to the Merchants Guild myself since you're going to be too busy here. Right?"
"No, no ... I didn't really want to go all that way in the first place and..." Elland-san muttered. "It's a pain..." but Ugor-san ignored his superior's whining. Mention of Elland-san's forthcoming trip to the capital reminded me of something I had decided.
"Elland-san, when you go to the capital, you will meet with the King, right?"
“Yes, I will. He wants a direct report on the dungeon's conquest." Elland-san confirmed.
"In that case..." I took something I had collected from a dungeon treasure chest out of my Item Box and passed it to him.
"Please give this to the King for me." As he studied it I went on to explain. "The King made it very clear to the nobles and others that me and my contracted monsters were to be left alone and not bothered or interfered with. That proclamation has made our time here in this country a lot more pleasant than we had expected and this is a gift to show that we appreciate his efforts on our behalf."
I wanted our freedom to travel around without being hassled to continue and I reckoned this would be an investment, cheap enough.
"Yes, I can give this to the King for you but... what is it?" Elland-san lacked the Appraisal skill so he couldn't figure out what it was at a glance.
"Ah, that's a 'detoxification necklace' I found in a treasure chest in the dungeon. It nullifies all poisons." I explained. Both Elland-san and Ugor-san looked shocked.
"That's a magic item, surely?" Ugor-san said, staring at the necklace in Elland-san's hands. "Are you really just going to give it away?"
"I think it's better for the King to have this." I said. After all kings faced the constant threat of assassination and poison was one of the favourite methods used if the stories I had read were accurate.
“True, it's the sort of thing a Royal family would really like to own but..." Ugor-san went on. "You could sell it easily, I think, such an item is eagerly sought after. You could name your own price."
"No, please give it to the king on my behalf." Thanks to Fer and the others, I wasn't at all troubled for money and maintaining a thoughtful and considerate King on his throne was worth a lot more to me personally. If he got poisoned who would replace him? As for using the necklace myself, my contracted monsters and me all had blessings of the Deplorable-samas that prevented poisons from having any effect on us so we didn't actually need it. "You can deliver it personally, Guild Master, when you go to report to the King about the dungeon's conquest."
"Work hard and get ready for your journey, Guild Master." Ugor-san said. "And don't lose that necklace, please." Ugor-san looked at me and smiled. "The Adventurers Guild will benefit from being associated with your gift too, of course and for that I thank you Mukouda-sama. Now let's go down to the warehouse and get today's purchases dealt with."
I woke up Fer and Dora-chan who were sleeping behind my chair and we all went down to the warehouse with Ugor-san, leaving Elland-san sitting at his desk and staring at the piles of paper on it. Sui was in her leather bag as usual.
"What do you want me to get out first?" I asked once we were in the warehouse. There were so many items to deal with I really needed to produce things in the order Ugor-san preferred. Piling it all up in a heap would be counter-productive and messy.
"Right." Ugor-san said, consulting his list again. "First of all, can we get the Orc skins? Then the Lizardman skins, the Ogre skins, Troll skins and ... (omitted) ... and fifteen vials of Paralyse Butterfly paralysis powder." Ugor-san stopped for a moment, scratching his bald head as I got the vials out of my Item Box and put them on a workbench nearby. "There's something else, something else..." he flipped the paper over. "Oh, here they are. Twenty Wild Ape furs and a small magic bag."
Right, right. I pulled the final items he requested from my Item Box and put them down on the bench too.
"I think that's all." I said, ransacking my memory, but it sounded about right. "Please confirm that you've received these items." Marcel-san and his co-workers were standing around, staring open-mouthed at the immense piles of skins laying on the warehouse floor. They would be the ones to check the quality and number of the items the Guild was buying and it looked like they had a lot of work ahead of them. Ganbatte, Marcel-san.
“I think that's all too." Ugor-san agreed, giving his list one final check before he nodded. "Mukouda-san, we have received the items as agreed. We will assess them immediately," he nodded to Marcel-san who waved his subordinates towards the piles of skins and other items, "and we will make the payment for all of them to you tomorrow."
I sighed quietly, glad to see a large number of the dungeon item drops sold and no longer cluttering up my Item Box. There were still a lot left, of course. However...
"Now I'll escort you to the Merchants Guild." Ugor-san said, gesturing towards the warehouse door. We followed Ugor-san and left the Adventurers Guild, heading for the Merchants Guild where, I hoped, I'd be able to sell off a lot more of the drops we had collected.
The next morning we arrived at the Adventurers Guild. As soon as we appeared at the receptionist's window the staff hurried off to fetch Elland-san. We were here to discuss the purchase of the item drops from the dungeon. I hoped the Guild Master had done his job properly after Ugor-san's upbraiding in the warehouse the previous day and it would all be sorted by now but, well, Elland-san... I sighed, if it wasn't possible to finish up today then I could come back tomorrow.
By the way, this morning I tried cooking the meat I had marinated overnight in the magic bag for breakfast. The Bloody Horn Bull's miso-yaki rice bowl was a great success and tasted wonderful.
I looked around the Adventurers Guild building as I waited. It was getting to be rather familiar territory but, well, we had conquered Doran's dungeon and I felt it was time to move on to the next city in our itinerary. All we had keeping us here now was the sale of the items we had collected in the dungeon and hopefully that would be completed today. I would cook a lot of food for the trip and then we would leave.
"Mukouda-san, welcome." Elland-san appeared, gesturing to the stair up to his office. "So, so, this way please."
Just then Ugor-san also appeared from behind Elland-san. "Ah, Mukouda-sama." he said. "I'll be assisting Elland-san today with the purchasing of your items." Elland-san shot him a look but said nothing more. So Ugor-san and Elland-san would be working together? Or was it that Ugor-san wanted to keep tabs on his unruly superior? Well, the Guild Master did have a track record of impetuousness... We followed Elland-san and Ugor-san up to the now-familiar Guild Master's room on the second floor.
* * * * *
"We will buy all the Orc skins, Lizardman skins, Ogre skins, Troll skins and Minotaur skins you have. We'll also buy all the Ogre small magic stones, Troll small magic stones, Minotaur small magic stones and Giant Killer Mantis small magic stones." the Deputy Guild Master Ugor-san said, reading from a piece of paper. "We also want to buy fifteen vials of the Paralyse Butterfly paralysis powder and twenty Wild Ape furs, and since you're offering a small magic bag for sale we'd like to buy that too."
It seemed like the leather skins used to make basic and intermediate Adventurer armour were always in great demand and short supply. I had been told that dungeon-drop skins were preferred for making armour as they were stronger than skins obtained from monster subjugations so the Guild wanted as many of the skins I had collected as they could afford.
As for the magic stones, Ugor-san explained that the smaller ones were easier to sell. The larger magic stones were individually much more valuable but there were fewer buyers for them in part due to their high price. That's why he was buying all of the small magic stones I had. I could see his reasoning, intending to turn a quick profit in the simplest manner rather than spend time and effort finding buyers for the larger stones after having to pay me significant amounts of money up front for them.
However, Ugor-san's practical intentions were not left unchallenged by...
"N-, no, Ugor-kun, the common items you listed earlier are fine of course, but, I think, shouldn't we buy some of the rarer items too?" Elland-san blurted out.
Ugor-san glared at him. “Guild Master," he said, controlling the obvious anger in his voice, "we discussed this matter THOROUGHLY yesterday and I've just given Mukouda-sama the list of purchases we agreed to. I don't think there is anything else, is there?"
Elland-san didn't waver though, despite Ugor-san's clear warning. "No, no, what we agreed about the skins and the magic stones, they'll make a big profit for the Guild, I understand that, but... joining the Guild is something someone only does if they have a dream, a desire to be an Adventurer." He gestured to the paper Ugor-san held, the list of items they wished to buy from me.
"Those drop items, they're not a dream. Mukouda-san's list had things on it an aspiring Adventurer would covet, like the Vasuki's fangs and skin, the Manticore's skin and its Poison Stinger and don't forget the Gustave's drops, all of them." The handsome Elf's face took on that look I had come to dread, that obsession he had with Dragons transferred to the items we had collected from Doran's dungeon. "My recommendation is that we purchase the Vasuki's fangs, the Manticore's Poison Stinger and the Gustave's fangs and spine." He smiled, the sort of smile that would make a woman's heart quiver. "And then after those there's Behemoth's skin to consider..."
Sadly for Elland-san that day his opponent was not a soft-hearted woman but a flint-hearted Deputy Guild Master who quickly reined him back before he could go further.
"Forget it." Ugor-san said bluntly. "Your fantastical plans to buy in those items would beggar the Guild, and all for a dream?" Ugor-san looked thoughtful for a moment. "Guild Master, tell me. It's just a coincidence, is it that the Vasuki's fangs and the Gustave's spine are both items used to make magical swords, correct? Someone more cynical than me might say that your intention to impoverish the Guild is just so you can indulge yourself."
Really? Is that what he's after? More magical swords?
“No, no, no, no, no, that's not true." Elland-san stuttered, waving his hands in denial. No, Elland-san, that's too much, it's just like saying "Yes, that's right, I admit it."
Ugor-san leaned forward, pushing home his assault on his superior. “The materials from Mukouda-sama's Earth Dragon you purchased, the sword you want to make from them, well, I agreed with those purchases because I know you, Guild Master. But no more, understand? One magical sword, your precious Dragon Sword is enough."
Elland-san stiffened and muttered something under his breath. No, Elland-san, don't push it any further, I begged him silently.
"Well, the person you are..." Ugor-san sat back again, eyeing the tense figure beside him. "Look, how much do you think it would cost to buy just one of the rare items you listed? It would come to half of the total purchase price of all the items we agreed to buy from Mukouda-sama, and there's a good demand for all of those items. And Behemoth's skin?" Ugor-san struck the table repeatedly. "We. Don't. Have. That. Much. Money." he said, "even if we spent all our purchasing budget for a year and more!"
"U- Ugor-kun, Uh... please don't get angry at me. I was just making a little suggestion..." Elland-san's face was red as he tried to deflect his subordinate's fury.
"No, it wasn't a 'little' suggestion, was it?" Ugor-san replied, "you really thought you could get away with it, didn't you?" Elland-san looked down and said nothing more.
“That's better, Guild Master." Ugor-san said after a few moments of silence. He turned to me and bowed his head. "Mukouda-sama, I'm sorry you had to witness that. Now, the items I mentioned earlier, we'd like to buy them from you, and nothing else." His eyes flickered sideways to Elland-san as he continued to address me. "Is that fine with you?"
“Yes, of course." I agreed hurriedly, trying to move things forward. "What should I do with those items? Do you want me to bring them out here?" The office was large but there were a lot of skins, hundreds of them and...
"No, we'll take the items from you in the warehouse because there are so many of them, and we'll want to check their quality and count them too, of course. That means we can't make payment until tomorrow, after that's all done." That seemed a sensible thing to do, after all they had a business to run. The argument between Elland-san and Ugor-san about the rare items they weren't buying from me had brought something else to mind though.
“Oh, before we go to the warehouse there's something I wanted to get your advice on, Ugor-san..." I told him I was aware that normally Adventurers were obliged to sell items and monsters exclusively to the Guild. However I had many more items from the dungeon to sell than the Guild could afford to buy from me, and in such cases I understood the Merchants Guild might be permitted to buy excess items from me directly.
“That's correct," Ugor-san said, "Adventurers are normally only allowed to sell materials and items to the Adventurers Guild but that's to protect the Adventurers in most cases. Adventurers are skilled with weapons and magic but they're no match for a seasoned Merchant when it comes to selling their goods, sadly. It's far too easy for those sly old foxes to trick and brow-beat our Guild members into receiving a much lower price than they should for what they're selling." He shrugged. "We don't care that much about small transactions, a monster skin or a magic stone here or there, that sort of thing we can usually overlook." I remembered Lambert-san's desire for a Black Serpent skin and his successful efforts to get me to supply him with one through the back door and looked away guiltily, but Ugor-san didn't seem to notice. "When the Adventurers Guild just can't afford to buy in such items, that's a much rarer situation where we don't enforce the rule, for obvious reasons." Ugor-san finished.
I see. Lambert-san had said the same sort of thing to me back in Carerina, about small transactions involving one or two minor items being overlooked. It seemed the two Guilds had an understanding on this.
"The Guild Master here was in a party that once nearly conquered the dungeon here in Doran before you arrived." Ugor-san went on. I had heard that before, of course. "They collected a lot of jewellery which the Guild didn't want to purchase and so the Merchants Guild were invited to make offers on the items."
Is that so? We had amassed a lot of jewellery in our dungeon exploration too and frankly I wasn't interested in keeping any of it. If I could find someone to buy it that would be great.
"In fact," Ugor-san said, looking at another pile of papers on the desk, "if you have the time we'd like you to go to the Merchants Guild soon, tomorrow maybe or even earlier? I'm sorry to push you but we've received a lot of requests from them to meet with you, to discuss purchasing items you brought back from the dungeon."
That sounded fine to me, the sooner I sold off those sorts of things the better. "Yes, I'll be happy to go there. In fact I can go later today, after we've been to the warehouse?"
"Really? Excellent, thank you for this. I'll take you over to the Merchants Guild after we've visited the warehouse." Ugor-san said with some satisfaction.
Elland-san broke his cowed silence. "W- wait a minute." he said. "I'll guide you over to the Merchants Guild, Mukouda-san. I really should go with him, Deputy Guild Master since I'm the Guild Master after all-"
Ugor-san interrupted. "What are you talking about? You have a lot of work to get through today to process the items Mukouda-sam is delivering to us. And how are your preparations to travel to the Royal capital tomorrow proceeding?" he asked acidly. Elland-san looked away guiltily. Ah, so he hasn't made any preparations at all. Ugor-san sighed. "I did tell you to start getting ready, but... Anyway, I'll take Mukouda-sama over to the Merchants Guild myself since you're going to be too busy here. Right?"
"No, no ... I didn't really want to go all that way in the first place and..." Elland-san muttered. "It's a pain..." but Ugor-san ignored his superior's whining. Mention of Elland-san's forthcoming trip to the capital reminded me of something I had decided.
"Elland-san, when you go to the capital, you will meet with the King, right?"
“Yes, I will. He wants a direct report on the dungeon's conquest." Elland-san confirmed.
"In that case..." I took something I had collected from a dungeon treasure chest out of my Item Box and passed it to him.
"Please give this to the King for me." As he studied it I went on to explain. "The King made it very clear to the nobles and others that me and my contracted monsters were to be left alone and not bothered or interfered with. That proclamation has made our time here in this country a lot more pleasant than we had expected and this is a gift to show that we appreciate his efforts on our behalf."
I wanted our freedom to travel around without being hassled to continue and I reckoned this would be an investment, cheap enough.
"Yes, I can give this to the King for you but... what is it?" Elland-san lacked the Appraisal skill so he couldn't figure out what it was at a glance.
"Ah, that's a 'detoxification necklace' I found in a treasure chest in the dungeon. It nullifies all poisons." I explained. Both Elland-san and Ugor-san looked shocked.
"That's a magic item, surely?" Ugor-san said, staring at the necklace in Elland-san's hands. "Are you really just going to give it away?"
"I think it's better for the King to have this." I said. After all kings faced the constant threat of assassination and poison was one of the favourite methods used if the stories I had read were accurate.
“True, it's the sort of thing a Royal family would really like to own but..." Ugor-san went on. "You could sell it easily, I think, such an item is eagerly sought after. You could name your own price."
"No, please give it to the king on my behalf." Thanks to Fer and the others, I wasn't at all troubled for money and maintaining a thoughtful and considerate King on his throne was worth a lot more to me personally. If he got poisoned who would replace him? As for using the necklace myself, my contracted monsters and me all had blessings of the Deplorable-samas that prevented poisons from having any effect on us so we didn't actually need it. "You can deliver it personally, Guild Master, when you go to report to the King about the dungeon's conquest."
"Work hard and get ready for your journey, Guild Master." Ugor-san said. "And don't lose that necklace, please." Ugor-san looked at me and smiled. "The Adventurers Guild will benefit from being associated with your gift too, of course and for that I thank you Mukouda-sama. Now let's go down to the warehouse and get today's purchases dealt with."
I woke up Fer and Dora-chan who were sleeping behind my chair and we all went down to the warehouse with Ugor-san, leaving Elland-san sitting at his desk and staring at the piles of paper on it. Sui was in her leather bag as usual.
"What do you want me to get out first?" I asked once we were in the warehouse. There were so many items to deal with I really needed to produce things in the order Ugor-san preferred. Piling it all up in a heap would be counter-productive and messy.
"Right." Ugor-san said, consulting his list again. "First of all, can we get the Orc skins? Then the Lizardman skins, the Ogre skins, Troll skins and ... (omitted) ... and fifteen vials of Paralyse Butterfly paralysis powder." Ugor-san stopped for a moment, scratching his bald head as I got the vials out of my Item Box and put them on a workbench nearby. "There's something else, something else..." he flipped the paper over. "Oh, here they are. Twenty Wild Ape furs and a small magic bag."
Right, right. I pulled the final items he requested from my Item Box and put them down on the bench too.
"I think that's all." I said, ransacking my memory, but it sounded about right. "Please confirm that you've received these items." Marcel-san and his co-workers were standing around, staring open-mouthed at the immense piles of skins laying on the warehouse floor. They would be the ones to check the quality and number of the items the Guild was buying and it looked like they had a lot of work ahead of them. Ganbatte, Marcel-san.
“I think that's all too." Ugor-san agreed, giving his list one final check before he nodded. "Mukouda-san, we have received the items as agreed. We will assess them immediately," he nodded to Marcel-san who waved his subordinates towards the piles of skins and other items, "and we will make the payment for all of them to you tomorrow."
I sighed quietly, glad to see a large number of the dungeon item drops sold and no longer cluttering up my Item Box. There were still a lot left, of course. However...
"Now I'll escort you to the Merchants Guild." Ugor-san said, gesturing towards the warehouse door. We followed Ugor-san and left the Adventurers Guild, heading for the Merchants Guild where, I hoped, I'd be able to sell off a lot more of the drops we had collected.
Sunday 13 October 2019
Ch 161 Tondemo Skill de Isekai Hourou Meshi
Chapter 161 -- Giant Tarepo, Having Eaten It Before (Sort Of)
Well, what should I make for dinner today? It would be Giant Tarepo meat, of course. Oddly enough I had actually eaten ostrich meat previously. One time I was out eating dinner in an izakaya and ostrich meat was on the menu. I asked for it because it was unusual to see something like that listed. My recollection was that it was quite delicious, a lean red meat not typical of bird meat's flavour and texture. Now I had the Giant Tarepo meat to hand I decided I'd try to make the same sort of thing I had back then, seared ostrich meat in a cutlet. I should add that ostrich meat can be eaten raw like a Korean dish, seasoned yukhoe-style with a raw egg or even as Italian-style carpaccio, sliced thinly after being cooked very rare and then coated in sauce. The carpaccio option was tempting but thinking about it a little more the seared cutlet route meant beer as an accompaniment and that settled it, seared cutlets it would be.
Yosh, I started with getting ingredients from the Net Super. I bought sour ponzu sauce to start with, planning to treat the Giant Tarepo meat like pork. The cutlet would be cooked Milanese style, I decided so I'd need flour and herb salt, eggs, bread crumbs and powdered cheese and of course olive oil because, well, Italian? Bellissimo! (about the only word of Italian I knew...)
Oh, and beer. Don't forget that. I assembled the ingredients for the cutlets under the watchful eyes of the Gluttonous Trio and quickly changed my mind -- I'd first make some carpaccio-style cold cuts and store them in my Item Box for later. I'd make the cutlets afterwards.
"Is Fer able to do Ice magic?" I asked. I vaguely remembered Ice magic was listed on his Status but...
"Nuuuu, Ice magic? I can do it." Fer replied.
"Well, can you make a little ice and put it in here?" I held out a large bowl to Fer, the sort of large bowl I had never needed when I only cooked for myself back home. Feeding my three contracted monsters in this world had required a serious upgrade to the capacity of my cooking utensils.
"Got you." Fer concentrated for a second and a big lump of ice fell into the bowl. "There you go."
"Ah, it’s too big..." I said, "Hold on, I'll buy an ice pick and break it up a little." I started to open Net Super but Fer interrupted.
"Too big?" When I nodded the lump of ice in the bowl suddenly shattered into lumps. I blinked as Fer asked, "Is that enough? I can break it up more if you like." I sometimes forget just how powerful Fer's magic was and how off-handedly he could use it. I supposed I wasn't really used to magic even after spending months in this world. Never mind, I got on with making dinner. Some carpaccio-style Giant Tarepo cold cuts to start with, I decided.
First I put salt and pepper on a large piece of Giant Tarepo meat and cooked it in a frying pan with olive oil until the outer surface was seared. I cooled the piece of meat down in the ice bath Fer had prepared to stop the centre of the meat cooking from the residual heat and wiped off the moisture with kitchen paper before cutting the lump into thin slices about 5mm thick. I laid them out on a plate and dressed them with ponzu citrus sauce before trying a nibble.
Oooh, it has a rich texture. The Giant Tarepo looked like an over-sized ostrich and its taste was similar to the ostrich meat I had eaten once before but it wasn't, on further reflection, exactly the same. It was more like lean beef with only a little fat marbled through it, a surprise since it was supposed to be bird meat. It was definitely tasty and went well with the ponzu sauce I had dressed the cold cuts with. Anyway, being a low-fat and firm-textured meat should make it a good candidate for deep frying, so cutlets were next. As for the cold cuts I'd save them for later. Or so I thought.
"Hoi, what are you doing with those?" Fer interrupted as I started to put the cold cuts away in my Item Box. "Pass the dish over here." Ah- the Empty Belly Army can't wait, it seems.
"I was just experimenting. I'm going to make different food for dinner and I was going to save this for later but do you want to try it now? It's nearly raw, you know."
"Hand it over." Fer ordered. Okay, okay. I took the Giant Tarepo cold cuts and divided them into three dishes before putting them down in front of Fer, Dora-chan and Sui-chan who immediately dived in.
"Oh, this food's texture is wonderful." was Fer's opinion after his share had been vacuumed up. I didn't understand what Fer was going on about, the carpaccio was basically raw in the middle so it was actually quite tough and chewy.
"This bitter taste's kinda refreshing, makes me wanna eat more of it." was Dora-chan's opinion. So you liked it too? The ponzu citrus sauce works well with meat cooked like this.
"Aruji-, seconds?-" Sui-chan had already finished her portion? I needed to hurry making the cutlets now all the cold cuts were gone. First, I put bread crumbs in a plastic bag and broke them up very fine, mixing in powdered cheese and herb salt. I pounded pieces of Giant Tarepo meat thin, to break up the sinews and dusted them with with salt and pepper before coating them with flour and beaten egg as a binder for the breadcrumb and cheese mix coating I had prepared earlier.
To cook the prepared cutlets I used a frying pan with about a centimetre of olive oil heated to near-boiling rather than deep-frying in regular cooking oil as I normally would for cutlets and kaarage. When the cutlets were crisp on the outside they were done. I didn't bother with extra seasoning since the breadcrumb coating included herb salt but I did add some lemon juice since it's an option for Milanese-style cutlets if you like that sort of thing.
I fried lots of cutlets, three each for Fer and Sui and one for Dora-chan, dishing them out on plates and putting them down so they could eat. "The juice coating is lemon, see how you like it?" I explained as Fer gave the cutlets a sour look before he gobbled them up.
"Umu," he declared, head tilted before he nodded. "Yeah, more like that."
"I'm fine with this too." Dora-chan agreed, working on his own dish. "But one is enough for me."
"Sui is also good with sour for seconds-." Sui-chan's dish was already empty, of course.
Okay okay. I was already frying more Giant Tarepo cutlets Milanese-style for Fer and Sui, including some for myself this time round. And of course, fried food meant... pssssh, glug glug glug. Oh yeah, beer is delicious. I meant to have some after eating the cold-cut carpaccio but on second thoughts beer goes better with hot food like these cutlets.
I bit into the cutlet, crispy and delicious with the cheesy taste from the crisp coating adding a noticeable tang to the meat. Beer to chase it down, glug glug glug and then another bite of cutlet. Ahhh, what was it about fried food and beer that make them work together so well? Oops, I forgot the lemon juice. I sprinkled a little on the rest of my cutlet and took another bite. Oh yes, the refreshing sharp taste combined with the lean meat juices, yummmm and then wash it down with more beer.
""Seconds"" I put down more cutlets for Fer and Sui, this time leaving the lemon juice off for a change, to see how they liked it. Both of them agreed they preferred the cutlets without the "sour stuff" as they announced they were full up. I had a second cutlet on bread with ketchup and shredded cabbage and that worked fine too.
I marked up the Giant Tarepo cutlets as a success and made a lot more of them while I had the ingredients to hand, putting them away hot in my Item Box to keep in reserve. After tidying up I put out Fer and Dora-chan's futons in the inn's stables and Sui and I returned to our room.
Sui was full up and went to sleep straight away but I had more to do. I wanted to see how the magic bag worked for marinating and soaking meat since Fer had said that time didn't stop for goods stored inside such a bag. My first experiment would be with meat marinated in miso. I diced up Orc and Bloody Horn Bull meat and put them in oversized plastic bags partially filled with miso and other ingredients. I deposited the bags into the large magic bag, intending to make miso-yaki dishes with the results the next morning.
I wasn't quite finished though, I still wanted to make a lot of minced meat with the excellent Mithril mincer Sui had made. I fed large pieces of Orc and Bloody Horn Bull meat into the mincer's hopper, amazed again at how little effort it took to turn the handle as the minced meat poured out. After producing a ridiculous amount of minced meat I tidied up, put everything away back in my Item Box and went to sleep.
Well, what should I make for dinner today? It would be Giant Tarepo meat, of course. Oddly enough I had actually eaten ostrich meat previously. One time I was out eating dinner in an izakaya and ostrich meat was on the menu. I asked for it because it was unusual to see something like that listed. My recollection was that it was quite delicious, a lean red meat not typical of bird meat's flavour and texture. Now I had the Giant Tarepo meat to hand I decided I'd try to make the same sort of thing I had back then, seared ostrich meat in a cutlet. I should add that ostrich meat can be eaten raw like a Korean dish, seasoned yukhoe-style with a raw egg or even as Italian-style carpaccio, sliced thinly after being cooked very rare and then coated in sauce. The carpaccio option was tempting but thinking about it a little more the seared cutlet route meant beer as an accompaniment and that settled it, seared cutlets it would be.
Yosh, I started with getting ingredients from the Net Super. I bought sour ponzu sauce to start with, planning to treat the Giant Tarepo meat like pork. The cutlet would be cooked Milanese style, I decided so I'd need flour and herb salt, eggs, bread crumbs and powdered cheese and of course olive oil because, well, Italian? Bellissimo! (about the only word of Italian I knew...)
Oh, and beer. Don't forget that. I assembled the ingredients for the cutlets under the watchful eyes of the Gluttonous Trio and quickly changed my mind -- I'd first make some carpaccio-style cold cuts and store them in my Item Box for later. I'd make the cutlets afterwards.
"Is Fer able to do Ice magic?" I asked. I vaguely remembered Ice magic was listed on his Status but...
"Nuuuu, Ice magic? I can do it." Fer replied.
"Well, can you make a little ice and put it in here?" I held out a large bowl to Fer, the sort of large bowl I had never needed when I only cooked for myself back home. Feeding my three contracted monsters in this world had required a serious upgrade to the capacity of my cooking utensils.
"Got you." Fer concentrated for a second and a big lump of ice fell into the bowl. "There you go."
"Ah, it’s too big..." I said, "Hold on, I'll buy an ice pick and break it up a little." I started to open Net Super but Fer interrupted.
"Too big?" When I nodded the lump of ice in the bowl suddenly shattered into lumps. I blinked as Fer asked, "Is that enough? I can break it up more if you like." I sometimes forget just how powerful Fer's magic was and how off-handedly he could use it. I supposed I wasn't really used to magic even after spending months in this world. Never mind, I got on with making dinner. Some carpaccio-style Giant Tarepo cold cuts to start with, I decided.
First I put salt and pepper on a large piece of Giant Tarepo meat and cooked it in a frying pan with olive oil until the outer surface was seared. I cooled the piece of meat down in the ice bath Fer had prepared to stop the centre of the meat cooking from the residual heat and wiped off the moisture with kitchen paper before cutting the lump into thin slices about 5mm thick. I laid them out on a plate and dressed them with ponzu citrus sauce before trying a nibble.
Oooh, it has a rich texture. The Giant Tarepo looked like an over-sized ostrich and its taste was similar to the ostrich meat I had eaten once before but it wasn't, on further reflection, exactly the same. It was more like lean beef with only a little fat marbled through it, a surprise since it was supposed to be bird meat. It was definitely tasty and went well with the ponzu sauce I had dressed the cold cuts with. Anyway, being a low-fat and firm-textured meat should make it a good candidate for deep frying, so cutlets were next. As for the cold cuts I'd save them for later. Or so I thought.
"Hoi, what are you doing with those?" Fer interrupted as I started to put the cold cuts away in my Item Box. "Pass the dish over here." Ah- the Empty Belly Army can't wait, it seems.
"I was just experimenting. I'm going to make different food for dinner and I was going to save this for later but do you want to try it now? It's nearly raw, you know."
"Hand it over." Fer ordered. Okay, okay. I took the Giant Tarepo cold cuts and divided them into three dishes before putting them down in front of Fer, Dora-chan and Sui-chan who immediately dived in.
"Oh, this food's texture is wonderful." was Fer's opinion after his share had been vacuumed up. I didn't understand what Fer was going on about, the carpaccio was basically raw in the middle so it was actually quite tough and chewy.
"This bitter taste's kinda refreshing, makes me wanna eat more of it." was Dora-chan's opinion. So you liked it too? The ponzu citrus sauce works well with meat cooked like this.
"Aruji-, seconds?-" Sui-chan had already finished her portion? I needed to hurry making the cutlets now all the cold cuts were gone. First, I put bread crumbs in a plastic bag and broke them up very fine, mixing in powdered cheese and herb salt. I pounded pieces of Giant Tarepo meat thin, to break up the sinews and dusted them with with salt and pepper before coating them with flour and beaten egg as a binder for the breadcrumb and cheese mix coating I had prepared earlier.
To cook the prepared cutlets I used a frying pan with about a centimetre of olive oil heated to near-boiling rather than deep-frying in regular cooking oil as I normally would for cutlets and kaarage. When the cutlets were crisp on the outside they were done. I didn't bother with extra seasoning since the breadcrumb coating included herb salt but I did add some lemon juice since it's an option for Milanese-style cutlets if you like that sort of thing.
I fried lots of cutlets, three each for Fer and Sui and one for Dora-chan, dishing them out on plates and putting them down so they could eat. "The juice coating is lemon, see how you like it?" I explained as Fer gave the cutlets a sour look before he gobbled them up.
"Umu," he declared, head tilted before he nodded. "Yeah, more like that."
"I'm fine with this too." Dora-chan agreed, working on his own dish. "But one is enough for me."
"Sui is also good with sour for seconds-." Sui-chan's dish was already empty, of course.
Okay okay. I was already frying more Giant Tarepo cutlets Milanese-style for Fer and Sui, including some for myself this time round. And of course, fried food meant... pssssh, glug glug glug. Oh yeah, beer is delicious. I meant to have some after eating the cold-cut carpaccio but on second thoughts beer goes better with hot food like these cutlets.
I bit into the cutlet, crispy and delicious with the cheesy taste from the crisp coating adding a noticeable tang to the meat. Beer to chase it down, glug glug glug and then another bite of cutlet. Ahhh, what was it about fried food and beer that make them work together so well? Oops, I forgot the lemon juice. I sprinkled a little on the rest of my cutlet and took another bite. Oh yes, the refreshing sharp taste combined with the lean meat juices, yummmm and then wash it down with more beer.
""Seconds"" I put down more cutlets for Fer and Sui, this time leaving the lemon juice off for a change, to see how they liked it. Both of them agreed they preferred the cutlets without the "sour stuff" as they announced they were full up. I had a second cutlet on bread with ketchup and shredded cabbage and that worked fine too.
I marked up the Giant Tarepo cutlets as a success and made a lot more of them while I had the ingredients to hand, putting them away hot in my Item Box to keep in reserve. After tidying up I put out Fer and Dora-chan's futons in the inn's stables and Sui and I returned to our room.
Sui was full up and went to sleep straight away but I had more to do. I wanted to see how the magic bag worked for marinating and soaking meat since Fer had said that time didn't stop for goods stored inside such a bag. My first experiment would be with meat marinated in miso. I diced up Orc and Bloody Horn Bull meat and put them in oversized plastic bags partially filled with miso and other ingredients. I deposited the bags into the large magic bag, intending to make miso-yaki dishes with the results the next morning.
I wasn't quite finished though, I still wanted to make a lot of minced meat with the excellent Mithril mincer Sui had made. I fed large pieces of Orc and Bloody Horn Bull meat into the mincer's hopper, amazed again at how little effort it took to turn the handle as the minced meat poured out. After producing a ridiculous amount of minced meat I tidied up, put everything away back in my Item Box and went to sleep.
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