The Max Level Hero Has Returned!

Chapter 1402.1

- Don't overfeed her. She'll get sick.

Yuria reported the current situation through the comms device connected to Davey. “You'd never say that if you'd seen how much Myuu has been fussing, Gracious Savior!”

- Haah. Fine. I've heard she's been a picky eater lately. But don't people usually starve a picky eater?

“It's awful to be deprived of food, Gracious Savior. Even if you punish her, you should always make sure she never goes hungry.”

Yuria had been responsible for Myuu's education from the start, so Davey didn't interfere beyond that. However, given that the main reason for her fussiness was her monstrously refined palate, Davey was a little worried that she might become a second Yuria.

- More importantly, please take good care of those two. Since I haven't been paying enough attention as their guardian, I was worried they weren't eating well.

“Don't worry, Gracious Savior. Of course, I’ll extract some data in the process, but I’ll make sure to turn both of them into people who’ll eat well no matter the situation. Besides, there's the matter from before...”

- Don't worry about it too much. I trust you, so it’s fine as long as you're aware of it. But... you're not causing any trouble, are you?

“Come on, Gracious Savior! No way. Plus, even if trouble breaks out here, it's not going to affect the outside world. I'm just so happy that no ingredients have to go to waste.”

Hearing how satisfied Yuria sounded, Davey breathed a sigh of relief.

She sure was a mad psycho, and she'd requested the right to measure their psycho-emotional graphs as payment for the request, but it didn't seem like she intended to harm others beyond that.

Davey tried not to think about Myuu, who kept desperately insisting she'd never be picky again, or Kouna and Reina, whose cooking attempts kept failing so badly that they were starting to resort to increasingly ridiculous ideas.

- I can trust you... right? You're not hiding anything from me?

“Actually, those two are now almost to the point where they won't be called bad cooks anywhere, and I’ve only fed Myuu the things she picked out when she was being picky. So she'll definitely eat less than before, even if it's just from trauma...”

- Aren’t your methods a bit too extreme?

“Gracious Savior, you shouldn't think like that! You can't forget that Myuu’s nutritional balance has been slightly skewed since she started eating good food, so if I don't adjust it, she'll definitely cry and fuss about it later.”

Seeing even Yuria shake her head, Davey let out a disgruntled groan.

- Don't overdo it. Just take it easy. Oh, and...

“Yes, Gracious Savior?”

- I think I can get the ingredients you asked for soon. It shouldn't be too much longer

“Really?! I look forward to it. Uhuhuhu...”

The best reward for Yuria was to receive an ingredient she'd never seen before, especially one that was incredibly hard to get. Having to keep an extremely rare or one-of-a-kind ingredient without ever being able to use it would've been pure torture for her.

Therefore, the ability to input the data of her possessions into the virtual space and use them willy-nilly within it was a huge advantage. In fact, unlike in the past, requests for implementing cooking practice in virtual reality were apparently coming from the Sacred Group as well.

There were also military training requests, but Al Hajat and Hyun-Ah, as project leaders, were the ones to make the decisions for those kinds of matters. It wasn't an issue for Davey or Yuria to worry about.

“Oh, right, Gracious Savior. There's something else I have to tell you.”

- What is it?

“Professor Alice from Heins Academy sent a request asking if I’d consider starting a fellowship using an imitation of this system Willow made for research.”

- I saw it, but no.

They might be able to recreate the virtual space with magic, but only a small number of ultra-high-level mages could do that. Moreover, even if they did implement it, it’d clearly lack the sense of realism that the virtual space had.

“That's a shame. Then I’ll report the results later. On that note, a little more budget...”

The reply came before she could even finish.

- Alright, keep up the good work. I'll talk to you later.

“Aww! Gracious Savior!”

* * *

Davey couldn’t help but let out a sigh of relief after his call with Yuria. She seemed satisfied, but the virtual space Willow created was still unstable.

He had a feeling it’d probably leave Yuria with several side effects afterwards. Yet, at the same time, he figured she wouldn't use it for long enough to make them too severe.

“Well, that's one thing marked off my to-do list.”

The remaining issue was to slightly improve the image of the demon race. The plan was to achieve that using the content that was beginning to be released in the virtual space.

As Willow said, improving the demon race's public image was the top priority if they wanted to integrate them into human society without any problems. In that regard, Earth had better conditions than Tionis.

Besides, he figured that if he made good use of the virtual space Willow had created, changing people's perceptions would be easy.

“Davey, why do you look so annoying?”

“Perserque,” he calmly called out, turning to her.

Most of those who could cross over to Earth already knew she was the Demon King, which meant she was a demon.

“What ridiculous thing are you trying to get up to now?” She’d gotten tired of his meddling.

“Aside from Tionis, aren't you going to reveal your identity?”

Facing his question, she fell silent for a moment.

“I think it’ll be doable for you. I'm planning on making the demon race's existence known to a certain extent through the virtual space Willow created.”

She smiled faintly and stroked his cheek. “That wouldn't be a bad idea.”

“Willow created the virtual space partly for her own amusement, but also for your sake. She seems to have noticed what happened with Chef MacGuff this time.”

Davey figured she must've been disappointed in herself, so she probably pushed herself even harder. The process may have been a bit rushed, but he understood what she had been trying to accomplish.

Perserque glossed over it vaguely, remarking, “The opportunity will come someday.”

She figured she could just give a noncommittal reply, since actually revealing her identity on Earth would be far in the future.

“Oh, right. I forgot to mention something.” Davey chuckled as something finally occurred to him. “I don't remember whether I told Yuria that copying data into the virtual space slightly degrades the original ingredient.”

That was because the structure of the virtual space wasn't fully complete yet. Among the ingredients Yuria registered in a frenzy, there were quite a few that were hard to get. Whether she would give up quality for quantity, or vice versa, was her choice. Or at least, her semblance of choice.

“You remember everything without even trying; there's no way you forgot. I’m guessing you deliberately didn't tell her. What a liar,” Perserque said with a shake of her head.

* * *

People say there’s always a light at the end of the tunnel after several days of hardship.

On the first day, they successfully fixed Myuu's picky eating. A few days after that, Kouna’s and Reina's cooking skills had visibly improved.

Compared to the way they had initially hacked at ingredients like they were swinging swords, their culinary touch had become much more delicate.

Seeing that, Yuria started bringing out the expensive ingredients she had registered in the virtual space. The virtual space was still practically a blank slate, and Willow had told her to register the truly rare ingredients herself, which had made her doubtful for a bit, but it didn't matter.

The merit of being able to try repeatedly in various ways, even if the quality was slightly lower, was a huge draw for Yuria. Nothing made her happier than being able to use the same ingredients over and over instead of losing them after one failed attempt.

After multiple rounds of research, she clearly felt a sense of disconnect where the ingredients' natural flavor wasn't fully realized.

However, the most important thing for Yuria was the supreme taste the actual ingredients would provide to her after all the effort she was putting in. For that alone, she happily accepted even this unbearable sense of disconnect.

Then...

“Ahem. The time has finally come.”

Seeing the completed dish giving off an incredible aroma, all members of the Gourmet Research Society had sparkling eyes.

“Rinne’s taste data is heating. Rinne evaluates this as mouth-watering.”

“This is a supreme flavor that couldn't possibly be achieved without the perks of this place! It's the best dish I created after countless failures in the virtual space.”

The dish was vegetarian, but that didn't matter. The Gourmet Research Society didn't discriminate between vegetarian and non-vegetarian food; as long as it was delicious, it was fine.

They had gone to great lengths to get the ingredients for scanning to use in the dish, spending a significant portion of their group’s allocated budget.

It was shocking that such a large budget was spent just on food, but no one cared. All their attention was focused on the golden-hued dish placed before them.

“We can't forget the past! Let's think about all the struggles we went through to get this ingredient.”

Marky and Rinne's expressions weren't good, as if the terrible memories had resurfaced.

“We overcame that adversity, and this is the culmination of all our work after the final preparation.”

Yuria picked up her fork with a smile. At the same time, Rinne and Marky's eyes lit up, and they both reached out to poke at the food on the plate. They all put it in their mouths, one after the other.

‘The taste, even with the extreme disconnect, is sure to be impressive. There were plenty of shortcomings, but it wasn’t difficult to account for that disconnect and draw out the ingredient's true flavor.’

She was certain it’d taste amazing.

“Aah. I must’ve lived for this day.” With those words, Yuria gently placed the golden-hued food into her mouth.

Rinne and Marky followed.

However...

“Ugh...” Marky was the first to react.

Yuria froze, and Rinne, with an expressionless face, slumped down and spoke in a voice mixed with a mechanical tremble, “Error... Error...”

Yuria was the most shocked. “T-this can't be...”

In fact, she was so flabbergasted that even those few words were all she could manage at first. She was utterly stunned by the fact that she herself had created a dish so disgusting that it brutally assaulted her taste buds.

“It feels like eating chalk,” she lamented.

“Rinne evaluates this as a terrible failure, beyond the point of tastelessness. Rinne evaluates this lowly...”

“T-that's impossible! Even with much lower-quality ingredients, it tasted much better!”

Yuria’s eyes trembled non-stop. She had ensured there was definitely no mistake! She had done plenty of research beforehand, and there had been nothing wrong with the cooking process itself.

The aroma was there. It also had the distinct taste it had shown in the virtual space. Yet the terrible dish before her, which seemed to have lost all the fundamental essence of the ingredient itself, was impossible to eat.

No matter how bad food tasted, food was precious.

She tried to eat it somehow, but she couldn't.

“Ugh...”