[You gain the traits, stats, and experiences contained in the Essence.]
[You gain the experience of a Dasmurian chef.]
The acquisition of “experience.”
When I first heard the word, I had no idea what it meant.
“So this is what it meant.”
A meaning both simple and intuitive.
Right now, I was in the state of being a “Dasmurian chef.”
“Then... shall we step outside.”
“‘I’”... no.
The chef of Dasmur opened his mouth, then moved his body and went out of the building.
“...Huh?”
And when he stepped outside—
The scenery that spread before us
was, to me, quite a shock.
“This... is the original Dasmur?”
I recalled the dungeon I had experienced.
The landscape of [Erosion Abyss – Dasmur].
Monsters that cannot adapt to our world’s environment.
They terraform our world into one similar to theirs—that’s what a dungeon was, or so they said.
If I’m not misremembering what the status window explained back then,
I had only one thing to say.
“Yeah right—what a scam.”
Water, turbid and twisted.
A dark city where not a single speck of light entered save the moonlight.
On ground drowned in water, starving monsters prowled.
That was the [Erosion Abyss Dasmur] I went through.
By contrast,
the vista spread before my eyes now—
“Beautiful.”
An expanse of transparent blue sea stretching to the horizon.
All manner of marine life moved freely throughout the waters.
Here and there, ivory buildings of sacred, beautiful design had been raised upon the sea.
Each and every one, as lovely as a work of art.
A vast moonlight softly embraced those buildings.
A “dungeon” is, without a doubt...
a space meant to remake Earth into the same environment as their world.
In other words, a place where terraforming is underway.
“And the dungeon I went through was trying to make this environment?”
The name might be the same,
but the landscape looked like nothing but an entirely different world.
Yet, looking closely,
there were hints scattered about that told me the two places were fundamentally alike.
“Those buildings.”
This side’s are far larger and far more beautiful—that is a difference.
But—
“The buildings erected at the dungeon’s core... the architectural style is the same.”
The placement of the pillars, the structure of the entrances,
even the decorations carved here and there—
very similar to what I saw inside the dungeon.
“A landscape of a complete otherworld...”
Not long ago,
by entering a Gate called [Heavenly Mountain Martial Hall], I had seen a world beyond ours.
But that place had been devastated, with only a single mountain left standing.
Whereas here—
a complete, intact otherworld.
For me, it was a shock comparable to seeing the civilization of extraterrestrials.
Though that was only how it felt to me.
Sploosh...
To the Dasmurian chef, it seemed to be an everyday scene.
As if the beauty filling the surroundings stirred no sentiment at all,
he set off, walking somewhere.
After walking for a while—
[Wow! A Sea Giant!]
The Dasmurian chef, trudging on in silence.
From afar came the noisy shout of someone who had seen him.
My gaze slid over.
There, small creatures were swimming in the sea.
“No. They aren’t small.”
Only then did I catch on.
“I’m big.”
The chef whose body I was riding right now—
similar to the [Pontiff of the Deep Ones] I met in the dungeon...
No, bigger still—a truly colossal giant.
“A Sea Giant, he says. There wasn’t a single one in our sea!”
“As expected from a country-sea bumpkin, making a fuss.”
“W-what was that...!?”
“That’s not just any Sea Giant. That’s the chef of the Temple.”
“...!”
Watching the cutesy-looking sea creatures chattering,
I even found them a little cute.
More surprising, however, was the size of the body I was in.
“Those little ones are probably about human-sized.”
Judging by that scale,
the one I was possessing now had to be at least over ten meters tall.
“The Pontiff said it back then... that the dungeon was too cramped for their species to grow properly.”
The ones I met in the dungeon were at most a little over two meters tall.
If they grew under normal conditions,
they were a species that easily surpassed ten meters.
After that,
the chef kept walking somewhere.
And shortly after,
he arrived at the most colossal of all the buildings in sight.
And
at its entrance—
[Ho. A precious one has come.]
A giant ten meters tall.
A being that made even a “Dasmurian” look small.
“Big.”
Would this be what it feels like if a skyscraper bent down and walked around?
That colossal.
“...A turtle?”
It was a turtle.
“Calling me precious... enough joking.”
Its face looked so sharp and steadfast you could call it a dragon and be believed,
and the torso within the shell strangely gleamed with a sacred light,
but—
“A turtle.”
Anyway,
a turtle.
That gigantic turtle, body half-submerged in the seawater,
offered a greeting to the Dasmurian chef.
“Your Excellency, the Sacred Beast, you seem in fine health as ever. I’m glad.”
[I do nothing but loaf about with no duties to perform. There is no reason for my health to decline.]
“While you carry out your charge to guard the Temple, what are you saying.”
A Sacred Beast, indeed.
It was a presence whose oppressive force merited such a name.
“Even if our entire Legion threw in everything we had... could we even leave a scratch on that thing?”
We’ve grown quite strong ourselves, so perhaps we could leave a nick.
But a mere nick at best.
It wouldn’t be strange if our unit were annihilated—such was the presence it radiated.
“Then, please go in.”
“Yes. And thank you for your watch as well, Your Excellency.”
Finishing a brief exchange with the Sacred Beast,
the chef moved inward.
The largest building nearby.
And seeing that a Sacred Beast guarded it—
“This must be the Temple.”
After going inside
and proceeding further, much further in—
“...You have come.”
“I greet His Holiness.”
There awaited
a presence familiar to me.
[The Pontiff of the Deep Ones]
A giant over five meters tall.
It was the Pontiff of the Deep Ones.
“The one whose breath I personally ended...”
However,
the atmosphere was very different.
When we faced each other then,
to the Pontiff, I was nothing but a miscreant who devoured his kin.
The dungeon’s environment itself could hardly be called splendid.
Thanks to that, the Pontiff back then was—how to put it—
a fearsome monster steeped in a sinister air.
Whereas now—
“He looks gentle.”
Perhaps it was because I was larger than the Pontiff.
What sat before me was merely shrunken and wrinkled with age,
seeming nothing more than an elderly man of kindly temper.
“It is not yet mealtime. For what business have you come.”
“Well, in truth, I have something to convey.”
“Mm?”
“...It seems we will have to change the menu to healthy food starting tomorrow.”
“...Hoh!”
A world-collapsing look overtook the Pontiff’s face.
Seeing that face,
I remembered the last thing he had said.
“It’s been a while since I had food that was passably pleasing.”
He had spoken as if he hadn’t eaten anything delicious in a long time.
Perhaps from this point his meals shifted fully to health food.
Because his palate was exceptionally exacting,
even the effects of my cooking hardly took on him.
And now to be told he would eat only patient’s fare—
“No wonder he’d get depressed.”
At any rate,
the chef I was possessing
seemed to hold a court-chef-like post, responsible for the Pontiff’s meals.
“Now, now. Are you serious.”
“Yes. I will care as best I can for taste... but it will inevitably fall short of what it has been.”
“Eating has been the sole pleasure of old age. Ngh.”
Seeing his disappointment,
the chef must have felt pity as well.
“In exchange... I will do my utmost to serve Your Holiness one last, supreme /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ meal.”
“Truly? I am deeply grateful.”
A promise of a last supper.
At those words, the Pontiff rejoiced like a child.
****
After that,
I continued watching the chef’s memories.
Though called a court chef,
“Is the work basically like an office worker’s?”
He commuted to the Temple, cooked,
and when the duties were done, he went home.
A life of repeating that.
Nothing seemed special in that routine,
until a few days later—
“The request I asked you about last time has been approved.”
“Ooh... thank you!”
A small change occurred.
“It must have been a difficult petition...”
“What of it. For one who devoted his life to the Order—the Pontiff—the god was glad to grant it.”
“A gracious thing indeed. Truly.”
Come to think of it,
the chef, while going to and from work, had asked the Sacred Beast for something.
I had let it pass at the time,
but it must have been more important than I thought.
And
I soon learned what that request had been.
—Screeeech! Kek... Shaaaaa!!!!
As usual, the chef reported to the Temple’s kitchen.
At the center of that kitchen,
something like a grotesque tentacled monster was twitching, spewing dreadful slime.
“What the hell is that.”
As I gaped in horror,
[Chef’s Eyes] activated.
[Parasite of the Sacred Beast]
[A byproduct of the Sacred Beast that guards Dasmur.]
[Among all ingredients existing within Dasmur, this ranks at the very top. It is especially supreme for restoring vitality. It is an ingredient permitted only to the rarest few—heroes of the age or the highest rulers, above all those who rendered the greatest service. Feed it to the sick and illness vanishes; feed it to the ordinary and their lifespan is said to double...]
An immense block of explanatory text went on,
but I had no leisure to read it.
“Ugh.”
I was the one in our unit who first insisted we try eating monster meat,
but even I thought, surely we aren’t supposed to eat that.
It looked like something out of a cuisine from twisted netherworlds.
“I never thought I’d live to handle an ingredient like this...!”
What made it even more absurd—
while I was retching inside,
the Dasmurian chef felt deeply honored.
“With this, it will greatly help His Holiness’s health.”
And so,
the [Dasmurian Chef] began to cook.
I had seen him cook a few times.
Being a being of another world, his cooking method was utterly unlike mine.
The process was fairly simple.
The chef placed his hand on the parasite that was oozing viscous slime, and—
“Nngh.”
let out a kiai.
“Hup...”
“Haaaaaat...!”
“Heu-uk!”
With quite peculiar shouts,
the chef strained, sweating cold sweat.
I had seen this sight several times,
and it still didn’t sit right with me.
“...This is supposed to be cooking?”
As a chef, I had some curiosity about another world’s cuisine,
but if this was what they showed as “cooking,”
how could it help me?
However—
today, that sight was a little different.
“Guhhh...!”
“Hrrrmp!!!”
“Kiiiiiiiiii!!!”
Strangely, he was putting far more spirit into it than usual.
To my eyes, it was just exerting more strength than normal,
so my thought—“And that’s supposed to be cooking?”—remained.
—Ding!
It didn’t take long to realize that thought was wrong.
[A culinary art of another world.]
[You have witnessed its ultimate.]
“...Huh?”
[Top-Tier Elemental Cuisine]
[Esoteric Ultimate — Water]
[Elemental cuisine is one branch within mana cuisine.]
[And among those, this is a technique that ranks at the very top.]
With a sudden chime,
messages filled my view.
[Chefs capable of handling mythic-grade or higher ingredients to perfection are, across all dimensions, by no means common.]
[In the world of Dasmur, where a unique environment has driven extreme development of elemental cuisine—]
[the chef who rose to the very pinnacle is one of those exceedingly rare greatest chefs.]
“...What is this.”
[You have experienced the methods of a chef who strides far, far ahead.]
[You gain a massive amount of experience.]
After surpassing level 30
and becoming a [War Chef],
my leveling speed had slowed noticeably.
Yet—
[Your level increases.]
My level
rose out of nowhere.
“Just by watching, my level goes up... that level of technique?”
...That [Kiiiiiiiiii!!!] just now?
