Cooking with Wild Game (LN) - Volume 5 - Chapter 2.1

Chapter 2: The Fifth Day—Roaring Business

1

It was my fifth day of business, and just as planned, we added a second stall.

However, despite the fact that Lala and Sheera Ruu were supposed to come to the post town directly from the Ruu settlement, there was no sign of them even when we started setting up for business in our usual spot.

“They’re late... Won’t it be a big commotion again if they don’t show up soon...?”

There were even more customers surrounding the stalls than yesterday, and as always the guards with their spears at the ready looked seriously on edge.

“It’ll be fine. But let’s start getting ready as slowly as possible.”

As I gazed over at the unmanned stall to the side, I started dicing up the tino for the giba burgers.

The plan was to borrow the pot for the myamuu giba from the Ruu clan, and I had asked Sheera Ruu to make the poitan for that stall, so it wouldn’t be possible to open till they arrived.

As long as we were borrowing a pot anyway, there was no need for Lala and Sheera Ruu to come by way of the Fa house. In that way, we cut out the two hours needed for the round trip between the Ruu settlement and the Fa house, so I asked them to handle the gathering of firewood and baking of poitan using that time.

Thanks to that, I was able to prepare 60 of each meal for today, making for 120 in total.

Regardless of how things had gone so far, it was going to be difficult to sell that much. But with this, I should finally be able to remain here in the post town for the amount of time I had allotted.

If we spent the scheduled time of a little over five hours, just how many meals could we sell? I couldn’t stop myself from trembling just thinking about it.

“...If all of those sell, it will be 240 red coins... Just how many giba’s worth of horns and tusks would that be...?”

“If we’re talking horns and tusks from grown giba, it’d be exactly 20, right? But if we remove the expenses it would be 150 red coins, or roughly 13 giba worth.”

I had already at least calculated out that much.

Thinking of it from another angle, if we didn’t even sell a single meal it would be seven giba worth of losses, which I needed to calculate in advance, too.

“13 giba in a single day... That’s a big enough number to just make you sort of go numb, isn’t it?”

“I mean, it’ll be tricky to sell all of them, though. You shouldn’t get your hopes up that high.”

“Really...? I have a harder time imagining having any left over, though...”

As we had that conversation, we slowly and steadily prepared. After a long while, I suddenly heard a voice energetically shout out, “Let us through!” from the other side of the crowd.

Our reinforcements had arrived.

“Sorry for the wait! We thought we were arriving just in time, but were we late?”

It was the third daughter of the main Ruu house, Lala Ruu. I shot a smile at the girl with her pure red hair in a ponytail and said, “You’re fine. We probably just arrived early. From tomorrow on, let’s meet up behind the inn.”

“I see. Got it. Ugh, this is heavy... Can we leave the pot here?”

“Yeah, that’s good. Thanks a ton. You too, Sheera Ruu.”

“It’s nothing. I’m perfectly fine with this much weight,” the girl from one of the branch families responded with a smile. Her blackish-brown hair was done up behind her head, and she had a bit of a fleeting feel about her for a woman of the forest’s edge.

The baked poitan were inside the pot, wrapped up in a cloth. And they were carrying the firewood Lala Ruu had gathered over the course of two hours on their backs, split between the two of them.

Sheera Ruu had some trouble in terms of strength and stamina, but if she could transport this much luggage, then she didn’t quite fit my image of a frail girl. She just wasn’t strong by the standards of the able-bodied women of the forest’s edge.

By the way, they were both clad for the post town with veils and shawls, and Sheera Ruu had a beautifully-colored skirt that went down to her ankles, wonderfully complementing her neat and tidy appearance.

“Alright. We’ll be doing things like we discussed yesterday, so first up Vina and Sheera Ruu will be handling the giba burgers, while Lala Ruu will be together with me on the myamuu giba.”

“Yup,” “Got it,” “Alright,” they all replied.

We were surrounded by such a big crowd, and this was Sheera and Lala Ruu’s first time doing the job, but they showed no signs of hesitating. It must have been down to how the people of the forest’s edge were used to the townsfolk staring at them.

While we waited for the pots to heat up, Sheera Ruu and I each started dicing vegetables in our respective stalls. I had visited the Ruu settlement yesterday to explain everything in advance, so the two newcomers were working perfectly smoothly.

“For now, I’ll be in charge of the cooking over here. Lala Ruu, you remember how to finish them up after they’re cooked, right?”

“Yeah. And if Vina Ruu can do it, it should be easy for me.”

That was a pretty difficult comment for me to reply to.

But for the sake of Vina Ruu’s honor, just let me note that she wasn’t especially clumsy or anything. She may have burned the meat before while manning the stove, but at least here in the post town, she hadn’t made any significant mistakes.

“Still, there sure are a ton of people. I can definitely see how you could make several hundred coins with things like this,” Lala Ruu said undaunted while looking out over the dozens of customers.

On the third day it was less than 20, yesterday on the fourth day it was just over 30, and today on the fifth day... It looked to be a bit over 40. The folks from Sym were just silently standing there, while the Jagar group was making a commotion. Any passersby who knew nothing of what was going on may just think that the antagonistic folks from Sym and Jagar were breaking the law and were about to start fighting.

“Alright, looks like that should be about good.”

I went ahead and tossed the sliced aria into the freshly heated pot.

It was about 15 people’s worth, or seven aria in total.

That alone was enough to get the Jagar group all worked up, and when I went ahead and added just under 30 kilos of giba meat, they were full on cheering.

“Whoa, that smells good... So this is that myamuu stuff?”

“That’s right. It’s not all that expensive of an ingredient, so I definitely think you could buy some for the Ruu house if you’d like,” I responded to Lala Ruu with a smile, stirring with a wooden spatula all the while so that the large quantity of meat and aria wouldn’t burn.

Lala Ruu’s eyes, blue like the color of the ocean, blinked in surprise.

“Asuta... How should I put it...? You look ridiculously happy right now, don’t you?”

“Huh? R-Really?”

“Yeah. You always look like you’re enjoying yourself when you’re cooking, but this may be the first time I’ve seen you that happy.”

As she said that, Lala Ruu also bared her teeth in a joyful smile.

I got the impression that Lala Ruu had some serious insight and sensitivity, so I couldn’t help but feel embarrassed hearing her say that.

So on the fifth day of business, I finally had enough leeway to enjoy myself, huh? It was true that yesterday I was just praying there wouldn’t be an incident, so I was more on edge than anything else.

As that thought ran through my head, I tossed in the marinade to finish things off, causing the aroma of myamuu and fruit wine to explode forth, stirring up the folks from Jagar even further.

“H-Hey, come on already! Is the food still not ready?” one of the guards asked, having run over looking all flustered.

“Yes, it just needs one more push. I think they can start lining up soon.”

I wasn’t especially feeling nervous or anything, so I answered him with a smile.

The folks from Jagar certainly were all worked up, but nobody seemed to be going overboard or trying to pick a fight with the group from Sym or anything. In fact, from looking at them, I even seemed to sense a sort of leadership at work.

The incident from two days ago was due to the food running out. On top of that, they saw the group from Sym beating them to the punch, so their frustrations came exploding forth.

The folks from Jagar seemed pretty frank about their feelings, but right now their faces were just plain sparkling with joy. A good number of them were definitely on the older side, yet they all wore innocent smiles.

Of course I’d feel happy with my customers showing me faces like that, I thought, then I turned to face the giba burger stall.

“Vina Ruu, are you good over there?”

“Yup, just perfect.”

“Alright, then we’re open for business! Please order in groups of five each!” I yelled out just loud enough that I wouldn’t get scolded by the guards.

The first group to come up to the stand were from Jagar.

“Lala Ruu, you can accept the coins and hand over the completed dishes, right?”

“I’m on it.”

Lala Ruu wrapped up the cooked meat and diced tino in baked poitan, then handed them over one after another.

The next five were from Sym, and then it was a group from Jagar again. And in no time at all, we had used up that 15 meals worth of meat.

“Sorry! Please hold on just a moment!”

The fire was still lit under the pot, so I chucked some fresh aria and meat on in.

As that heated up I looked over to see how the neighboring stall was doing, only to hear Vina Ruu happily proclaim, “Sorry, please hold on just a moment...”

So they had already sold 20 meals over there, huh?

Added to the meals we sold, that made for 35 in total... And yet, the crowd still didn’t feel like it had thinned all that much.

“Sheera Ruu, are you alright?”

“Yes. At least for now...”

As she was the most skilled of the group, I left the preparations for the supplemental tarapa sauce to Sheera Ruu.

And from what I could see, she didn’t seem to be making any mistakes.

In the meantime the meat had finished cooking on our side, so I moved it over to a plate and called out, “Vina Ruu, switch with me.”

I then moved on over to the giba burger stall, entrusting the creation of the myamuu giba to Vina Ruu.

“Good work. Yeah, this looks good.”

The pure red tarapa sauce was giving off a pleasant simmering sound as it boiled.

When I tossed in crumbled rock salt and pico leaves, a customer called out, “Hey,” in a low tone.

It was a somewhat younger man from Jagar. In all likelihood, he was one of the members of the construction group who had been stopping by every day since three days ago.

“It’s still not ready? It’s just awful to be teasing me at this point, isn’t it?”

“My apologies! It’ll be just a little bit longer!” I replied while bowing my head, then I added the patties from the leather bag into the tarapa sauce. Now all that was left was to heat them, then they would be ready.

“This is amazing... I’d heard about it, but I still didn’t think it would be this bustling,” Sheera Ruu quietly whispered. “And I’m truly grateful to you for giving me this work, Asuta. Now I can earn coins and relieve Shin Ruu of some of his burden.”

“Ah, don’t thank me. Mia Lea and Donda Ruu were the ones to choose you. I just asked for a woman who was good at manning the stove.”

It wasn’t flattery or anything. No, I felt Sheera Ruu’s cooking skills really were foremost among the people of the Ruu settlement. The only ones who could compete with her were probably Reina and Mia Lea Ruu.

When she joined our forces, a secret ambition started taking shape in my mind. Sometime in the future, I’d like to see if I could entrust the management of one of the stalls entirely to the Ruu clan.

If that happened, then the Ruu clan could be earning just as many coins as the Fa clan. I mean, I just couldn’t help but feel bad about paying just six red coins when I was even leaving the poitan baking up to them.

Of course, I may need to keep an eye on things for several months before I can even consider that.

At any rate, the patties had heated up plenty, so I turned towards Vina Ruu again and said, “Alright, Vina Ruu, I’ll leave this up to you! Ah... We’re going to start selling again, so please hold on just a moment!”

With that I returned to the myamuu giba stall, only to find that almost all the meat I had added was already gone.

But looking around, the crowd of customers seemed like it was finally starting to thin out.

“Lala Ruu, can I leave it to you to finish up and sell the dishes?”

“Yeah, that’s fine. I mean, I’m probably better at this than Vina.”

This younger sister sure didn’t show any mercy.

However, it was also hard to imagine anyone more reliable.

“Well then, I’ll leave that up to you while I make up another batch.”

From a quick glance, it looked like we had around ten customers left over here.

However, the customers who had already made their purchases were standing in the back happily smacking their lips, so it was no less lively.

Still, 30 customers first thing in the morning, huh...? Things are almost going a little too well, I’d say.

There was also the fact that it took time to cook up more giba burgers, so the customers who couldn’t wait any longer flowed over to the myamuu giba stand.

Still, thirty meals was exactly half of what we had prepared. And the giba burger stall had customers lining up for those 20 meals we just added, so they seemed to be selling pretty well, too.

At this rate, would we really last the remaining five hours?

As that question ran through my head, a tremble ran down my back.

“Two please, Asuta!” a voice called out, from a dark brown haired head in the middle of all the adults. It was my usual little regular, Tara.

“Hey there, thanks for your continued business. You just need two today?”

“Yeah! For the guys from the cloth and pot stores! I’m going to have a giba burger!”

“So is Dora having a giba burger too, then?” I asked while preparing the dishes for the customers from Sym and Jagar who got there first, but Tara’s eyebrows drooped a bit, making her look a little sad.

“Dad said he’s not having any today. He’s been all down since this morning.”

“Huh? Is he not feeling well?”

“I don’t know. He said he’d probably be alright again tomorrow, though...” she replied, her gaze cast downwards and looking sad. But then, Lala Ruu thrust out the myamuu giba towards her.

“Here. Two of them will be four red coins.”

“Thanks! Ah... Nice to meet you!”

“Huh? Ah, yeah. You too...”

Lala Ruu was clearly trying to figure the girl out, but Tara just shot her a bright smile back.

It would seem that Tara felt a lot less fear of the people of the forest’s edge nowadays. In the back of my mind, I seriously wished she hadn’t run into Mida Suun yesterday.

“Tara, I’ll stop by again to buy vegetables once we’re done here with the shop. So give my regards to Dora and let him know, alright?”

“Yeah! Okay, see you later!”

With that, Tara took off running.

The next person to show up was Aldas, from the construction group.

“Hey there. I ended up oversleeping a bit today... Ooh, so this is your new dish, huh?”

“Ah, welcome! Thanks for your continued business. Would you like to try a sample?”

Now that I thought about it, everybody had just gone ahead and ordered the myamuu giba, so I had completely forgotten to even put out the plate of samples.

“No need. But go ahead and prepare a few for these guys,” Aldas said, moving his large body aside and letting four grim-faced folks from Jagar step forward.

I got so many customers each day that I was having trouble remembering all their faces... but I definitely recognized the stout older man at the front.

He was the guy in charge of the construction group, who they called Pops.

This was the man who had completely rejected my giba burgers back on our second day of business.

“...Thank you so much for coming!”

“Hmph. Aldas wouldn’t stop begging me, so I didn’t have much of a choice. But no matter how you flavor it, giba meat’s still giba meat, right? Why’d I have to come all the way out here just to have such a lousy meal? Seriously, what a pain...”

Apparently his sharp tongue still fired off like a machine gun.

Then, with a stern look gleaming in his green eyes, he looked over the surroundings.

“Who’d have thought this world would be this full of idiots with no taste whatsoever? If they like giba so much, then they should all go chase them around the forest. Hey, I’m so hungry I could die. Let’s hurry up and get this farce over with so I can go get some karon to eat.”

“Right! Please hold on just a moment!”

I pulled the plate for samples on out of the bag, moved over just a bit of cooked meat that was still giving off steam, then placed down four toothpicks and held it out.

“Hmph,” Pops snorted, but he was the first one to reach out.

As I watched that out of the corner of my eye, I prepared Aldas’s myamuu giba. And knowing nothing of the circumstances, Lala Ruu was shooting Pops’s group a dubious look.

Without even a pause, Pops tossed the chunk of meat on into his mouth.

The other three followed in turn, their faces making it clear they were only doing it because they were pressured into it.

And while that was going on, Aldas happily shouted out, “Whoa, this is delicious! I already couldn’t get enough of the smell, but tasting it, this is a work of art! I thought you would never be able to come up with a tastier dish than that tarapa one, so I had really underestimated it. From tomorrow on, I’ll be buying this one.”

“Thank you!”

There were still customers from Sym behind them, so I couldn’t afford to take a break from my work.

I stole a peek over at Pops while secretly feeling all anxious inside, but his expression looked every bit as displeased as always as he chewed away.

“...It’s no good,” one of the youths from Jagar muttered.

I felt my heart skip a beat.

“Yeah, I agree,” an older man from Jagar agreed, shaking his head.

So... it was no good after all, huh?

It had been three days. I hadn’t seen any other folks from Jagar looking so openly displeased since then, but I suppose some things were just plain impossible.

But even so, it was thanks to their disapproval that I had set my sights on strong seasonings to begin with. And I thought this myamuu giba really was the perfect dish for customers from the west who were resistant to the idea of giba meat.

It was a shame that I wasn’t able to satisfy Pops and the rest, but it would probably be difficult to do so at this point even if I fixated on that. Feeling a bit more lonesome than frustrated, I went to say, “My apologies.”

However, Aldas beat me to it and said loudly, “What was no good? Isn’t it crazy delicious?” with a big grin on his face. He really looked euphoric as he bit into his myamuu giba.

The one older gentleman who hadn’t talked till now gave a strained smile and patted Pops on the shoulder.

“Pops, let’s give up already. It’s just no good at this point.”

Even so, Pops remained silent. Or more accurately, he just kept on chewing.

Was it some sort of appeal to the fact that the meat was too hard to chew through or something?

I’d be very grateful if he told me exactly what he was dissatisfied with... Thinking that, I started to lean forward, but then the youth who had muttered that it was no good suddenly approached the stall.

Then, he held out two red coins.

“I didn’t like that mushy meat, but this was delicious. I’ll buy one, too.”

“Huh...? Ah, r-right!”

I hurriedly grabbed a baked poitan, and then another of the men from Jagar held out coins.

“Me too. Back then I said it wasn’t good, but honestly, I never liked tarapa to start with. But I didn’t think the giba meat itself was all that bad.”

“T-Thank you.”

As I prepared another myamuu giba, I stole another glance at Pops.

The man who had patted Pops on the shoulder still had an awkward grin on his face, and now he was scratching his head with his thick fingers.

“I didn’t like the smell of that meat from before, but that didn’t bother me at all with the stuff I ate just now. Hey, is that seriously giba meat, too?”

“Yes. It’s a different cut and it’s seasoned differently, but it’s giba meat.”

“I see. Well, it’s true that it’s definitely not karon, and it doesn’t seem like kimyuus either. Yeah, holding out is no good. I admit defeat... Hey, I’ll have one too.”

“Thank you,” I started to say.

But then, Pops angrily yelled out, “Give me a break!” and drowned me out.

Then, he stomped on up and slapped his palms down on my counter.

“Hey, just what in the world is going on here?!”

“W-What do you mean...?”

“The smell, taste, and even texture are totally different, aren’t they? As if I could believe something as crazy as this being giba meat, too.”

Pops’s voice soon returned to its usual volume, but he was looking seriously displeased.

“Um... The dish from before was made by chopping up meat and balling it back together, so that’s why the texture is different. And in regards to the taste and smell, I used a fruit wine and myamuu marinade to combat the strong quirkiness of giba meat,” I replied while making up the dishes for the three who had paid me.

“So this sweetness is from fruit wine, huh? I see. Now that you mention it, sugar is more valuable than salt here in Genos, isn’t it?” the other oldtimer besides Pops replied. “Most places in Genos use lots of salt as seasoning. So I’m sure lots of folks will appreciate this sweet and salty flavor... At the very least, I love it.”

“T-Thank you.”

The three other than Pops were all giving embarrassed-looking smiles. It was like they were thinking some kid had gone and got one over on them.

As for Pops... He was still standing right in front of the stall, looking like a bundle of umbrage.

“...Pops. I don’t know what you’re so dissatisfied about, but if you keep on standing planted there, you’ll interfere with business, won’t you?”

“Ah, it’s still alright for the moment. It looks like I’ve run out of other customers.”

It would be hard to increase my menu any further, but if I could improve the dish then I’d certainly like to do so. So if Pops had an opinion to give, I’d love to hear it.

In the meantime, Lala Ruu handed over the completed myamuu giba to the other three men from Jagar.

“Ah, this is seriously tasty!”

“Yeah, it’s so good.”

“Who would have thought giba meat was so delicious? I can’t imagine anyone believing us when we go back home and tell them about this.”

The three men all had truly joyful smiles on their faces, just like their comrades.

Then, hearing those words, Pops finally spoke up again.

“...Can you prove that this is giba meat?”

“Huh?”

I was taken aback.

“It’s not like you prepared a giba in front of us. So can you prove that this meat really came from one?”

“You’re going and saying something weird again. At the very least this isn’t kimyuus or karon meat, right?” Aldas said with a strained smile, but Pops wasn’t backing down.

“It’s not just giba on Mount Morga. There are giiz and mundt too, right? There’s no guarantee this is giba meat.”

With that, one of the men chewing on myamuu giba said, “Don’t say those names while I’m eating.”

“That’s right, Pops. You shouldn’t be bringing up names like that in a place like this. As if you could eat meat from those animals.”

“Then what about the giant madarama snakes and varb wolves?!”

“Um... Those creatures eat humans, so wouldn’t it be even stranger for their meat to taste good instead of a giba’s? What you’re saying is seriously crazy, Pops,” Aldas responded, sounding completely astounded.

With that, Pops muttered, “I see...” and seemed to have the energy completely drain out of him.

His big green eyes stared at me, looking completely dispirited.

“Then this really is giba meat...?”

“Yes. Both that meat from before and this meat all came from giba,” I said with a nod, completely unable to tell what Pops was thinking.

Pops gave a deep, heavy sigh.

“...I was wrong.”

“What?”

“I was wrong when I said that giba meat was awful. It was true that I thought so about the meat from last time, but the meat from today was delicious enough to die for. It’s because of your poor skill that I thought it tasted bad back then, not because of the giba meat.”

That may have been so, but I still had no clue at all why Pops had been so depressed.

“I only like the leg meat from karon when it’s sliced thinly.”

“Huh? A-Ah, right.”

“Boiled kimyuus is out of the question. It’s at its tastiest when it’s grilled.”

“Right...”

“Giba meat also has cooking methods where it tastes good, and others where it doesn’t. That’s all there is to it, huh?”

Then, Pops gave a sigh that made it sound like the world was ending.

“And yet, I went and said something stupid like giba wasn’t worth eating... I’m embarrassed by how much of an idiot I was.”

“P-Please don’t worry about that, sir!”

So this was how it went when the emotional folks from Jagar got all down in the dumps, huh?

I couldn’t help but feel a bit flustered, honestly.

“Um, I had thought such a unique dish would attract the attention of everyone from around the post town, but it also probably isn’t the right way to introduce people to giba meat. Because you came out and said that clearly, I was able to realize my own mistake.”

“But...”

“It’s the same in regards to the seasoning. The other clear complaints that you voiced acted as advice for me.”

I didn’t know if it was right or not for me to be exposing my feelings like this, but I felt like I had to say it.

“I felt very frustrated when you said it was bad. But thanks to that, I decided to think more deeply about it. And so, I’m very grateful to you.”

“...I see,” Pops quietly muttered. “But because of that, now I’m the one who has to feel frustrated.”

“Ah... That is, my apologies...”

“It’s nothing to apologize about. I mean, even I can admit I’m wrong, but I still don’t feel like bowing to you.”

As he said that, he gave the counter a light slap. And where his hand had come down, there were now two red coins.

“I’ll pay money for food this good. But I’ve got work after this, so hurry up and make it.”

With that, Pops finally regained his usual brazen expression, a big grin on his face.