After muttering a single word—"Delicious"—Rei devoted himself entirely to scooping the Orc stew into his mouth.
He wasn't the only one. The others were doing exactly the same.
It wasn't simply the overwhelming presence of the meat.
While the Orc meat asserted itself strongly in the stew, the vegetables had been crafted into a flavor every bit its equal.
A celebration feast would normally involve noisy chatter over the meal, but right now, everyone was single-mindedly focused on savoring the stew.
Only once the stew in their bowls was gone and they had finally caught their breath did Rei speak up.
"Man, that really was delicious."
His words seemed to act as a trigger. The others began to speak as well.
"Just as Rei said, this stew has a flavor... one doesn't get to taste very often."
"Indeed. The dishes served at the dinner party of Count Mails—the one they call the Gourmet Count—were also wonderful, but..."
"The Gourmet Count? What's that? It sounds fascinating."
The moment Elena and Ara spoke, Vihera reacted instantly.
"Ah, you mean Count Mails. He once sent me a letter asking to be informed if I came across any particularly delicious Dark Elf dishes."
"Sending a letter to the Guild Master... No, I suppose it isn't that strange, given he's a noble?"
"It isn't strange at all. In fact, that man would probably think nothing of writing to the emperor of the Bestia Empire if it was for the sake of delicious food."
Yohanna's companions had been surprised at the idea of someone writing to the Guild Master, but hearing that he would even send a letter to a neighboring country—moreover, a long-time enemy nation—they could do nothing but stare in stunned disbelief.
Rei, who had been listening to the conversation, found himself growing slightly interested in this Gourmet Count... Count Mails.
Rei generally held the opinion that, with only a few exceptions, the vast majority of nobles were hopeless. Even so, the reason he found himself intrigued by Count Mails was undoubtedly that nickname—the Gourmet Count. Though calling it a nickname felt somewhat inaccurate.
Originally, both Rei and Set loved the act of eating.
They enjoyed it enough that Rei had even tried to spread the recipes he remembered.
...However, considering that Rei had been a high school student back in Japan, there was almost nothing he could actually teach.
Even if the ingredients were available, he didn't know how most of them were made.
For example, he knew that potato starch was different from wheat flour, but he had no idea how potato starch was actually produced.
He knew that with the right knowledge, it could be easily made from potatoes, but without that knowledge, there was nothing he could do.
To be precise, he had learned it in elementary school but had completely forgotten.
"The ham and sausages we had at the start were also incredibly good... At this rate, I'm really looking forward to the other dishes too."
Recalling the taste of the stew, Rei next reached for a dish of boiled Orc meat that had been properly drained of excess fat and dressed with a tart fruit sauce.
The fruit used in the sauce had surely been harvested from the Dungeon as well.
The Orc meat had clearly been prepared with great care during the boiling process, as it had been delicately seasoned with its own flavor.
It was a subtle balance; if the meat's own taste had been any stronger, it would have clashed with the acidity of the sauce.
Additionally, a stir-fried dish made with Dungeon-harvested vegetables used a spice that resembled pepper yet was subtly different. Because it had been cooked over high heat, it retained a pleasant bite that perfectly cleansed the palate after the heavy, Orc meat-based dishes.
"This is delicious. Especially this simmered vegetable dish—it's absolutely exquisite."
Just as the restaurant's name suggested, most of the dishes centered around Orc meat.
However, the other dishes were by no means neglected. They were good enough to impress even Marina, who had sampled countless cuisines over her long life.
As a Dark Elf, she had lived for a very long time. She had worked as an adventurer and later as Guild Master.
With all that experience—and possessing a beauty that drew everyone's attention—it was only natural that she had received countless dinner invitations and had the opportunity to try a vast array of dishes.
Among all those experiences, the food they were eating now undoubtedly ranked among the very best.
"It's not just the meat. This fish here practically melts in your mouth the moment you put it in. It's a white-fleshed fish."
There was no way ordinary fish could be obtained in a place like this, so this fish had undoubtedly come from the Dungeon as well.
Probably from the forest floor, Rei thought, rinsing his mouth with fruit water to refresh his palate before bringing the fish to his lips.
Just as Vihera had said, it melted in the mouth... yet it carried a richness of fat different from that of Orc meat. It reminded Rei of the fish he had eaten back in Japan.
(It's similar to Okhotsk atka mackerel. Though the flesh is much plumper than that, and it has a lot more fat.)
Whether that was simply because it was a different species, because of how it had been prepared before cooking, or for some other reason entirely, Rei didn't know. But there was no mistaking the simple truth that it was delicious.
After that, they continued sampling the other dishes, repeatedly letting out sighs of admiration. Once they had tasted everything and a certain amount of time had passed, their impressions of the meal wound down, and the conversation naturally shifted toward the recent Dungeon incident.
"Still, that Silver Lion was really something else, wasn't it? I only saw the corpse, but to think a monster that huge existed... Set-chan is already big, but compared to Set-chan it was like an adult to a child. Or maybe even more than that."
While stroking Set, Yohanna murmured nostalgically, no doubt recalling the Silver Lion's corpse.
Her companions seemed to share her opinion. They all nodded and began talking about how shocked they had been when they first saw the Silver Lion's body.
"Yeah. Honestly, facing something that big... and on top of that, it was incredibly agile and had absurd defensive power. If its offensive power had been as strong as everything else, I don't even want to imagine what would've happened."
Recalling the fierce battle against the Silver Lion also brought back the pain in his ribs from that fight.
It had improved considerably since right after the battle, but he still felt a faint twinge from time to time.
(By tomorrow the pain should be almost completely gone... Should we have postponed the celebration until tomorrow? No, momentum is important for these kinds of things.)
Enduring the faint pain, he still couldn't resist the temptation of the dishes before him and reached out again.
"To have that many powerful people gathered and still struggle... Honestly, there's no other way to describe S-Rank monsters other than 'monsters.'"
One of Yohanna's companions murmured with deep feeling.
As former members of the Mobile Unit, they knew Rei and Set's true strength. Naturally, they also knew Vihera's strength, having fought alongside her on the same battlefield.
Since they had lived in the Bestia Empire, they naturally knew of the Princess General Elena, and they also knew Elk's name as an Alias Holder and A-Rank adventurer.
On top of that, they had the Guild Master Marina, Elena's attendant Ara, and Elk's wife and party member Min all present. Yet what Yohanna and her companions had seen after the battle ended were Rei and the others covered in wounds.
The ones who had been injured were only the vanguard members, and even those wounds were not serious enough to be called heavy—they were all light injuries.
Considering that, they couldn't help but realize that if they had participated in the battle, they would have done nothing but hold the others back.
"Yeah. I honestly have to agree that S-Rank monsters are all monsters. Well, this time there were also quite a few bad matchups."
He wondered if that sounded like sour grapes, but he also genuinely believed it wasn't a lie.
Rei's Death Scythe weighed around a hundred kilograms.
Even when he struck with it while using Flame Emperor's Crimson Armor, he hadn't been able to cut through the Silver Lion's fur.
The only effective attack had been the Death Scythe's skill, Power Slash.
In the end, he had resorted to thrusting the Twilight Spear into its eyeball—the one place without fur—and destroying the Silver Lion's brain through the roof of its mouth.
"Bad matchups, huh. If even Rei-san struggled that much, then it really was for the best that we didn't participate in the fight. Right, Set-chan?"
"Guru?"
Yohanna murmured while stroking Set, responding to Rei's heartfelt words.
For a moment, Set turned its gaze toward Yohanna, but immediately returned to its meal.
Even though Set acted that way, Yohanna still looked delighted and gently continued stroking its body.
"Silver Lion, huh... Yeah."
While thinking about the Silver Lion, Rei's gaze drifted toward the many dishes lined up on the table.
If Orc meat could produce this many delicious dishes, he suddenly wondered what Silver Lion meat would be like.
And once the thought occurred to him, he couldn't stop it.
It would be formally announced by the Guild in the near future that the Silver Lion had been defeated and the Dungeon core destroyed, but it wasn't as though they were strictly forbidden from talking about it right now.
That was precisely why they were casually discussing the defeat of the Silver Lion inside the restaurant, even though the Hobbyist Shop Owner had stepped away.
With that in mind, Rei placed a roughly one-kilogram chunk of meat onto an empty plate on the table.
Yes—it was Silver Lion meat from the monster they had slain just a few hours earlier.
The moment he casually set the meat down, everyone's eyes were drawn to it.
That was how much presence the chunk of meat possessed.
"Since we have the chance, I was thinking of having this meat cooked. What do you all think?"
"Agreed."
The instant Rei spoke, everyone—including even Elena, Marina, and Vihera, who were all accustomed to fine dining—immediately voiced their approval in unison.
There wasn't the slightest hesitation.
There existed only those who purely sought meat.
Of course, Rei was no different from the rest of them.
With a chef of this caliber running the restaurant, there was no doubt he would prepare the S-Rank monster Silver Lion's meat with the utmost care.
"Alright, since no one has any objections, I'll go ahead and ask right away."
After confirming once more and seeing that no one objected, Rei called out.
"Shop owner, got a moment?"
"Huh? I'm busy over here too... Oi, what the hell is this meat?"
The Hobbyist Shop Owner had been about to ask what they wanted, busy with preparations for additional dishes, but he stopped mid-sentence when he saw an unfamiliar piece of meat on the table.
If it had been ordinary meat or something commonly seen, he would have been sick of it and wouldn't have bothered asking.
But the meat before him had a completely different presence.
It possessed an aura clearly distinct from ordinary meat.
"It's S-Rank monster meat."
The moment Rei said that, the Hobbyist Shop Owner immediately understood that the meat in front of him belonged to the Silver Lion that had been protecting the Dungeon core in this very Dungeon.
If he had been working somewhere in the kitchen where he could hear voices, he might have caught the content of Rei's group's conversation.
Unfortunately, he had been shut away in the storeroom at the back of the restaurant organizing spices.
Though even if he had been cooking in the kitchen, he might not have noticed if he was deeply focused.
However... the Hobbyist Shop Owner now knew.
He knew that the meat before his eyes was from an S-Rank monster—the Silver Lion.
And as a cook, it was only natural that when such supreme ingredients appeared before him, he would want to prepare them.
"Let me cook this meat. If I do, today's bill is on the house. In exchange, let me taste the dishes made from this Silver Lion meat too."
He wanted to cook it himself and confirm the taste.
Rei, of course, had no reason to refuse and readily nodded.
After all, that was exactly what Rei had been hoping for.
"Got it. Then I'll leave the preparation of this Silver Lion meat to you. It's the finest ingredient, so please make it into the finest dish."
"Cheh, who the hell do you think you're talking to? Leave it to me. As a cook, there's no way I could waste ingredients this good!"
With a bold, masculine grin, the Hobbyist Shop Owner took the plate holding the Silver Lion meat and disappeared into the kitchen.
Rei and the others watched him go, eagerly looking forward to what kind of dish would come out, their gazes fixed in that direction...
"NUOOOOOOH!"
"UOOOOOH!"
"GURAAH!"
"GORAAH!"
"ORAAH!"
Shouts that sounded like nothing short of a brawl echoed from the kitchen, leaving them with no choice but to exchange bewildered looks.