"Oh, here he comes."
Rei had been helping prepare dinner in Marina's courtyard—though helping amounted to little more than setting up the Magic Item oven and arranging plates. Seeing Gaga step into the courtyard, he called out to him.
Only Gaga had come. Zozo was still standing guard at the Birth Tower.
Without Zozo's Stone Tablet, proper communication would be difficult, so they would have to make do with gestures.
That much had been settled the moment Zozo stayed behind, yet Gaga had still chosen to sleep in Marina's courtyard.
Rei couldn't help but question whether that was appropriate for the Third Prince of the Gran Dragonia Empire, but he also understood that the customs of a Lizardman nation from another world didn't necessarily align with those of this one.
In any case, since Gaga and Zozo had each made their own choice, Rei had no intention of objecting.
"Dinner will take a little longer, so make yourself comfortable."
He spoke while gesturing for Gaga to rest.
Gaga seemed to understand from Rei's demeanor and settled onto an earth chair that Marina had shaped with Spirit Magic.
"Even without Zozo, it looks like basic communication won't be a problem."
"That's true. But only because Gaga is sharp enough to read what we're getting at. An ordinary Lizardman probably couldn't manage it."
Marina said as much while transferring a slab of meat from the oven onto the table.
Perhaps because it had been roasted with herbs, the meat gave off a deeply tempting aroma.
Gulp. The sound of Byune swallowing carried through the courtyard as she waited at the table for the meal to be served.
"Mn!"
Byune made clear she wanted to eat right away, and Vihera, overhearing, chimed in with agreement.
"Gaga's back, so why don't we start dinner? Just looking at this is making me starving."
"Agreed. So, how do we eat this meat?"
At Rei's question, Marina slipped back inside the house and returned carrying a plate.
Several thin, lightly cooked sheets of dough were stacked on it.
"Crepes?"
The sight of the dough triggered a memory of his old life in Japan, and the word slipped out.
Of course, Rei had lived in the Tohoku countryside. Crepes were something he'd only ever eaten from stalls at festivals—if even that. He'd had the kind sold in supermarket dessert sections often enough, though.
That said, crepes as a confection didn't exist in Elgin. Or rather, while sweet crepes didn't, there were savory galette-like snacks—thin dough wrapped around ham or cheese—that served as light meals.
Marina set the plate down and asked, "What's a crepe?"
"Ah... it's a dish from a book I read while training under my master."
From that, Elena, Marina, and Vihera gathered that crepes were a dish from the world Rei had inhabited before coming to this one. Ara and Byune simply took his word at face value.
Only Gaga, unable to follow the conversation, tilted his head in confusion.
"Putting crepes aside—do we cut this meat and wrap it in the dough? Along with vegetables and such?"
The table was also laden with vegetables cut into bite-sized pieces. Between those and the dough, Rei could more or less piece together how the meal was meant to work.
(So it's basically like Peking duck. Though with real Peking duck, you apparently only eat the skin, not the meat.)
Another tidbit he'd picked up from television back in Japan. Though even without that knowledge, the spread on the table would have made the method obvious enough.
"That's right. You put the sliced meat and vegetables on the dough, drizzle sauce over them, fold it up, and eat."
Byune was the first to reach for the dough, as if that were the most natural thing in the world.
The moment she cut into the meat with a knife, juices spilled out. She set the meat on the dough, added leafy greens and boiled mountain vegetables, drizzled on sauce, rolled the whole thing together, and brought it straight to her mouth.
Byune rarely showed any change in expression, but just now a faint smile had crept onto her face. The dish was that good.
(The meat's pretty juicy. Once it's on the dough, you'd want to eat it fast... or actually, if you lay the vegetables down first, the juices won't soak through.)
Watching Byune, Gaga seemed to grasp how to tackle the dish as well. He mimicked her—meat and vegetables drizzled with sauce, rolled in dough, and lifted to his mouth.
What looked like a reasonably sized portion in Byune's hands seemed bite-sized—or smaller—when clasped between the fingers of the three-meter-tall Gaga. He placed the tiny morsel in his mouth, chewed carefully, and looked thoroughly satisfied.
The quantity was nowhere near enough, but on flavor alone, it clearly hit the mark.
Rei followed suit, layering meat, vegetables, and mountain vegetables onto the dough, adding sauce, rolling it up, and eating.
"Yeah. This is good."
Just that one phrase. And since it genuinely was that delicious, one phrase was enough.
Marina, hearing even that brief response, wore a thoroughly satisfied expression of her own. She had gone to the trouble of preparing this dish—a bit more effort than usual—thinking Rei must be worn out from the events of yesterday, more precisely from everything that had erupted in the middle of the night, and hoping it might help him recover even a little.
"I'm glad. You must be exhausted from yesterday, so eat up tonight."
"Thanks. I'll take you up on that."
Rei returned to his meal. Elena and Ara also brought the food to their mouths, eyeing it with some curiosity.
It might not have passed muster as proper noble table manners, but neither Elena nor Ara was a stranger to eating on a battlefield. Because of that, they had no qualms about eating with their hands.
"As Rei said, this is delicious. Especially this dough. It isn't just plain roasted flour—there's a hidden seasoning in it. That must be what binds the flavors of the meat and vegetables together so well."
"Oh, you noticed. As expected of a noble."
Marina sounded genuinely impressed. Given that it was a hidden seasoning, most people would find the dish delicious without ever realizing what gave it that extra quality.
This time in particular, she had added just a touch of nectar and finely chopped petals from a flower that only grew around Gilm.
The fact that no one besides Elena seemed to pick up on it spoke volumes about the sharpness of her palate.
In terms of raw senses, Rei— inhabiting a body forged from the crystallized techniques of Zephyle and the Zephyle Clan—was equally gifted. But a sharp palate was of limited use without a deep mental catalog of flavors, and Rei simply didn't have the background to identify the hidden seasoning.
Had it been poison, he would have noticed instantly.
"You're right. This flavor couldn't come from ordinary flour alone. There's a truly faint sweetness layered over the flour's own natural sweetness, giving it a solid, rounded taste."
Vihera, as a former imperial princess of the Bestia Empire, possessed an equally discerning palate.
Prompted by their remarks, Rei tore off a piece of the baked dough and tasted it on its own.
(Now that they mention it, there is a sweetness beyond just the flour. But it's so faint I never would have caught it without being told. Impressive.)
Rei reached for the food once more, duly impressed.
The centerpiece was the wrap-style dish, but other dishes naturally shared the table as well. A stew made with Orc meat was among them—no doubt Marina's way of making sure Gaga could eat his fill.
"Gruu!"
Set purred, fixing Rei with a look.
Rei paused, wondering what had prompted that, until he noticed Set eyeing the wraps Byune was eating with unmistakable envy.
"Ah... this dish is a bit tricky for you, isn't it, Set?"
"Gruu..."
Set purred again, sounding genuinely mournful.
Piling meat and vegetables onto the dough was one thing, but the act of folding it into a wrap was beyond what Set could manage. The thinly baked dough—soft enough to put Rei in mind of crepes—tore the instant Set tried to work it with his beak or claws.
He might have managed with enough persistence, but it was only natural for Set to nudge the task over to Rei instead.
Humoring him, Rei swiftly began rolling meat and vegetables into wraps. Meat and mountain vegetables. Vegetables and mountain vegetables. Dried fish and mountain vegetables. He assembled one combination after another.
"Gururururu!"
Set purred with delight at the finished wraps.
Watching the scene unfold—and seeing everyone pick and wrap their own favorite ingredients—Rei was struck by a sudden thought.
(Ah. It's like hand-rolled sushi.)
His initial impression of crepes hadn't been wrong. But at the same time, this style of eating, where each person chose their own fillings and wrapped them in dough, was undeniably reminiscent of hand-rolled sushi, despite the wildly different ingredients.
Even back in Japan, Rei had eaten hand-rolled sushi about once a year, maybe once every few years.
Lost in such reminiscences, he savored his dinner...
"Yaaawn..."
After the meal, during a brief rest, a drowsy yawn slipped from Rei's lips as he leaned against Set's reclining body.
He'd been on his feet since midnight yesterday, racing around to deal with the Teleportation at the Birth Tower. Though he'd slept in reasonably late, it hadn't been enough. The fact that he'd slept inside the Birth Tower—an unfamiliar place—probably hadn't helped either.
Nestled against Set's warmth and full from dinner, his eyes drifted shut on their own.
A short distance away, Vihera and Gaga were in the middle of a mock battle, but even the thunderous sounds of their clashing felt like a lullaby to Rei now.
A spring night should have carried a certain chill, but Marina's Spirit Magic kept the courtyard comfortably warm—another factor working in his favor.
"Ah... Rei's out. What should we do?"
Marina murmured, watching Rei with eyes closed, half—no, eighty percent—asleep already.
The sight of him nestled against Set, hood pulled down, stirred something warm and tender in her chest.
Elena, standing beside Marina and watching him just as closely, felt the same.
To anyone watching, it would have looked like a portrait of maidens gazing upon their beloved, lost in quiet reverie.
Given that both Elena and Marina were beauties of almost unparalleled renown, the scene was strikingly picturesque. So much so that anyone with a painter's eye might have found their brush unable to stop.
Though, the mock battle raging a short distance away would have gone some way toward dampening that creative drive.
Then again, a clash between the three-meter-tall Gaga and a peerless beauty clad in the wispy garments of a dancer or courtesan might, depending on the viewer, have the opposite effect entirely.
"Then I shall carry Rei."
"Oh, I couldn't possibly let a guest like Elena do that. Shouldn't I, as the mistress of this house, be the one to carry him?"
"Now, now, I've been living here long enough. There's no need to keep calling me a guest."
"I wonder about that. But don't you think I'm the better choice for carrying Rei? With Spirit Magic, I could move him without waking him."
Elena and Marina went back and forth, each insisting she should be the one to carry Rei.
Ara, watching the exchange, made no move to intervene. She understood that this wasn't a real argument. If anything, they were enjoying themselves.
That was why she simply watched over them with an affectionate smile.
"Mn."
Byune, taking in the whole scene, contented herself with the fresh, seasonal fruit that had been brought out as a post-meal dessert.