Having played to his heart's content in the grasslands, Rei decided to head back to Gilm, since it was almost evening.
He chose to return a little early because he knew that once evening fell, the workers who had been outside would come flooding back into Gilm, making the entry procedures take longer.
(Ah, I should've swung by the Treant Forest to greet the Lizardmen while I was at it. ...No, I only had a few hours to spare. It'd be better to visit when I have more time.)
Rei mused on this as he enjoyed the floating sensation of Set's descent toward Gilm.
A considerable line had already formed at the gates.
Since it was still before evening, those waiting consisted only of people whose work had ended early or who had just arrived at Gilm.
The line was a bit longer than Rei had expected, but it was undoubtedly shorter than it would be at peak hours.
As he took his place in line, the people around him naturally reacted with surprise.
They seemed familiar enough with Set, though, so no real commotion broke out.
"Rei-san, would it be alright if I petted Set a little?"
A merchant who looked to be in his twenties, standing right in front of Rei, asked the question.
Judging by his eager curiosity toward Set, Rei didn't get the impression he was the type to harm it.
"As long as Set doesn't mind, I don't care. But if you try anything to hurt Set, you'll get what's coming to you. Keep that in mind."
"Gruu."
Set purred in agreement with Rei's words.
The merchant was slightly startled by the warning and nervously reached out toward Set.
Eventually, his hand touched Set's body...
"Haa..."
The merchant let out a sigh of admiration at the smoothness of the fur.
For a brief moment, he wondered if he could make clothes out of this fur and sell them—but fortunately, he quickly recalled Rei's words and shook the thought from his mind.
Granted, Rei had exaggerated somewhat. But even if the merchant was entertaining such thoughts, Set wouldn't attack him as long as he didn't actually act on them.
While all this was going on, the gate entry procedures progressed, and Rei and his companion passed through without a hitch.
First-time visitors or those who had been away from Gilm for a long time would be subjected to a thorough baggage inspection. In Rei's case, however, he had just left Gilm a few hours earlier.
Given Set's flight speed, the guards apparently chose not to dwell on exactly how far he could have traveled in that time.
In the first place, if Rei were going to smuggle something, he would just store it in his Misty Ring.
And inspecting everything stored inside his Misty Ring would take far more than a single day and night.
For that reason, Rei wasn't subjected to any baggage inspection whatsoever.
This was likely a result of his track record as a long-standing adventurer in Gilm.
The perception was simply that Rei wouldn't commit such crimes.
...In reality, his habit of readily killing anyone who turned hostile—noble or otherwise—was quite criminal in its own right. But based on his past conduct, people probably assumed he wouldn't pull anything like that against Daskar.
Having entered Gilm far more easily than the others, Rei pondered what to do next... and noticed a fragrance drifting through the air.
A stimulating aroma composed of numerous complex spices.
Thanks to the Green People's influence, a wide variety of spices were currently being cultivated in Gilm.
These spices held tremendous appeal for merchants... but Daskar ensured they weren't sold exclusively to them, making sure they reached the residents of Gilm as well.
This was likely done to survey which spices the locals preferred.
Cuisine varied greatly from region to region.
For instance, the steamed egg custard Rei ate back in Japan was a sweet variety containing candied chestnuts.
He had always thought that was the norm, so he was genuinely shocked the first time he discovered that Tokyo's version was savory.
Similarly, finding ginkgo nuts instead of candied chestnuts had been an equal surprise.
In that regard, the desert region Rei had visited before—the place where he obtained the Sand Ship—had also had thriving spice cultivation. But even if they grew the same kinds of spices there, there was a very real chance they wouldn't suit the palates of Gilm's residents.
"Gururu."
"Yeah, it does smell pretty good. ...We've got time to spare, so let's go check it out."
After finishing work and entering Gilm on an empty stomach, the appetite-stimulating aroma wafting through the air was hard to resist.
To Rei's senses, the scent was something close to curry.
Driven by that conditioned reflex, he and Set headed toward the source of the fragrance.
When they arrived, they found a food stall with quite a long line.
"Figured as much," Rei muttered, sounding disappointed.
The stall was already wafting out the aroma of a dish loaded with appetite-stimulating spices. With evening approaching and work wrapping up, it was only natural that a crowd would gather, drawn in by the scent.
That said, as long as an aroma reminiscent of curry hung in the air, not lining up simply wasn't an option for Rei.
As he waited, the line crept steadily forward.
It moved quite fast, too.
That was probably because serving was simple—just ladling soup from a pot into a deep bowl and handing over a piece of bread and a spoon.
Incidentally, the bowl and spoon were technically sold together, but if you returned them after finishing, you got that portion of your money back.
Seeing this reminded Rei of the candy shops in Japan, where returning an empty glass bottle from a carbonated drink would get you a small refund.
With this setup, anyone who wanted to take the tableware home could simply walk off with it, while those who didn't need it could return it to the stall and recoup a little money.
Granted, this system itself wasn't particularly unusual in Gilm.
Most stalls selling soup adopted the same format.
So the mechanism wasn't what surprised him...
"Blue...?"
As the line shortened, Rei could make out people near the stall eating soup and bread.
When his gaze fell on their soup bowls, he was startled to see the soup was blue.
Soup came in all sorts of colors, as a rule.
Red soup made with hefty quantities of red vegetables like tomatoes, green soup made from pureed leafy greens, clear soup, brown soup—you name it.
Rei had seen soups in all those colors before.
But blue soup was an entirely different story.
He had eaten his way through a wide variety of dishes, but this was the first time he had ever laid eyes on a blue soup.
(Is this even edible?)
The thought crossed his mind for a moment, but when he looked again at the others eating it, they all seemed to be enjoying it thoroughly.
Judging by their reactions, there was no doubt the soup tasted perfectly fine.
(It's probably fine, right? ...More importantly, how does soup turn blue?)
Maybe they used some kind of food coloring? he wondered. But there was no real reason to deliberately make soup blue.
Which meant the color came from some other cause, he reasoned... and right at that moment, it was his turn.
"Eh? Rei?"
The stall owner clearly recognized him, as a surprised voice rang out.
Among those running food stalls, Rei was quite a well-known figure.
If the food was good, he was a prized customer who would buy in large quantities—so that was only natural.
Of course, that also meant he wouldn't buy in bulk if the food was bad, which inadvertently made Rei's presence a kind of litmus test for whether a stall's cooking was actually any good.
That was likely why the male stall owner was surprised, pleased, and visibly nervous all at once upon seeing Rei.
Rei bought a portion for himself and one for Set, then paid.
But he was taken aback by how cheap the price was.
"It looks like you use quite a lot of spices. Are you sure you can make it work at this price?"
"Ah, I buy from a special source. Even at this price, I turn a decent profit."
That special source was undoubtedly the Green People... or more precisely, Daskar, who employed them. But Rei kept that to himself and continued the conversation.
"Still, blue soup... I've eaten all sorts of things, but I've never seen a blue—and I mean completely bright blue—soup like this before."
As Rei spoke with open amazement, the stall owner broke into a proud grin.
"You can't just rely on spices. You've got to hone your cooking skills too. Sight plays a huge role when it comes to eating, after all. In that sense, this soup is my masterpiece."
In Rei's experience, people who spoke with such overflowing confidence were either genuinely sure of themselves, or they made self-satisfying food and insisted that anyone who called it bad simply didn't understand flavor.
Fortunately, not a single person eating soup around the stall looked like they were suffering through it.
If anything, perhaps because they were famished after work, they were eating with genuine relish from the bottom of their hearts.
Seeing those customers, Rei could tell the stall owner's confidence wasn't mere self-delusion—he actually had the skills to back it up.
(Besides, he's someone Lord Daskar chose.)
There was a chance it hadn't been Daskar personally, but one of his subordinates... actually, that was the more likely scenario. Even so, they wouldn't entrust spices to someone with poor cooking skills.
"Well then, take your time and savor it. If you like it, you can always buy in bulk, you know?"
The way he said "you know?" carried an attitude that said if Rei tasted his soup, he would absolutely want to buy in bulk.
Nodding to the confident stall owner, Rei moved with Set to a spot a short distance from the stall and dug in right away.
Set, naturally, had no way of using a spoon and simply drank the soup straight from the plate.
On an extra plate Rei set out, he placed Set's portion of bread as well.
"Well, let's eat."
"Gururu!"
Set purred happily at Rei's words and savored the soup.
It was delicious.
That was Rei's honest impression after tasting it.
That said, it was quite different from the curry he had been imagining.
...Naturally. The curry Rei had in mind was the kind made with curry roux.
Curry roux was a solid block containing a blend of various spices, oils, and other ingredients. All you had to do was add it, and you could effortlessly enjoy curry that spice experts had spent years perfecting to suit the Japanese palate.
For someone like Rei, who was accustomed to eating that kind of curry, a dish dreamed up by a single person using unfamiliar spices was bound to feel a bit underwhelming.
Even so, it was only lacking when compared to the curry Rei knew. Eaten purely as soup, it was undeniably delicious.
(I suppose it's a curry-flavored soup. ...I hear there's something called soup curry—is it something like that? Well, soup curry obviously isn't blue.)
Unfortunately, Rei had never actually eaten soup curry. He had only seen it in cooking manga and on TV.
Because of that, if someone asked whether this curry-flavored soup qualified as soup curry, he couldn't confirm or deny it, so he couldn't honestly nod along.
Savoring the taste... a thought suddenly struck him.
If it was a curry-flavored soup, wouldn't adding Gilm's signature udon turn it into curry udon?
Rei had never eaten soup curry before, but he had eaten curry udon on plenty of occasions.
It wasn't uncommon to find retort pouch versions in supermarkets where you just poured the sauce over boiled udon, and he would sometimes order it when eating out.
Recalling that, Rei wondered if he could just slip some udon into this soup.
Of course, Rei simply figured he could toss boiled udon into the soup as-is. In reality, if they were to serve it as "curry udon (provisional)," both the udon and the soup would need careful adjustment to complement each other properly.
Even so, keen to eat curry udon, Rei decided that once he finished this soup, he would buy a decent amount as a reserve, and then bring up the idea of curry udon with the stall owner.