Several days had passed since we returned from Waterhorn.
The muscle pain went away in two days,
and the restaurant returned to its quiet everyday routine.
No customers had come by after that, either.
It seemed the fact that customers had made the trip for nothing while we were in Waterhorn had hurt us more than expected.
A restaurant with no menu, inconvenient reservations, and a difficult road leading to it.
Still, the restaurant’s name had become somewhat known, so customers would come again someday.
Besides, there was plenty to do even without customers.
Tidying the herb pots on the rooftop, checking ingredients, researching new cooking methods.
As for running the restaurant, keeping it as a hobby like this,
doing things my own way, was more comfortable.
Today, I planned to thin out the herbs in the vegetable garden out back.
“Manager~ What are you going to plant today?”
Aris followed right beside me, watering can in hand.
“I’m not planting. I’m thinning them out.”
“Ah, thinning them out?”
“If they grow too densely, they steal nutrients from each other. You have to thin them out now and then so the rest can grow properly.”
“Wow… So you have to pay attention to things like that too…….”
Aris looked genuinely impressed.
I had only said something obvious, but she reacted as if it were amazing, which made me feel a little embarrassed for some reason.
I squatted in front of the garden and examined the herbs.
Rosemary, basil, dill…….
This side was in good condition.
Next to them, herbs unique to this world were growing well.
They were ones I had personally gathered from the nearby forest and transplanted here.
When I first reincarnated into this world,
there was something I found strange.
Many of the plants and animals that had existed in the world I used to live in also existed here exactly as they were.
Livestock such as dogs, pigs, cows, horses, and chickens.
Plants like garlic, green onions, rosemary, basil, dill, and lemon balm.
Of course, there were many that didn’t exist.
But there were plenty of new otherworldly flora and fauna that more than made up for what was missing.
It felt as if the ecosystem of my original world had simply been expanded on a much larger scale.
That was why familiar plants like rosemary and basil,
and special plants that existed only in this world, coexisted in my garden.
“Hmm… Then I should pull out ones like this, right?”
Aris glanced at me and pointed to a small-leaved herb.
“Leave that one.”
“What about this one?”
“Pull that one. Carefully, so you don’t damage the roots beside it.”
“Then this one……?”
“Pull that one too.”
We continued working like that for a while.
The sunlight wasn’t bad.
The breeze was cool too.
It was a silent morning without even a single birdsong,
but I could enjoy this level of stillness as much as I wanted.
Quiet was a good thing, after all.
“Managerrrrr!”
Just as I was focused on tending the garden,
Aris suddenly shouted.
The watering can fell with a thud,
and I heard it topple over in the garden.
“What is it?”
“Over there! Over there, in front of the restaurant……!”
Aris pointed toward the shop with a trembling finger.
I slowly stood up and looked back.
In front of the restaurant door.
Someone had collapsed there.
* * *
The moment I drew closer, several things came into view at once.
A small frame.
Short, dirty, tangled silver-brown hair.
And drooping limply from the top of her head at an angle,
a pair of fluffy cat ears. It was a girl.
“……A beastkin?”
They were a race rarely seen around here.
I bent down and checked her condition.
She was breathing.
Thin, rapid breaths.
And wounds visible all over her body.
Scratch marks,
cut marks.
As though she had been attacked from behind while fleeing from something,
the worst wounds were concentrated on her back.
There was a large bruise on her arm that looked like something had bitten her,
and around her ankle, perhaps because she had torn her own clothes for emergency treatment, it was roughly bound with cloth.
The blood had already hardened, so it seemed like quite some time had passed since she was injured.
If she didn’t receive treatment, it looked as if she might stop breathing at any moment.
“Manager… This person… she has ears and a tail.”
“We need to take her inside first.”
“She’ll… she’ll be okay, right?”
“If she made it all the way here before collapsing, then maybe she’s fated to live.”
Aris stamped her feet anxiously.
I lowered myself and carefully lifted the fallen beastkin into my arms.
She was lighter than I expected.
Her body was small, yes, but she was so thin that the joints of her bones showed here and there.
Being attacked and wounded by something was a problem,
but so was the fact that she hadn’t eaten properly for a long time.
“Open the door.”
“Y-yes!”
Aris hurried ahead and opened the restaurant door.
I carried the beastkin inside and laid her down on the floor deeper in the hall.
First, emergency treatment to keep the wounds from festering.
“Aris, in the kitchen, second drawer of the white cabinet in the back. There’s a container with bandages and medicine. Bring it.”
“Yes! Got it!”
Aris quickly disappeared into the kitchen.
I slowly examined the beastkin’s wounds again.
The worst was her back.
Deep wounds, as though she had been raked by a beast’s claws.
It made me think she must have passed through the Demon Beast Forest, which stretched endlessly to the west of the restaurant.
To the west of Gourmet Restaurant Slow lay a vast forest.
Fairly strong demon beasts appeared there,
so ordinary people couldn’t pass through it carelessly.
Of course, to me, it was nothing more than a place where I could procure all kinds of ingredients myself,
but even active adventurers from the guild could lose their lives there if they were half-baked.
The shape of these wounds resembled what one would get when chased by demon beasts,
or when directly encountering them.
On top of that, among her wounds were some that seemed to have been inflicted not by demon beasts,
but by proper bladed weapons.
“…….”
A moment later, Aris returned with bandages and disinfectant,
and I silently cleaned the wounds and wrapped them with bandages.
Then I cast healing magic.
“Recovery.”
But the effects of my healing magic had clear limits.
Compared to the true healing magic of priests who used divine power instead of mana,
my healing magic could only temporarily replenish a little stamina at best.
Directly and instantly healing wounds was impossible.
Still, even this shoddy healing magic
would be far more helpful than nothing.
The rest would have to depend on the recovery power of this beastkin’s body.
“……How is she? Do you think she’ll live?”
Aris asked with worried eyes.
“I’ve done everything I can for now. The rest depends on whether this one’s strength holds out.”
I stood up and headed for the kitchen.
“Manager! Wh-where are you going?”
“To make some porridge. If she wakes up later, she’ll need to put something in her stomach.”
People—no, all living things—had to eat in order to recover.
* * *
What I made was a very simple porridge.
After sufficiently soaking the rice with magic,
I boiled it for a long time in plenty of water.
I chose only the tender thigh meat of chicken and shredded it as finely as threads before adding it in.
I minced vegetables and mushrooms and added them,
then seasoned it only with salt.
I adjusted the heat and waited until the rice completely bloomed.
I kept stirring with a ladle so the porridge would cook evenly in the pot.
In truth, it was closer to thin rice gruel than porridge.
I prepared it as if it were for a child just starting on baby food,
taking care not to burden the stomach.
Around the time the porridge was nearly finished,
Aris, who had been looking after the beastkin in the hall, came to the kitchen and said,
“Manager! She… she opened her eyes!”
“Shh—lower your voice. You might startle her.”
“Yees…….”
Aris answered in a voice that was practically crawling,
then returned to where the beastkin was.
* * *
When I ladled the porridge into a bowl and came out into the hall,
the beastkin girl was sitting with her back pressed flat against the restaurant wall, knees hugged to her chest.
Her cat ears were flattened down.
Her tail was wrapped tightly around one leg,
coiled all the way to her ankle.
Her eyes, close to golden in color, looked at me.
Her pupils were similar to a cat’s, giving off a strange impression.
Those eyes looked at my face,
then turned to the bowl of porridge,
then came back to me again.
I set the bowl down in front of her and took one step back.
“Eat first.”
The girl did not move.
Her gaze wavered as if measuring the distance between me and the wall behind her.
Her two feet pushed slightly against the floor as she tried to retreat farther,
but her back was already against the wall.
“There’s no poison or anything. I didn’t put anything strange in it.”
Even so, the girl gave no reaction.
“Hmm.”
I sent Aris a look.
Aris paused for a moment as she grasped my intent, and then her expression changed.
“Ah…! Yes!”
Aris brought another bowl of porridge from the kitchen and plopped down opposite the girl.
Then, without hesitation, she picked up a spoon and took a big bite.
“Mmm~ It’s delicious! The ingredients are a little lacking, though…… Ah! I’m Aris. What’s your name?”
Aris spoke to the girl in a friendly way.
The girl did not answer.
She glanced at Aris,
then lowered her gaze back to the bowl of porridge,
then looked at Aris again.
That exchange of glances went back and forth two or three times.
As she watched Aris take a second spoonful,
the girl’s hands began to move little by little from atop her knees.
She took hold of the spoon.
Very slowly.
Then, while watching me for any reaction, she carefully scooped up a spoonful and put it in her mouth.
The strength left the tail that had been tightly wrapped around one of the girl’s legs.
Her flattened ears also rose ever so slightly.
Without a word, the girl ate a second spoonful, then a third.
The spooning, cautious at first, became unrestrained at some point.
Her tail slipped loose, completely unwinding from her ankle and slowly brushing across the floor.
As though she had become aware of it,
the girl set the spoon in the bowl and pressed down on her own tail with her hand.
“Eat slowly, as much as you like. There’s plenty more.”
I said that in as gentle a voice as possible,
then went back into the kitchen so the beastkin girl wouldn’t feel uncomfortable.
* * *