The next day, as soon as morning broke, Iseria and I headed for the mansion attached to the knights’ garrison.
To be precise, it was closer to being summoned there.
“That commissary officer bastard... He managed our order’s provisions for ten years, and I never imagined he’d do such a thing. It wasn’t just the flour you left behind, Jinwoo... He’d been helping himself to quite a lot. Once we added the testimony of the cooks and the supply soldiers, his crimes only increased. From vegetables to flour to seasonings. He stole a portion of everything he managed.”
“I-is that so?”
“Yes. Still, thanks to you, we were able to catch him. As commander of the Silbaerin Knights, allow me to express my gratitude. Thank you. But... why are you so stiff? Be at ease. At ease.”
“Y-yes! Thank you...”
The commander of the Silbaerin Knights and ruler of this territory, Duke Kailan, spoke with an easygoing smile.
Probably because I was frozen stiff.
I wanted to act at ease too. You think I enjoyed being uncomfortable?
But... when he came to my shop and ate banquet noodles, I hadn’t realized it, but this old man’s presence was no joke.
Was this what it meant to be a margrave duke guarding the border?
It was definitely not a position he’d somehow won through a shoddy card game.
He wasn’t wearing the luxurious clothing nobles usually wore, but something meant to be worn under armor so he could don it and march out at any time... What was it called, a gambeson? I think that was it.
Even so, befitting a duke and the commander of a knightly order, it was an extremely refined gambeson.
If what ordinary soldiers wore felt like a Korean army quilted liner handed down for ten years... Kailan’s had the vibe of a crisp officer’s fleece.
At any rate, with him dressed like that and talking while wearing an ominous sword at his side, there was no way I could act comfortably.
And this office too... Is that taxidermied thing a bear? Why is it so huge when it’s only the head? How big was the actual body?
While my eyes were darting all over the place, Duke Kailan spoke.
“Well, I suppose you’ll get used to it with time. By the way, the mage beside you... The last time I saw one was decades ago, but she’s an elf. I don’t know what sort of connection brought you together, but how curious.”
“Ugh, how did you know, human?!”
“Hey, hey. Use polite speech! Polite speech!”
“Hahaha! It’s fine. I know elves don’t say such things with ill intent.”
“What are you talking about! You old m—mph!!”
Even though she had pulled her robe down low, Iseria flared up after being discovered as an elf.
Honestly, I hadn’t expected her to use polite speech, but she’d at least shown Arthur the bare minimum of courtesy. So why was she acting like this toward Kailan, who was even higher-ranking?
It seemed she’d been startled because he had openly stated her identity.
Right before Iseria could finally cause a disaster with her tongue, I clamped a hand over her mouth.
‘Hey. I’m begging you, please stay quiet. Just don’t talk.’
‘Mmmph, hngh!’
I whispered quietly into Iseria’s pointed ear so only she could hear.
Whether she understood me or not, Iseria mumbled with her mouth covered, then suddenly shivered and her ears turned red.
Figuring she’d understood well enough, I removed the hand covering her mouth. Puhah—Iseria drew in a breath and glared at me.
Hmm, well...
Sorry about that. Still, it’s better than running your mouth at a duke and getting your head lopped off.
In the awkward atmosphere that followed, I forced my energy up.
“Ah, ahaha! In any case, I only did what had to be done, Your Grace. I’ve spent my whole life cooking, so I simply couldn’t forgive someone who played around with food.”
“Food is important. All the more so in a military organization. Don’t belittle what you accomplished. I’ll reward you properly once the wave is over. However, by any chance...”
Duke Kailan praised me and brought up compensation first.
There was no reason to refuse what he was offering. It felt awkward to say it myself, but I did think catching someone siphoning off food during wartime was quite a big deal...
What bothered me was the sentence Duke Kailan had trailed off on.
With a premonition that something troublesome was coming, Duke Kailan said,
“Since we’re in the middle of a monster wave anyway, you can’t return to your shop, can you?”
“Yes. That’s right.”
“And sitting around in the shelter chatting with other people must be getting tiresome by now?”
“Well... yes.”
“Then... how about giving it a try?”
“Pardon? Giving what a try?”
“Commissary officer.”
***
“Couldn’t you have just refused? You accepted for no reason and now you look like you’re dying.”
“Sigh... You’re right...”
To get to the conclusion first, I accepted. The position of commissary officer—more precisely, honorary commissary officer, to be performed only during the monster wave.
I could understand “honorary knight,” but “honorary commissary officer”? It was clearly an honorable title given to an outsider, but somehow it lacked style.
Even when the company sergeant major practically filmed an obsessive, ruinous confinement drama with me trying to make me become an NCO, I refused to the bitter end and got discharged. I never imagined I’d end up doing it after coming to another world.
My worries were mountain-high, and my chest felt heavy, as if filled with lead.
The reason I accepted despite knowing I’d end up whining like this was... because I felt sorry for them.
It didn’t matter if business didn’t go well. My goal was to run a quiet restaurant together with regular customers.
But as a cook who handled food, however unworthy I might be, it made me terribly sad to see soldiers struggling to protect the city eating that... something that was hard to even call food.
Maybe it was because I, too, had once served as an ordinary soldier and eaten tasteless army chow. Perhaps that was why I felt a sense of kinship.
‘Should I feed them all properly? I could fill their stomachs so full they won’t even be able to complain.’
I had the ability to do it too.
I wasn’t simply talking about [Mana Market], but the knowledge and techniques I’d honed in the modern world, where culinary science had developed.
In truth, that was a more precious ability than [Mana Market]. What use were ingredients if you didn’t know how to handle them?
I had the motivation, I had the ability, and the situation had been laid out for me.
Since I’d decided to do it, I might as well give it my all.
I steeled myself and headed for the kitchen.
I had poked around every nook and cranny yesterday, but if I was going to be in charge from now on, my perspective changed.
Not just the quantity of provisions, but the cooking proficiency of the kitchen soldiers, the fluctuating number of mouths to feed depending on combat formations, supplies for meal deliveries, and so on.
Even thinking about it briefly, there was an enormous amount to pay attention to, but fortunately, a considerable portion of that had already been resolved.
When I went to the kitchen and talked with the soldiers, it turned out the only useless one had been the commissary officer. The soldiers under him were all competent.
The profession of knight was, in the end, closely tied to combat, so one wrong move could put your life in danger.
But the Middle Ages weren’t a world where knights were more in danger and commoners were safe. Everyone died easily, all the same.
In that sense, knights were actually given self-defense techniques(?) and self-defense equipment, and received somewhat regular wages, so they could secure what amounted to an iron rice bowl in the medieval world.
Because of that, these cooks had half-forcibly chosen to become competent in order to survive for a long, long time in that iron rice bowl. Since they weren’t combat personnel, they could be replaced even more easily.
“Breakfast distribution for today has been completed. Lunch will be delivered as combat rations, and dinner preparations will begin after the meal delivery.”
“What did you make for breakfast?”
“That... ‘thing’ you saw yesterday...”
“Kraaagh.”
I screamed as the nightmare from yesterday came back to me.
No, from what I saw, they were good with knives and handled cooking tools well. So why did they only make things like that?
“We learned the techniques, but we don’t have recipes. We only learned to do things the way the previous commissary officer taught us...”
Now that I heard the crestfallen cook’s words, I could understand a little.
Even on modern Earth, home-cooking recipes were easily shared, but a restaurant’s secret recipes were not properly shared.
Because those were the unique property of the cooks.
That was true even in the modern age, where communication technology had developed. How much worse would it be in the Middle Ages?
The culinary world was already closed-off and hierarchical by nature, and when medieval synergy was added on top of that, obtaining proper recipes was like plucking stars from the sky.
“What are the lunch combat rations... hardtack?”
“Yes. Hardtack, dried jerky, and salt will be sent out.”
Combat rations were just things prepared in advance and sent out anyway, so I didn’t need to worry about them.
Then dinner was the only problem...
Unlike before, when the ingredients had been suspiciously lacking despite this being a ducal knightly order, the current food storehouse had been normalized after raiding the commissary officer’s stash.
In other words, I didn’t need to worry about basic ingredients like flour or root vegetables.
“How many are we feeding for dinner?”
“We’re estimating six hundred servings.”
It was morning after breakfast had ended, but if I made a labor-intensive menu, everyone would have to stay glued to the kitchen without even glancing at other tasks.
This wasn’t peacetime but wartime, so we couldn’t afford to do something so inefficient and poor in cost-effectiveness.
‘It has to be fine in large quantities, so stir-fried dishes are out. As for bread, I can’t do anything that takes too long.’
If I didn’t think too hard and just threw in all the ingredients we had, then roughly dumped in spices and salt, it would probably be edible.
But there was a reason I had accepted this honorary commissary officer position despite knowing it would wear me out.
I had a cook’s pride. I absolutely couldn’t feed them some half-assed, tasteless slop.
Just as my head was filling with such thoughts, a sharp, foreign scent struck my nose.
An intense aroma that cut through my chain of thought.
Instinctively, I looked around and searched for the source of the smell.
It was coming from none other than the bag I was carrying.
“Ugh, shit.”
When I opened the bag, all sorts of spice smells billowed out.
Iseria and the kitchen soldiers beside me also frowned.
No, it looked like the lids of some spices I’d bought a few days ago had opened a little.
The spice powders scattered freely throughout the bag each showed off their scents as if declaring, “I’m the strongest!!”
‘Large-quantity food... spices... bread?’
This was totally curry, wasn’t it?
While organizing the spice bottles inside the bag, I suddenly lifted my head.
A dish with a taste and aroma these medieval soldiers had absolutely, under no circumstances, never, ever experienced anything even similar to.
A menu that could not be made with the preservation techniques and distribution systems of this era, one only I could make because I had the free-win, click-and-done [Mana Market].
“Guys. Bring out all the ingredients for today’s portion.”
Tonight’s menu is curry stew and flatbread!