“Lady Eilenna! The workers will handle setting up the stall, so let’s hurry and go get the ingredients!”
“R-right!”
Eilenna and I only confirmed the stall permit at the administrative office, then went straight outside.
If we stayed inside the building any longer, it felt like we’d be swept away by the crowd.
Crowds beget crowds, and curiosity calls forth more curiosity.
Other students, seeing the group surrounding the toast girl and wondering what was going on, had gathered around.
The cluster grew larger and larger until, before long, it became a single current like the wave pool at a water park.
The stall would be built on its own anyway.
All they had to do was assemble the frame and awning we’d prepared in advance, so it might even be finished faster than procuring the ingredients.
“Lady Eilenna, can you use magic? It’d be easier to move things if you at least have wind magic.”
“I’m not as good as Elioren, but I can use it. Don’t worry!”
“Nice! Please just gather the cooking tools we’ve set aside in the kitchen. I’ll take care of the ingredients.”
“Got it!”
We quickly ran all the way back to the mansion and packed up our things.
Good thing I’d set up the cooking tools ahead of time.
If we were rummaging through everything now and washing dishes, the entire lunch break would have passed us by.
Ah... The problem was the ingredients. What was I supposed to do about this?
This hadn’t been planned, so there was no carriage, nor any personnel from a merchant group I could ask for help.
The main ingredients were bread, eggs, cabbage, carrots, and various sauces.
There weren’t many kinds, but without a means of transport, there was no way we could carry them all.
Since we’d already attracted attention, couldn’t we just start business tomorrow?
One might think that.
But no matter how many times I emphasized it, it would never be enough—the mindset of the self-employed: always assume the worst.
Even if the place was packed today, popularity was something that could vanish like bubbles tomorrow.
It wasn’t that you row when the tide comes in; you had to already be rowing like mad so that when the tide came in, you could move forward.
‘Aah, I didn’t want to use it in a place like this.’
Until now, the only person who knew about my ability, [Mana Market], was Iseria.
I’d been detained because of the monster wave, so I’d had no choice but to reveal it then, and it seemed I had no choice this time either.
I’d wanted to at least build up more persuasiveness before telling Eilenna.
Iseria had been seriously worried that my ability could, if things went wrong, be branded as black magic or heresy.
If someone told me that, of course I’d get scared.
That was why I’d been careful every time I used my ability in the first place.
“Lady Eilenna! Please float this box of bread. Why is this so heavy!”
“Okay, but are the other ingredients all right?”
“Ah... it’s fine, so let’s just go for now.”
“Hmmm, got it. If you say so, Jinu.”
I groaned as I dragged out an absurd number of boxes of bread, then asked Eilenna to use magic.
Since I’d brought only bread and none of the other ingredients except seasonings, Eilenna looked puzzled.
But she let it pass, probably thinking I had something in mind.
After packing everything we needed, we ran full tilt toward the academy.
There was still quite a bit of lunch break left, but opening the stall and setting everything up would take no small amount of time.
At this moment, time had literally become gold.
We ran until we were gasping for breath and arrived at the academy.
Exhausted, Eilenna and I slowed our steps a little, panting heavily.
“Oh, man. Oh, man, I’m dying. We’re basically here, so let’s walk now.”
“Hieeek... huff.”
My precious stall finally came into sight.
But there was a somewhat strange scene in front of it.
“Huh?! There’s the owner!”
“He brought ingredients too. Is he going to open right away?”
“Food!!! Bring food!!”
The stall installation was complete, but the workers were flustered by the sudden crowd.
Worried that if they simply clocked out, the stall would be damaged by the students’ pressure, they were desperately guarding it.
And... in front of my stall stretched a long, endless line.
“Hey!! Black hair!! Hurry up and do something!”
“Ah, thanks. You can go!”
“Sure! Good luck!”
There was no time to leisurely prepare.
I went straight through the back door of the stall and entrusted the preparations to Eilenna.
“Lady Eilenna! Set up all the tools, and put the fire spirits in the burners! Once they’re heated, start toasting the bread!”
“O-okay! Got it!!”
As soon as she heard my instructions, Eilenna began setting up the shop in perfect order.
The practice we’d done beforehand was already paying off.
While she drew all the attention of the students packed in front of the stall,
I used [Mana Market] in the deep corner of the stall, in the storage area that couldn’t be seen from outside.
Cabbage, carrots, butter, eggs, milk, cheese, ham, ketchup, mayonnaise... Whew. There was more than I’d expected.
From next time, it’d be better to buy it from the market whenever possible.
I’d never exchanged this much all at once before, but it didn’t seem like it would be good for my body.
[Warning! The number and quantity of items being exchanged are large. Do you really wish to proceed with the exchange?]
As if it had read my mind, the status window message sent a warning unlike usual.
But what, was I going to die?
‘Gotta do what needs doing.’
There were about 700 students in the academy, but there was no way all of them would come buy toast.
So if I generously exchanged enough ingredients for 500 servings, that should do.
Back when I made meals for the knight order, there had been ingredients already prepared, and the menu was curry, so the mana consumption hadn’t been high.
With 1 kg of curry powder, you could make curry for 50 people. It was an ingredient with excellent cost performance.
Toast, on the other hand, wasn’t a dish you stir-fried or boiled in bulk all at once.
Each ingredient had to be cooked separately, and only after entering the mouth could they finally mix together.
In many ways, it was a menu that inevitably required more types and quantities of ingredients.
I shut my eyes tight and exchanged only the ingredients needed for today’s lunch business.
Whoooosh—
At that moment, along with the familiar sensation of mana draining away...
Crash—!
“Oof, shit.”
“Jinu! Are you okay? I heard a loud noise!”
“I’m fine! I just stumbled a bit.”
About seventy percent of my mana was drained away in an instant.
I had no way to precisely check my mana, but compared to what I usually used, I could roughly feel it.
Using this much at once made an intense dizziness wash over me for a moment.
Just in case, I’d braced my thighs hard before exchanging, and if I hadn’t, I would’ve fallen over.
I also needed to leave enough mana to control the fire spirits, and at this level, it was barely a safe margin.
Ingredients for 500 servings, delivered at the cost of my mana.
I quickly did some basic prep so they could be used right away, then filled the portioning containers that looked like the stainless food pans used in restaurants.
You know how, if you go to the side-dish refill corner at a neighborhood restaurant, the pickled radish and kimchi are in stainless side-dish containers?
Those are food pans.
Though the size markings for food pans used the cursed unit known as “inches”...
Modern food pans were standardized extremely well, making them convenient portioning containers that anyone in the food service industry had no choice but to use.
When I commissioned the stall through Callius, I asked for these food pans as well, and they’d made them perfectly.
There was no stainless steel in this other world, so I had to be satisfied with wood.
Wouldn’t chewing on wood shavings be better than eating iron powder?
Just kidding. All these wooden food pans had been coated with oil, so they were hygienically harmless.
If I tried to walk a tightrope with hygiene at the Imperial Academy and got caught, I had a feeling it wouldn’t end with just a business suspension.
Clatter, clatter—!
When I went out front carrying the food pans, Eilenna was busily finishing the setup.
“Huh? Where did you bring those from?”
“I’ll explain later. For now...”
“Owner!!! Open up!!”
“At this rate, lunch break is going to end...”
I’d started out cooking in the middle of a forest in some remote northern backwater, then gone to the land of the elves.
After taking the long way around, I had finally arrived in the capital.
The excitement welling up inside me was too much to describe with a simple phrase like “deeply moved.”
“Raise the shutter! Let’s go full speed!”
“Yeah!!”
It was only a small stall on the academy grounds, but the capital was still the capital.
In a massive market that could not even be compared to Silvaerin,
my debut match had just begun.
***
“Two ham and cheese toasts, please!”
“Thank you! That will be 30 copper coins!”
Jingle—!
Eilenna accepted the coins from the smiling female student.
Elves were fundamentally lacking in greed for possessions, but the clear clinking sound of metal hard currency piling up was rather pleasant to hear.
When customers entered the stall, the first thing they saw was the counter,
and beside it stood a huge griddle.
It was a natural shop layout that matched the movement of the customers.
Sizzle—!
The griddle was large enough to toast twenty slices of bread at once if packed full.
In front of that griddle, radiating fierce heat, Gang Jinu made toast with a skill that seemed almost possessed.
On one side of the griddle, divided into two sections, bread was toasted; on the other, the fillings were cooked.
“Wow, look at that guy. Was he a knight or something? His hands are insanely fast.”
“Hey. Why would a former knight be running a stall here? It doesn’t look that hard.”
“Hmm... I guess?”
Students unfamiliar with cooking murmured among themselves in front of the stall.
Whether they did or not, Gang Jinu cleanly flipped the thick vegetable egg patty,
and cooked while keeping his surroundings neater than a high-end restaurant.
If someone’s work looks easy, that person is a remarkable master.
Eilenna had done a little cooking on her own, and after deciding to help Gang Jinu’s stall, she had practiced kitchen work whenever she had time.
Seeing Gang Jinu’s sincere skill for the first time, she couldn’t help but be shocked.
He didn’t live long and age slowly like an elf, so what on earth were those hand movements he was showing now?
Like an elderly master who had sold toast for fifty years, Gang Jinu’s proficiency was beyond imagination.
‘Jinu is... even more amazing than I thought.’
Just how densely packed a life did one have to live to gain such skill at such a young age?
“Here are your two ham and cheese toasts~ Enjoy!”
“Thank you!”
The female student received the piping hot toast from Gang Jinu with eyes full of anticipation.
Then, together with the friend who had waited beside her, she immediately took a bite.
“Mmmph!! What is this sauce? It’s so good!”
“It’s sweet and salty—I want to bring some to Father too!”
Toast was a food you could easily eat while walking.
As if enchanted, the students tore into their toast and headed back to the academy main building.
“Wow... The smell is seriously insane. How many people are left in front of us?”
“Almost there now. Just hang in a little longer.”
“If the stock runs out at my turn, I’ll have no choice but to spread the fertilizer I developed in class. Very foul fertilizer.”
“Please, I beg you, don’t...”
The end of the long line of orders for the stall faced the academy main building.
So the students who bought toast ended up unintentionally tormenting the waiting students.
The academy’s students were divided into the Faculty of Magic, Faculty of Combat, Faculty of Alchemy, and Faculty of Administration.
Students from faculties far from Gang Jinu’s stall couldn’t help but feel anxious.
Gang Jinu, too, had a vague guess after seeing just how large the academy grounds were.
After all, the reason commoner students skipped meals in the first place was because it took too long to leave the academy to eat.
That was why Gang Jinu did not stop his hands despite the endless flood of orders.
‘I’m running low on cabbage and eggs. I should slice some more carrots too.’
Cabbage was used in the same form for both ham and cheese toast and street toast.
Compared to the other ingredients, it ran out far more quickly.
Gang Jinu swiftly placed new bread on the griddle, then took out a whole cabbage while the bread toasted.
Tatadadadang—!
After cutting it into quarters to make it easier to slice, Gang Jinu’s blade came down like an arrow.
The students waiting for toast in front of him watched in a daze.
“Wow, his knife skills are crazy fast.”
“I don’t think even the swordsmanship instructor could cut that fast?”
“Come on, students. A sword and a kitchen knife are different.”
Gang Jinu finished slicing the cabbage and soon completed the toast for the waiting students.
There wasn’t much of the whole cabbage he had prepared left either, so it was about time for customers to thin out.
“Jinu! One of each kind of toast. This is the last order!”
“Okay. Let’s go!”
Leaving only the French toast, which had to be slowly cooked over low heat, on a separate burner.
Gang Jinu’s hands moved with machine-like precision.
Bright red ketchup was spread smoothly over the golden-brown cabbage-and-egg pancake.
Sugar was scattered generously over the viscous ketchup, and a blanket of sandwich bread was laid on top.
On another slice of bread, he first spread a generous layer of that fresh, sweet-and-tangy sauce.
Then came an egg pancake, cooked tight to give it a soft, fluffy texture.
Add a little ham, cheese, and crisp shredded cabbage... and the ham-and-cheese toast was done too.
Meanwhile, from the burner set off to the side, a soft, pillowy aroma began to rise.
It was the signal that the French toast had cooked to just the right point.
The surface of the bread, richly fried in butter.
The tenderness of the milk fully settled inside the thick slices.
He topped it, likewise, with plenty of sugar and honey, completing the French toast as well.
At the same time, his stock of French toast, ham, and cheese ran out.
“Here are the three toasts you ordered. Looks like the ingredients ran out right on your turn, students. Enjoy.”
“Good thing we won’t have to sprinkle fertilizer after all.”
“Hey, don’t say weird stuff. Thank you!”
The students said something he couldn’t quite understand, but the last order was over.
Only when the front of the stall, which had been packed with people, opened up wide did the closing of business finally feel real.
Gang Jinu straightened his hunched shoulders and said,
“Ughhh!! Thank you for your hard work, Lady Eilenna. Was it manageable?”
“Yeah, it was fine. You worked harder than I did. I knew you were impressive, but you’ve shown me again.”
“Not at all. It’s just a small skill.”
When the stall had been in chaos, they had been too busy to talk.
But now that there was room to breathe, she could ask.
Eilenna brought up the question she had been keeping to herself.
“But where did you get all the ingredients? They weren’t already stored at the stall, were they?”
“Ah, that’s...”
There was no particular suspicion behind it.
It was simply genuine curiosity. After all, it had been an amount of ingredients that couldn’t possibly be improvised on the spot.
Yet at that simple question, Gang Jinu, unusually, floundered.
He looked deep in thought, his eyes like those of someone about to make a great confession.
At his suddenly serious attitude, Eilenna, too, began to feel nervous.
At last, just as Gang Jinu was about to open his mouth.
Click, clack—
“Hm, looks like business is going fairly well, chef.”
“L-Lady Ermia? What brings you here...”
“What do you mean? I told you I’d come by once.”
After lunchtime had passed, silence had settled over the street in an instant.
The sound of dress shoes, quietly breaking that silence, approached the front of the stall.
“Make me one too, will you? I’m curious... just how good it is that our students lined up like that.”
A peerless talent even her own master had envied.
A walking strategic weapon, and the highest authority of Arcadia Academy.
Ermia Belfast had visited Gang Jinu’s stall.