Ch.16The Cooking King Shota (2)

FWABABABAT-!!

I quickly sliced the cabbage into fine shreds.

Right after that, I immediately took out the lard. Surprisingly, we had some at home.

“What’s that? Butter?”

Eri tilted her head as she asked.

“Hmph. Your question reveals your low level of culinary knowledge.”

I smirked as I spread the lard on the heated frying pan.

“UGGGGH!! DISGUSTING!!!”

Eri reacted immediately.

“Ah… this is what we call lard.”

I promptly educated the ignorant one.

Yes, it was solidified pig fat. Anything fried in pig fat was bound to be delicious. It was on a completely different level of umami compared to regular cooking oil.

Well… it did have the downside of clogging drains if used too much, but Japan’s sewage situation wasn’t my concern. Right now, I was a seeker on the path of culinary excellence.

SIZZZZLE-!!!

As the oil began to heat up, I immediately threw in the cabbage and meat and started stir-frying.

When they were about half-cooked, I tossed in the teriyaki sauce. No need to make it from scratch. The store-bought version tasted better. It was the optimal sauce created by smart people at food companies who stayed up all night researching. If you can’t make it properly yourself, it’s better to use the commercial product.

SWOOSH-! SWOOSH-!

I quickly stir-fried the vegetables and meat.

“Come on… you’re just stir-frying. Why are you being so showy about it?”

Eri immediately criticized.

“Ah… so to your eyes, it just looks like simple stir-frying. Can’t be helped.”

I shrugged my shoulders.

“ARGH! Everything you say is so irritating!!”

Despite her complaints, Eri diligently continued cooking. She didn’t want to lose this competition either.

Here’s another key point: fry until it’s slightly charred. A bit of burnt flavor is the best seasoning.

“SIZZLE!!”

At the right moment, I turned off the heat and let the teriyaki sauce simmer in the residual heat.

“Seriously. Kehehehe. Could you stop… making sound effects… every time you do something?! Hehehehe!!”

Eri tried to hold back her laughter while focusing on her cooking.

Anyway, one dish complete. I quickly wiped the frying pan and immediately added more lard. There was a slight soy sauce aroma left, but that was actually better. Next, I made Chinese-style fried rice.

——–

Eri had also finished her cooking.

The dishes were placed on the table.

Blue corner: My Chinese-style fried rice and yakisoba vegetable stir-fry.

White corner: Eri’s typical home-style cooking. The classic combination of grilled fish, miso soup, rolled omelet, and salad.

“Hmph.”

Victory is mine. Certainly, Eri had good cooking skills. But that was it. No impact. No impact at all.

“Well then, shall we all eat together?”

My mother smiled as she picked up her chopsticks. Well… we needed to eat dinner anyway. I decided to eat Eri’s food, and Eri would eat mine.

“By the way, Shota, where did you learn to cook? You’ve never cooked once in your life until now.”

My mother asked me.

“……..”

Honestly, I was caught off guard. It’s a possession bonus. That explanation wouldn’t be accepted. No, I’d be taken to a psychiatric hospital.

“I learned from YouTube.”

I immediately mentioned the universal information source that is YouTube.

“Oh, I see?”

My mother accepted it right away. Amazing, YouTube.

“There’s a lot of useful stuff on YouTube.”

Eri nodded.

“Well then… let’s try it?”

My mother smiled as she picked up her chopsticks.

“Thank you for the food.”

Eri immediately tried my fried rice and yakisoba.

“Oh, by the way… don’t report this to the media. It would be troublesome if I suddenly got called to be an Imperial chef or something. I just want to live the life of an ordinary high school student.”

Before Eri started eating, I warned her.

“You’re so full of it!!! Talking nonsense every chance you get!!”

Eri giggled as she ate the fried rice.

Soon, Eri’s eyes widened.

“It’s… delicious…”

Eri began eating the fried rice and yakisoba with amazement.

“Why are you explaining such an obvious phenomenon? The sun rises in the east and sets in the west. And my cooking is delicious.”

“Stop being so full of yourself!! I’m trying to eat here… pfft!”

Eri laughed as she continued eating my food.

Then, Eri stared at me intently.

She probably wanted to know what I thought of her cooking.

I casually placed some fish on top of my rice and took a bite. Then I had a piece of the rolled omelet, followed by a sip of miso soup to cleanse my palate, and finally some salad to clear away any heaviness. A small course meal in everyday life.

“It’s delicious…”

I admitted it. Honestly, I had prejudged her cooking skills, but I was wrong. It was pleasantly tasty.

“See?! I told you I’m pretty good! Despite how I look, I’m the one who cooks at home!!”

Eri said.

“Wow… that’s impressive.”

I said to Eri. It truly was impressive.

“At my house… I have a lot of younger siblings. I do all the housework.”

Eri explained.

Eri… she was more admirable than I thought.

“Eri will make a good bride someday.”

I found myself saying.

“Y-yes… right?”

Eri’s face suddenly turned red, then she smiled happily.

“Eri, would you like to be my daughter-in-law after you graduate? I’d feel at ease with someone like you.”

My mother said with a smile.

“I’d love to!!! Can I call you Mother?!!”

Eri immediately rushed to embrace my mother.

“O-one more time…”

My mother seemed to take a critical hit from that.

“Omoni!”

Eri said with a cute nasal tone.

“Hnnngh…!”

My mother immediately clutched her heart.

“You… you can live with us!!”

My mother suddenly accelerated.

“No… that’s going too far.”

I immediately stopped my mother.

——-

Anyway, we had an enjoyable dinner.

“So, Mother, who won the contest?”

I asked about the result of the competition.

Well… my mother had been given a difficult role. She would inevitably have to announce my victory. But that might cause accusations of favoritism. I understand your difficult position, Mother.

“Eri-chan wins.”

My mother immediately raised Eri’s hand.

I was the one suffering from favoritism.

“Yaaaay!!!”

Eri jumped up and down with joy.

“W-why…”

Honestly, my food tasted better. It was obvious from the empty plates. Everyone had eaten more of my food. So why?!

“Nutrition, and love. That’s what’s missing.”

My mother said.

“Eri’s cooking shows her desire to provide balanced nutrition to the person eating it. That’s love. Shota’s cooking is delicious… but that’s all. There’s no heart in it.”

My mother spoke in a rather serious tone.

My mother… she’s surprisingly good at going with the flow.

“Heart… I see. The human heart…”

Have I been outdone by humans again? Human beings possess a strong light that I don’t have. A warm light that a machine like me cannot understand.

“Ah… this warmth, is this the human… heart?”

Imitating an android awakening to emotions, I turned my head with mechanical movements.

“Hahaha!! What kind of acting is that?!! But you’re good at it!!! This is killing me. Hehehe!!”

Eri laughed brightly.

In the end, Eri was declared the winner.

“Ah… that was fun.”

Eri was getting ready to go home. She said she needed to prepare for her younger siblings who would be coming home from school soon.

“I’ll walk you home.”

I said to Eri.

“Oh… is that okay?”

Eri’s eyes widened.

“It’s the proper thing to do. And…”

There was something I really wanted to say.

“I had fun too. Let’s continue to be friends, Eri.”

That was my honest feeling.

“……..”

For a moment, Eri had a blank expression. Moreover, her face had turned strangely red.

“Really… Shota is such a charmer.”

After saying something I couldn’t quite understand, Eri immediately linked her arm with mine.

“Escort me.”

Eri said.

“Sure.”

I decided to walk Eri home.

Eri’s house wasn’t actually that far from here. I had an ominous feeling that Eri might come over to play every day.

“See you tomorrow.”

I waved to Eri.

“Yeah.”

Eri said that and was about to open the gate and return home.

But that was a fake-out.

Smooch-!!

Eri suddenly stole a kiss from my lips.

Moreover, like a ninja drawing a hidden weapon, she quickly took out her smartphone and pressed the camera button.

Click-!

The moment of our kiss was captured on her smartphone.

“Hehehe. I’ll treasure this forever.”

Eri smiled and twirled around.

“…I love you, Shota.”

Eri said impulsively before scurrying through the gate.

“……….”

I was left dumbfounded at the scene.

In all my life, I never expected to receive a confession. What should I do now? I was suddenly lost in thought.

——–

After spending an enjoyable day with Shota, Eri stood at her entrance, trying to somehow control her racing heart.

“…I just marked him as a guy to date for relationship experience.”

Eri muttered to herself.

That was her initial reason for approaching him. Shota seemed kind enough, and he didn’t seem too intimidating as a first boyfriend. She also wanted to mess with someone Umi seemed strangely interested in.

“But… I ended up really liking him.”

Eri had to admit it.

Shota was kind. Moreover, he always made her laugh with his nonsensical remarks.

‘When he was concentrating on writing his novel… he looked cool.’

He looked incredibly sharp. His neckline was also slender… thinking about this made Eri’s face turn red again.

The rule is that whoever falls in love first loses. And Eri acknowledged her defeat. Eri had fallen hard for Shota.

“First… I should proudly declare war on Umi.”

Because snatching him away secretly wasn’t her style.

Eri immediately sent the photo from her phone.

It was the picture of her kissing Shota.

‘I stole Shota’s lips.’

She added a playful comment.

Who could have known that one photo would cause such a major upheaval?

———

A photo arrived for Umi, who was leisurely relaxing in her room. It was from Eri.

“Huh…?”

Umi’s expression immediately froze.

It was a photo of Eri forcibly taking Shota’s lips.

“HUUUUUH?!!!!!”

About three seconds later, Umi let out a scream.

———-

Anyway, back to Shota’s perspective.

Well, that concludes the evening schedule… what remained was today’s exploration of the other world. I had already written three novels, so I couldn’t have spent the day more perfectly.

Ding-!

As expected, a text message arrived.

It was from Taiga.

‘Tonight at 12. Meet at the incident site.’

The tone was extremely businesslike and authoritative. Well, that was typical of Taiga.

‘Ok’

I immediately sent a reply.

‘What kind of response is that’

Taiga casually ignored my attempt at being cute.

——–

At midnight, I grabbed the metal pipe hidden behind my closet.

And as usual, I climbed out the window into the night streets.

The location Taiga mentioned was quite significant in the game. In the original story, it was near the place where Arigiri Shota was murdered. Though it was someone else who died, not me, the location was the same.

There, the player investigates the incident and has their first encounter with monsters from the other world. Then teammates join one by one—the royal road of urban fantasy, you could say.

“Oh, you’re here.”

I waved to Taiga.

Taiga was standing majestically near the scene. She was even holding her signature weapon, a baseball bat. A fearsome older sister character holding a baseball bat was doubly intimidating.

“Yeah. By the way… the streets definitely get weird after midnight.”

Taiga said.

“Yeah. It seems people’s cognitive abilities decrease when monsters start appearing.”

I roughly explained the game’s background setting.

Ordinary people can’t see the monsters, and they barely notice humans wandering the night streets. Everything becomes hazy.

“Yeah. Usually at this hour, cops would be bothering us with random checks and stuff, but they haven’t.”

Taiga said.

“But… why did you come here?”

I asked about that point.

“The recently discovered corpse, that was the work of a monster too, right? My grandmother… died the same way.”

Taiga said.

“……..”

“If there are casualties, it means there’s a vicious monster around here. Let’s kill it.”

Taiga said with an ominous tone and a smile.

“Right…”

The wording “kill it” was too extreme, but I understood what needed to be done.

Well, this might be a good opportunity to help Taiga grow. I thought this as I surveyed the scene.