When I woke up, I was coughing a lot of water and trembling on the cold floor of the dungeon. Slowly, my eyes adjusted to the surroundings and realized that I had left the pool.

‘You are welcome… that is what I wanted to say, but I guess we are even since you swam and also had to cough this much water out of your chest.’

The other guy took over when I collapsed, but just for a short while… he immediately put me in control when he realized that my body was cold and coughing a lot thanks to all the water it got inside me.

Still, I didn’t have the energy to complain… I was physically and mentally tired. I just wanted to rest… the idea that I had to swim this much again to leave the dungeon only made me feel like I wanted to postpone that worry as much as possible.

In any case, my body recovered, and I eventually got up while looking around. It was the perfect moment to kill me with some traps or monsters, but that wasn’t what was around me.

I was in a grand chamber that immediately stole my attention. The place radiated opulence, the kind of extravagance that instantly made me think of a high-society party or one of those overindulgent buffets for the elite. The air itself felt richer, like it carried the smell of luxury, though there was no food in sight yet.

There were no chairs to be found, no seating arrangements, like one might expect. Instead, the focal point of the room was a massive round table at its center. From above, it would have looked like a perfect ring, its inner space empty save for the intricate design carved into the polished wood.

The table wasn’t empty either. It was laden with plates of all shapes and sizes, each meticulously arranged, all covered with glimmering metallic domes. Their polished surfaces reflected the light, adding an air of mystery and anticipation to the display. Whatever was beneath those covers was concealed for now, but it wasn’t hard to imagine delicacies as rare and refined as the chamber itself. The sight made me pause, almost feel out of place, like I had accidentally stepped into someone else’s world, a world of wealth, power, and indulgence.

‘What the hell is going on here? Is this the end of the dungeon already?’

‘Seems like it. I can’t see a treasure box or anything like that around here.’

I checked the area a bit more, but there was nothing to be found or seen… only the table and the food hidden on the plates. That should be related to the job that I could obtain here? So, cooking job? I wasn’t into cooking before, and it was hard to imagine how food could help me fight… There were some games where food offered some bonuses, though.

Well, I had to start at some point, so I just approached one of the plates and then lifted the dome-like thing. What was that called again, cloche?

You received a job quest: Gastronomic Gladiator - Eat all the dishes in three hours and survive

Rewards: A Job.

Time Limit: 2: 59: 59

‘Hm? Is that it? This will be easy.’

The other guy was being as naïve as ever… as if anything truly valuable in life could be easy. The final part of the quest also concerned… eat everything and survive. That meant that I could eat and not survive. In fact, that was very likely.

‘I didn’t survive all this bullshit to die of food poisoning, but…’

I raised the cloche and frowned when I found the first dish… as expected of high-class food. It was just a spoonful of something yellow that looked like cheese. It smelled like cheese as well… was that a good thing?

‘What are you waiting for? Time is ticking.’

I was preparing myself, but this moron couldn’t see what I had to consider before eating here. Still, the anxiety would only make things harder, so I decided to start already… I took the spoonful trying not to taste it that much, but I knew that eating without chewing would only make things harder for me.

It had a gentle sweet and spicy taste. It made me think that I was eating a marshmallow covered in ketchup… it was pretty good, so that only made me feel more confused. After a couple of seconds, I didn’t realize anything odd about me… but I noticed my body getting warmer.

Name: Ryan Winters

Class: Rogue Lv 02 (00/600)

If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

Job: (00/000)

HP: 140/160

MP: 140/180

SP: 140/160

Strength: 19 + 05 (3591)

Magic: 16

Dexterity: 18 + 05

Vitality: 16

Wisdom: 18

Endurance: 16

Toughness: 18

Spirit: 16

Adaptability: 18

Free Points: 12

Origin Coins: 811

Skills: Backstab (Basic), Stealth (Basic), Pick Lock (Basic)

Job Skills:

My strength increased by five points, but there was a timer on the side of the increase. It seemed that my guess was right, food could buff my parameters here too. Still, soon I began to sweat, and I noticed that my SP began to decrease.

‘I guess it isn’t that convenient, huh?’

‘Maybe at some point, you will be able to cook something that won’t have such demerits.’

‘We will see.’

I moved to the next dish… this one was a decent chunk of meat that looked like a fillet. There was even sauce around it. It was a bit red, but it didn’t look like blood.

‘Come to think of it, for how long has this food been waiting here?’

‘Man… Who. The Hell. Cares! Don’t think about every single detail.’

The other guy spoke like a true moron who only lives for the moment… Regardless, I began to eat the piece of meat. It was definitely better than any meat I had eaten outside… the good food made me relax. Was that the goal of the trial? I looked around while chewing… There were at least fifty dishes around… 48 more to go. Could I eat that much?

Regardless, the dish increased my endurance this time around and a bit more of my stamina began to be consumed. If I were to stop now, I would be fine, but I had to keep eating it to complete the quest. Maybe this was why I had the chance to get the honeycombs, but would that be so convenient?

I went to taste the third dish, and it was a salad this time around… it made me frown, but I didn’t hesitate to eat it as well. I felt my magic increasing, but my MP began to decrease as well now and then.

‘I have been eating periodically lately, and maybe that is why I am not feeling full yet.’

I was never the type to eat a lot, so just this kind of meal would have been enough for me. I was fine eating anything that had a lot of salt. Essentially, I had the tasting buds of a kid.

I only began to feel the food filling my stomach on the tenth dish and at that point in time, I also felt my stomach getting a bit upset. To the point that my health began to drop, this was bad… I decided to use the honeycombs to counter that effect. Despite all the flavors in my mouth, I didn’t feel nauseous or sick of it, so I resumed the buffet.

‘I guess I am in trouble…’

When two hours were left for the quest to end, I had only eaten fifteen dishes and I was already full. I had no idea what I could do in this situation aside from forcing myself to eat and get sick in the process.

‘It is fine if you vomit all that later.’

‘It definitely isn’t fine…’

Some of the effects of the energy drain were ending, but all of them lasted one hour too… It was already annoying enough to handle them, but I had to stack more than a few each time now if I wanted to complete the quest.

I strengthened my resolve and then kept going. My resolve soon weakened as I began to feel sick. I got better when I used the honeycombs, but the process of getting sick and better soon after only made things more unbearable.

‘Stop bitching and just eat everything.’

I didn’t know if the other guy said that or if I thought it myself… the weird thing was that while I felt full and sick, I still felt the taste of everything. Most likely, it was designed for me to feel like that. It felt like a new weird type of torture.

When I was in the middle of the process, I started to feel like throwing up. At that point in time, I truly decided to take a break and then laid down on the cold floor to recover a bit. My energy sources began to drop and recover every second thanks to the food effects and the honeycombs. At that point in time, I could tell that some of the food was poisonous… while not deadly poisonous by themselves, all of their effects combined were truly that much dangerous.

I recalled something and then forced myself to get up and jog around the area. I knew that a fast metabolism increases the body’s ability to process and eliminate waste products and toxins. When someone has food poisoning, the body produces toxins as a result of the harmful microorganisms in the contaminated food. A faster metabolism helps the body break down and expel these toxins more quickly, reducing the duration of those troublesome effects.

Once the blood began to warm up my body, I began to feel better. The enhanced blood flow helped transport immune cells throughout my body more efficiently, which improved the body’s ability to fight off infection. It was useful to know that my biology lessons in high school weren’t a total waste of time… finally.

Once I began to feel much better, I resumed eating and decided to keep moving around to make the food be processed faster. I knew that I shouldn’t exercise all that much after or during a meal, but I found the right balance between both. I still felt sick, but it was bearable now.

When one minute was left, there were still two dishes left. I put them inside my mouth without a care and began to chew everything. Still, the quest wasn’t completed… it seemed that I had to put it all down before that could happen. At this point in time, my jaw was already asking why it had to suffer that much, but I was forced to endure it. When only three seconds were left, I took the final gulp.

You completed a job quest: Gastronomic Gladiator - Eat all the dishes in three hours and survive

Rewards: Gastronomist Job