“Is that Pigfeed?” Violante balked at what Joey was doing on his team’s side.

They all looked over at Joey, who was pouring crushed seeds of Pigfeed and the white, mushy substance that filled the inside of the nasty fruits into a pot with some milk and sugar.

“For all the rot on the World’s Tree,” Melina swore in a low voice. “He’s making food with Pigfeed?”

Several employees started retching.

It was simply astounding to all of them that the Human would make such a disgusting choice. Why would he ever use something like Pigfeed? Was he molded in the head? What was going on?

“Melina, do not underestimate him,” Flaminia said, focused on making the cream filling for the cake.

“Chef,” Melina replied, “they are never going to win. What are they even doing with that fruit?”

“No idea,” Flaminia muttered, straining her neck to see what the very tall homeless man and the others were doing.

“We don’t need to worry,” Violante said again. “Seriously, Pigfeed? What’s next? Is he going to put actual poison in it? Do we even have to taste it to know it will be crap? That worm should be ashamed of himself. We should have never allowed Humans in this city.”

The third-best chef, renowned for her generous backside, kept spouting casual hate and chatting with the other bakers as she mixed the sponge cake. While not everyone was comfortable with her manner of speech, she wasn’t getting much pushback either.

“Chef, I hope you’ll treat us all to dinner as soon as you get that sweet bread money,” Violante laughed out loud to Flaminia. “It’s like stealing from a child.”

But the head chef of Happy Bakery wasn’t happy at all.

She could recognize an extremely organized workplace when she saw one. Even though all the people on Joey’s side were amateurs, except Raissa, things were sailing smoothly. Whenever someone looked like they were about to make a mistake, Joey would almost [Teleport] to their side to offer more guidance; he was able to anticipate the mistakes that each one of them would make. And it looked like he had sorted them out in the perfect way. Everyone did their part without stepping on each other’s toes.

And there was another thing that was bothering Flaminia. She had initially thought she had gotten a slight headache from the shouting, but now, when she looked over at Joey as he worked, it felt as if he had an… aura? She had felt the same thing when he had shouted at them before, imposing his presence and shutting everyone up.

I must be going crazy, Flaminia thought before convincing herself that it would be just like stealing from a child, as Violante said. Even if the other team was well-organized, Flaminia had no idea how they thought they could beat someone with thirty levels on them—especially if they kept using Pigfeed. She didn’t know Raissa’s level for sure, but it couldn’t be much higher than 10. But not even a hundred Raissas could have competed with her. Every ten levels were an exponential growth in one’s profession. There was a reason why people considered levels the best indicator of how good one would be at their job–and Joey would learn how to respect that difference today.

“The blonde is cute,” Violante suddenly said, looking up from the batter. “I might go for him, you know?”

“Eeew,” another [Baker] said, “he’s homeless!”

“So? I didn’t say I was going to marry him.”

Flaminia looked at the women on her side, chatting merrily as they went ahead and mixed the ingredients she needed. A smirk escaped her lips.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

The presentation is going to be the most important thing, anyway. Even if your side doesn’t do everything perfectly, there’s no way Joey’s winning this.

Another employee suddenly came to Violante and started whispering in her ear.

“What?! Hahaha! Chef, they are using cheese for their cake. Cheese! What’s it going to be, a meat pie? Hahaha!”

Several people laughed out loud, slightly distracting Flaminia from her cream.

“Pigfeed, fruit, and cheese,” Melina shook her head. “Who’s going to eat that?”

For all Flaminia wanted to say that they shouldn’t underestimate Joey, cheese definitely convinced her of the opposite. It seemed like he was trying to lose this on purpose.

“Cheese?” Flaminia shook her head. “And look at what he’s doing with the Pigfeed!”

Everyone laughed as they saw Joey teaching the [Enchanter], who was clumsily trying to knead the paste of crushed Pigfeed.

“[Farmers] will love this,” Violante snorted. “Maybe that’s what he’s going for. He wants to become a [Farmer] and convince other [Farmers] to take him in.”

Flaminia finished stirring the caramel-infused custard and took it off the flame.

She gave a long look at Joey’s team as most of her team was done.

Unlike them, no one on Joey’s team muttered more than a few words, all intensely focused on their work, even the weird [Enchanter] who was kneading the paste with metal spatulas. The Pigfeed concoction looked extremely dark and completely unappetizing, to be honest. With all her baking experience, she had no idea what Joey was going for.

She looked at Raissa, who was mixing cheese with sugar.

What is that even going to do? Do they have mold in their brain?

“Flaminia,” Clodia approached from the side, seeing the small break everyone was taking.

“What?” Flaminia snapped, all tense.

“Nothing. I’ll be the one judging, together with my cousin. He apparently came to check on how Joey was doing. Great timing.”

…

Joey waved happily at Lucillus, who was standing at the edge of the kitchen with Clodia.

Clodia looked at her cousin, who was always frowning for one reason or the other. She had just told Joey that she and Lucillus would be the ones judging the competition. While she had plenty of baking experience, Lucillus was an impartial judge whose character was incorruptible.

Joey seemed happy about seeing Lucillus.

“The Human is taking part in a competition?” The brute, Antoninus, Lucillus’s partner, asked her.

“Yes.”

“Who’s going to win?” Antoninus asked.

“I—I don’t know,” Clodia bit her bottom lip. “Flaminia is the best in Amorium. But Joey seems exceptionally sure he’s going to win. How? I couldn’t tell. He’s using cheese, Pigfeed, and fruits – all together – to make a cake.”

“Pigfeed?” Lucillus didn’t know much about baking, but he definitely knew more than enough to surmise that Pigfeed wasn’t a good choice for a cooking competition.

“Pigfeed,” Clodia nodded.

“And we have to eat it?” Lucillus paled. “Are we cows?”

“I have tasted it, actually,” Antoninus said from the side while chomping on some cookies he had found lying around. “It’s not that bad, you know? And it really keeps you awake at night. Sometimes I sneak some Pigfeed when the [Captain] assigns the night watch to me. I forgot about cleaning up the equipment last week and got it for three days straight. Pigfeed really helps. You should all try it.”

“It does not surprise me that you eat Pigfeed,” Lucillus said, rubbing his face.

“By the way, doesn’t Joey feel different today?” Antoninus asked with his mouth full of cookies under a death glare from Clodia. “Like, he feels similar to [Captain] Drusillus a bit, no?”

Lucillus turned to his friend, confused.

“In what sense?”

“You know how the [Captain] has this intimidating presence about him?”

“His aura?” Lucillus frowned.

“Yeah. That. Doesn’t Joey feel the same? Look at how people not in his group are trying to stay away from him. Isn’t that the same effect?”

Now that Antoninus mentioned it, Lucillus examined how the rest of the employees were positioned around the bakery, and indeed, it did seem like most were squished to one side.

“I do feel something,” Clodia said herself. “But an aura? That idiot has no levels.”

“Still?” Lucillus blinked twice.

“Right?” Clodia looked exasperated. “He’s a baker—a real one. But he isn’t getting any levels. I have even asked if he was refusing them under truth-stone. He is not.”

Lucillus rubbed his forehead.

“Sounds annoying.”

“He is.”

“So, what happened here again?” Lucillus asked.

“Flaminia is behaving like a child – she got offended after Joey disrespected her—she insulted him, and so he challenged her at a bake-off; not only that, he trash-talked her at the level of my mother, Lucillus.”

“Aunt Marcella? Are you joking?”

“Not just that, but Joey also brought homeless people to be his assistants. Cousin, it turns out that, once again, you have made my life miserable.”

Lucillus grimaced.

“If you didn’t like him, why didn’t you fire him at the very start?”

“Oh, that’s the problem,” Clodia muttered, “I do like him. I like him a lot.”