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Duke Thibault of Montassard was uncertain of how much trust he could actually give to their savior, despite the fact that she had rescued them from A-rank Arachnoids that were about to devour them. She even saved the prince from a blue ogre as he had claimed. However, one thing's for sure: she wasn't human, or at least, Thibault didn't believe she was.
Upon her arrival, every fiber of his being screamed at him to run. Duke Thibault had never fled from a monster, not even those of S-rank and higher. He hardly ever known fear, and he even confronted a few individuals blessed with S-class stats, but this woman was different.
He feared her.
He felt like an ant in the hands of a praying mantis.
The last thing he expected was to hear her tell them that they needed a bath.
So, the S-class woman's familiars—the flame fox and the ice fox—led them to the back of the cottage. Behind it stood another one-story building, but it was wider, and subtle steam was escaping from the open windows. The familiars, now in the size of normal foxes, gently guided each soldier inside the building. Meanwhile, the S-class woman entered the cottage, saying she would prepare lunch.
Was it already noon? Thibault couldn't tell.
Once inside, they found themselves in a room that resembled a reception area. To the right, there was a table with at least nine folded towels of different neutral colors. Thibault became suspicious.
"What is this place?" Fabien asked.
"This... This looks like one of those bathhouses in Ostia Florin," Sir Evander, the half-elf B-class knight who served Baron Aviret, said. "But different."
"Different how?" Another soldier asked, and this time it was one of his knights, Sir Cedric.
"It's less grand and more cozy... I think..." Evander wasn't too sure of himself but Thibault understood what he was saying. There were several items in the room that he couldn't out right identify, and even the table didn't seem like it was made from wood. However, the overall décor conveyed comfort.
"Yip!"
"Yip, yip!"
The foxes were trying to get their attention again as they pointed at red curtain portiere were a bit of steam was escaping into the reception area. Thibault moved forward first to inspect what was beyond the red curtains only to find a more spacious room with a wide, steaming pool of water decorated with stone and slab.
Evander was the next to follow and he confirmed with a nod. "Yes. This is definitely like the public baths in Ostia Florin."
It didn't take that long for them to figure out how to utilize this bathhouse, especially with Evander giving them instructions, though half the time he was unsure. Apparently, there were devices here that seemed advanced, especially the gadget that could spray water. Then there were soaps in liquid form inside these cylindrical containers. Again, Thibault couldn't tell what sort of material the bottles were made from.
Despite the strangeness of it all, the bathhouse was incredibly inviting. Thibault wanted to drop his guard and enjoy this blissful hot bath, especially after weeks of trudging through the Woods of Purgatory, but he still couldn't shake off this apprehensive feeling. Not only that, but he could tell someone, or something was keeping an eye on them, though without any murderous intent. If he had to describe the gaze, it was like having his servants present during bathing.
Fabien then let out a sigh of satisfaction as he sunk into the water, his head tilted back, resting on the stone.
"If this is a dream, please don't wake me up," he begged.
Philip chuckled a bit while he had the red fox in his arms. "I can hardly believe where we find ourselves..."
"This is all so strange," Baron Stuart Aviret said, getting the prince's attention. "I mean, how did you meet her, Your Highness? And why does she live in these woods? What is this place?"
"I do not know, but when you all told me to run, I didn't get very far. A blue ogre cornered me, and I thought for sure I was done for," the prince began recalling his first encounter with the black-armored woman, staring up at the open ceiling where the steam was escaping. "But then arrow pierced through the creature from behind, turning to vines that trapped ogre. In an instant, it was pulled into a white portal and vanished."
"And that's how she saved me. At first, I thought that she might be from the Arkanthal Empire, but why bother saving me?" Philip pondered aloud. "I introduced myself, but she didn't seem all that interested. Rather, she was curious. So then I thought, if she could kill that blue ogre so easily, then maybe she could aid us. I mean, she's helping us right now and we're enjoying comforts few have in the Woods of Purgatory."
Indeed.
The Woods of Purgatory covered most of Ozea, situated at the heart of the continent. Once, a kingdom of fey-like creatures, akin to elves, thrived here, but then dungeons began appearing. These dungeons were tougher to conquer than elsewhere. And because of that, the ruling kingdom was eradicated, and so did its neighbors. Afterwards, new countries rose from the ruins and ashes of dead kingdoms, but none ventured deeper into the woods without suffering heavy losses. While escaping the Arkanthal Empire, the First prince's retinue started with fifty soldiers; now, only eight of them remained, determined to return Prince Philip to Devontae Kingdom. It wasn't easy protecting an F-rank like the first prince, especially with the dangers surrounding the Woods of Purgatory. They faced giant spiders, greater basilisks, a pack of hellhounds, king anacondas, and most recently, spider people.
Thibault wondered how this strange woman was able to survive this place and how long she dwelled in it.
Who is she, really?
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While I gave my order to Chione and Pele to take care of our guests in the bathhouse, I made my way back in to my cottage where the kitchen was already prepped by the unseen servants, ready for me to get dinner ready. Lunch? It was just a little pass noon, so late lunch. Too early for supper.
Now what should I make? Obviously, it would have to be very filling for these hunters that had survived this place. Woods of Purgatory. I had no fucking clue I was living in such a dangerous place. I mean, yeah, it should be obvious considering the amount of monsters I've faced were average A-rank and above, but still, it's a shocker for me: a resident. While technically Coniston isn't located in the woods, it's still my neighborhood in a way with all the other S-rank gates that I kept around, like the Arachnids.
Anyway, food, food...what to prepare? Maybe something easy to eat and fill up. Something to recover their strength.
Ah! What about arroz caldo?
Arroz caldo is a Filipino dish that my Filipino friend once gave me when I was sick. While it's mostly served as a snack, or appetizer, it's also like having chicken soup when you're sick. The one she made for especially had ginger and turmeric.
Alright! Arroz caldo, it is!
First, let me buy the ingredients on the Supermarket Online. Since I have about nine guests, and taking account to my foxes and slime familiar that eat a lot, I should get 20 chicken drumsticks and 10 chicken thighs. Definitely, I'll have to use two big pots so all the ingredients would cook properly and efficiently. Hmm... maybe I should use a pressure cooker for this one? It will cook better if I did that, so, since I already had one, let me add another one just like it to the cart.
Okay, for the rest of the ingredients, I'll need to get 5x nobs of ginger, 2x stalks lemongrass, 3x red onions, some scallions, jasmine rice, a dozen eggs, glutinous rice, chicken bullion cubes, saffron, and most importantly 10-20 cloves of garlic, because just like kids to their Asian parents--you're never enough.
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
Anyway...
First, get some hard boiled eggs. Start boiling hot water and put the eggs in for 10 minutes then turn off the heat. Next, I get two of the pressure cookers and with the help of two unseen tiny servants, we started searing up the diced onion. Once it was fragrant, I added in the ginger and garlic. Once the garlic and ginger are browned, put in the chicken. I left it to cook at medium heat for 10-15 minutes. Then, I added half and half of jasmine rice and glutinous rice. Stir it around before adding water to the pot. Get it to a boil and then add the bullion cubes. To cook fully, just put on the lid and let it pressure cook for 30 minutes at medium high heat, but keep checking on it every 8-10 minutes.
Ah! I forgot the turmeric.
Thankfully, the unseen servants already grated the turmeric and I quickly added them to the pots. Haha, there's always something I forget to add even if all the ingredients are right there for me to take at the counter.
Halfway through cooking, take the lid off and add in the lemon grass. I had bundled up the lemongrass and tied it up so that it would be easier to take it out once it's done cooking. I stir the pots, making sure no rice was sticking to the pot and added more water if necessary, before closing the lid again and letting it stew a little longer.
While waiting for it to cook, I started peeling the hard boiled eggs and cut them in half.
After 15 more minutes, the arroz caldo should be ready. Taking off the lids, the savory, spicy smell of rice porridge spread through the air, wetting the appetite. Yup! I had cooked it right. Now, I need to add the finishing touches. First, I add the sliced hard boiled eggs, distributing evenly to both pots. Then, I added in some saffron and stirred them all together. Also, I added a bit more water since I like my arroz caldo just a little soupier.
And finally, it's done! The chopped scallions will be added to their serving bowls, but otherwise, everything is set.
Tap, tap, tap!
Hm?
I turned to the whiteboard that I attached on the wall for the unseen servants to communicate with me.
|| 𝑔𝓊𝑒𝓈𝓉 𝒸𝓁𝑜𝓉𝒽𝑒𝓈
𝓁𝒶𝓊𝓃𝒹𝓇𝓎 𝓈𝓉𝒾𝓁𝓁 ||
"Ohh? Is that so?" So my visitors need some clothes since my servants are still working on them. That's fine. Maybe I can buy them some temporary clothes from the Supermarket?
I opened up the menu and browse through men's clothing. They were all men right? And their body frames all seem similar. Okay. I purchased about 9 pieces of black V-neck shirts, half are medium and half large, and same for the light grey casual sweatpants. I even added 9 open-toe slippers into the cart, bringing it all up to a grand total of $692.79. Once purchased, the unseen servants carried all the goods out of the kitchen, and straight to the bathhouse.
Now, I would have found that amount to be ridiculous in my previous life, and question myself hard as to why I didn't go for more affordable alternatives. However, I had told myself that if I had the money, I would always choose quality over everything, disregarding brand names. Upon arrival, I had found that my godfather, Elheim, had left me about 50,000 GP in my inventory. That's a lot. When I converted that gold into dollars on my Supermarket skill, the exchange for one gold coin was about $1,900. So, at the time, I placed about 20 GP into the supermarket for my survival.
Currently, I had about $15,832.19 left in the balance of the supermarket skill. Technically, for the whole year, my expenses for the whole year were around twenty-two thousand dollars, mostly for groceries and miscellaneous purchases (including building my own little library room).
Anyway, I should probably set the table now. My guests would be out soon.
Not ten minutes later, Chione and Pele came running in from the back door kitchen and my guests followed right in, entering the open-concept living space of my cottage home. They were all dressed in the clothes that I had bought off from the Supermarket store, and somehow they all looked liked models. Maybe, it's because of their ranks. Another effect of the dungeon phenomena is that all hunters become a little more attractive, depending on their ranks/classes. Following that logic, the prince must be the highest of ranks, right? Since he's very attractive, but...his aura told me otherwise.
As they walked in, most of them were gawking openly at their surroundings. Did it look weird? No. Their expressions showed more wonder and awe than repulsed. I suppose there were multiple items here in this room that would look out of place in a fantasy medieval settings. I mean, there were hanging string lights casted with the [light] magic spell hung nicely along the walls. Vintage poster art were also nailed, or pasted to the wooden-panel walls. There was also a jukebox, a piano, and a mannequin wearing an off-shoulder puff sleeve dress. It had some crystal applique on the chest and a long flowy tulle, all in the color of latte with too much cream and sugar. It was a beautiful gown that I bought out of a whim because I had money, and now it was there in the corner of the living room, a couple of feet away form the fire place as decoration.
Sometimes, I wonder why I buy shit I didn't need.
I cleared my throat, getting their attention. "It's a little late, but lunch is ready...? Is there something wrong?"
When I called out for them, they turned to my direction and immediately averted their eyes. Some of them were even blushing, and Prince Philip's face was completely red.
"Milady...!" Count Aviret called to me first as his eyes struggled to meet mine, finding the ceiling more comfortable to look at. "H-have we come in a bad time, or...?"
"Um, no. No you have not," I answered, confused of their reactions. "Why?"
He didn't answer, or at least, he didn't know how to tell me, but Fabien, the prince's protector, was a braver soul as he stammered out. "Y-your legs."
"Huh?"
"L-Legs...!"
Legs...? Then, I glanced down.
After I had sent the men to the bathhouse, I had changed out of my armor to something more comfortable. Currently, I was wearing a long-sleeve pastel blue flannel shirt and some short jeans. With this, I was able to move around more freely. It didn't make sense to keep wearing my armor while cooking. Plus, it's not like any of them were strong enough to actually seriously hurt me.
Oh! I get it now. Maybe I was showing too much skin?
"Hmm, I suppose I'll change. Everyone, could you please serve them their bowls?" I had asked.
The Prince and his retinue seemed confused, but soon after, the cooking pots and serving spoons were moving by themselves, ladling a spoonful of arroz caldo into their bowls. They stood there with jaws dropped, forgetting me for a moment as I went away to change my shorts to black sweatpants.
When I returned, they were still standing there gob smacked, and I had to urge them to take their seats. After a couple of minutes, we were finally settled into our seating arrangement. The Prince had taken the end of the table, and I sat next to his left side. Fabien sat to my left, and across from me sat the Duke Montassard and Baron Aviret.
Again, Fabien was the braver soul as he shoved a spoonful of arroz caldo into his mouth. He let out a surprised alarming noise, indicating he was hurt, which stunned me and the others. For a moment, I questioned whether or not I cooked it well, and even thought that maybe these soldiers will attack me for trying to poison them, but a second later, Fabien swallowed the food in his mouth and shouted,
"Good! It's so good!!" He said and he continued shoveling the savory rice porridge in his mouth, but this time, he was blowing it hard to cool it.
Ah... he must have burned his tongue.
At his response to my dish, Philip was the next brave soul to taste my dish and the rest of them soon followed suit.
"What is this?"
"Why is this good?"
"It's really delicious!"
"Is this cursed? If it is, I don't care! It's really good!"
Haha... cursed? What do they think of me? I mean, I know they think I'm some kind of monster considering that I live in the Woods of Purgatory, but come on, aren't they exaggerating a little? Did I not allow them to use the bath? I even gave them clean clothes.
"Watch your words." Surprisingly, it was Duke Montassard that scolded the soldier for the comment.
The knight must have realized this as he quickly turned to me and bowed his head. "I apologize! I meant no insult! This dish just tastes really good!"
I held my hand up dismissively. "Don't worry about it, eat as much as you like. I made enough for seconds."
Once I said that, I noticed some of them started eating faster despite the steam still coming out of the rice porridge.
"This is really good. I don't think I ever had anything like this," said the knight with the slightly pointy ears, looking at his bowl. "This is rice, isn't it? I don't think I ever had rice that tasted this good."
"It's jasmine rice and another type of rice that's stickier and sweet, but it's called glutinous rice," I answered.
"Jasmine rice? Glutinous rice?" the pointy-eared knight wondered aloud. "I wasn't aware that other types of rice existed. Are they all from where you're from?"
I shook my head. "Not really. You could say though that where I'm originally from, we're able to acquire many imported varieties from over a hundred different places."
"And...where exactly is that, my lady? If I may ask?" The half-elf prodded carefully.
Elandrin Caladrel
Alias: "Sir Evander"
Age: 36-years-old
Rank: B-Class
Class: Ranger
Stats:
○ Vitality | 301
○ Agility | 308
○ Attack Power | 426
○ Defense Power | 415
○ Magic Power | 466
Special Ability:
○ Tracker
○ Truth Sense
<< See more >>
Tracker? Truth Sense?
Looking at those special abilities, Sir Evander, or Elandrin, could actually sense if someone is lying. He wouldn't be able to tell what words were truth or lies, but he would know if someone is dishonest. As for Tracker, he has the ability to track anyone down so long as he had an object belonging to that person. It didn't seem like there was a limit on distance, so he could possibly track someone down halfway across the world, but I bet it would heavily depend on his magical power.
Also, seeing his stats, they're all relatively balanced. That's rather impressive.
Evander was still waiting for my response and I simply answered, "it wouldn't matter now. My former homeland is too far away for any mortal man to reach."
It wasn't lie. One had to die first to reach another world, and still you would need a deity to help you do that.
Evander frowned, but he didn't further asked me of it.
Instead, someone braver asked something bolder from me.
"Is that so? Then what exactly are you if you don't mind me asking, milday?" Fabien questioned without any reserve as he continued helping himself some more of the arroz caldo. "Ow!"
The table jolted and it seemed like Baron Aviret, who sat across Fabien, kicked his shin.
"I am so sorry for his rudeness, Lady Connie," Baron Aviret said, apologizing for the knight as he bowed his head. "We are truly grateful for your generous hospitality. Moving forward, we'd like to return to the Devontate Kingdom. Do you happen to know a way to traverse the woods safely?"
Traverse these woods safely? Come to think of it, they don't know that Coniston is a pocket realm, huh? They truly believe they're still in the so called Woods of Purgatory, and that I somehow found a way to live in it safely. Sadly, that's far from the truth. In reality, I was the strongest one in existance.
"As far as I know, there's no such thing," I answered plainly to them. "Gateways to dungeons open often in this area, and depending on the gate, monsters can break out because the dungeons were already full to begin with. Then, all of the denizens duke it out in these woods until only the victor remain."
Baron Aviret's brows then furrowed deeply. "That's..."
"Then how is it possible that you're here living among them? If these woods are as dangerous as you say, then shouldn't there be monsters right now attacking this area?" Another knight, sitting next to Elrand, had asked.
Should I tell them? I probably should. It's not like anyone would believe them anyway.
"Because I own this little pocket realm, and only those that I've given permission may enter Coniston," I said rather proudly.
Duke Thibault Montassard, who had been eating his portion slowly, had placed his spoon down with a clutter grabbing my attention. He looked at me with a shocking gaze filled with suspicioun and slight fear in his eyes as if he stumbled upon a realization.
"Are you saying this is your dungeon, Lady Connie? Are you the boss of this dungeon?"
At those words, all the soldiers turned to me and Fabian even froze midway eating. The Prince gave me a look of horror, but more so in disbelief.
According to the stats of my character profile, I would be considered a monster wouldnt I? And technically, this pocket realm would be gone if I did die somehow, so...
"...In a way... I guess I am."
They didn't like my answer at all.
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