The human homes were strange to him. The idea that each family was like a clan unto itself made enough sense, but the separation of their homes from the others of their kind was still quite weird. What if they were attacked? Rather than getting to bundle up in the back of a cave, they would be forced to fight on two fronts or more.

But Chef couldn’t deny that it was much more pleasant and calming to live and go about your life when there were fewer people living with you. Also, more dangerous and concerning since if something sneaks up on you, there’s no one around to die before you.

Life was a balancing act, and his silent and handsome guide had no interest in entertaining him. Thus, he was forced to ponder silly things out of boredom. Just another set of things to balance: boredom and entertainment.

Suddenly his guide came to a halt, as they had reached their destination at some point. It hadn’t exactly been the longest walk ever, but this was quite the size for a settlement. Chef wouldn’t have thought the dumb creatures had it in them. Or perhaps having a base of this size would just increase the probability of attack, thus making it a moronic decision.

Chef leaned toward to latter. After all, it hadn’t been that hard for him to find them.

Finally reaching their apparent destination, the guide held up its hand and hit a particularly strange looking piece of wood twice. Chef did not quite understand the point of it, but after a while the piece of wood swung to the side to reveal the interior of the home and the person within. What a novel idea, perhaps some humans were actually smart.

Is that why they group up? To increase the odds that a smart one will be born or show up to save them from themselves?

Chef paused his thoughts as he realized that both people were staring at him and his beautiful bear fur outfit. Honestly, he couldn’t blame them. It was magnificent. Probably. He couldn’t really get a good look at it what with being the one wearing it and all.

“Call me Chef. Dad of Mirri is cook?”

The person in the home perked up at that. Chef wasn’t exactly sure what a ‘dad’ was, but he could already see a similarity in their behavior.

“Yes, I am Mirri’s father. I’m also currently a cook class and am quite happy with it. Oh, excuse me. My name is Therace. Thank you for taking care of my son.”

The cook lowered his head stiffly with his hands at his side. An interesting gesture and one that would be taken to mean “please remove my head” were he surrounded by goblins. Given the context though, it seemed to mean “thank you.”

Goblins and humans are really really different.

“Cooking trade with you and Mirri. You show me. I show you.”

The person smiled at that and led him into the home, talking all about things that Chef didn’t understand. Like father like son, apparently.

Even Chef had to admit that the interior was nice. There were tables and chairs and all sorts of neat looking things he had no ideas as to what they did. He figured that box like stone thing in the corner was for fires and understood that concept fairly easily, mostly on account of the fact that there was a fire inside of it. But what purpose could those strange things hanging on the walls possibly serve? They were just… colorful cloth? That one had a resemblance to a person’s face on it. Who would waste their time on that?

“Oh, do you like our paintings? My wife makes them in her spare time. That one,” he said, pointing to the thing resembling a human, “is of her mother. From memory, sadly, but very beautiful and more impressive for it.”

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

Chef didn’t have anything to say to that since he had some difficulty telling people apart already. The painting could have just as easily been of the cook or the maybe woman he had met days ago.

“Looks like Larese to me.”

Chef decided to remind this person of the pecking order by disparaging what he clearly cared deeply about. The tears forming in the corners of his eyes were a sure sign of that, though who smiles when they cry? What weird creatures these humans are.

“Yes, I think so too. But come now, I’ll show you the kitchen and we can get to work. I no longer have any of my flour, sadly, but we have plenty to work with.”

Entering what it called the kitchen, Chef was speechless. He had built his original kitchen slowly over the course of hundreds of days, but this place made it look like he was just cooking out of a cave. Which, admittedly, he was.

There was a proper place for a fire and stove, more than one size of pot and pan, and even utensils! Stupid Chief had kept all of those for himself so he never got to have any. They were all carved wood it seemed, the utensils not the pots and pans, obviously, but even still Chef felt a mighty urge to steal.

Later, he told himself. There will always be time to steal later.

“I have flour. Show me what you make with it.”

Chef wanted his flour more than anything really, but he also didn’t really want to see strange pulsing flesh every time he baked. He didn’t really know why, but it just felt wrong. He was pretty sure that a baked good wasn’t supposed to have a heartbeat, so he needed to see what other bakers made. Then he could steal their secret techniques and make his next baked good even more delicious!

The father of Mirri began to prepare the pan and then went to grab some fire from the fire box in the large room before. As it went, Chef used his spell to identify the temperature he was cooking at for future use. Then the cook grabbed a jug, removed the lid, and poured something like grease onto the pan but only a little bit. It was also a very different smell than grease was.

“What is that?”

Chef knew better than to ask every question that he had when watching humans in their day to day lives lest they realize he wasn’t just some strange hermit. But, if he didn’t ask questions about cooking and ingredients, he could never get better. Well, his number would go up, but he’d still be stuck eating goopy meat and berries for the rest of his life and that just wasn’t acceptable.

“It’s oil. You can make it with animal fat, but mostly I use nuts for it. I can show you how to make it later, but it’s used to help cook food while adding flavor and infusing moisture. That way you don’t end up with something too dry.”

Chef, having had nothing but dry meat and goopy slurry for the past several days was very interested in this oil. Wise of the human to hold back on delivering such important wisdom; it would be a hard trade for him to make.

“Next we can add in some flour if we have it or whatever else we want to use.”

Chef immediately summoned a handful of his flour. Painful as it was for him to give up any of what he had, truthfully there was no other option. Of course, Chef easily had another dozen such handfuls in his breadbox, but that was beside the point.

For his part, the human looked surprised but then immediately shifted to happy or excited. Really, this human and Mirri were quite similar, meaning the father was likely as cunning as the son.

He’d have to be careful with them both or they would ruin him.

“Ok, now you can stir the oil in with the flour to give it some more texture. It will also adhere really well to whatever you throw in with it. Watch.”

The human wandered over to a corner of the room and opened a sack that was tied shut. Chef followed of course in order to see what precisely it was doing. Inside, he saw some substance that was like tiny white rocks. He recognized it immediately as one of the tiny things he created with Summon Seasoning and made a note to get a sack from this town.

The human reached into the pile of rocks, pulled out a couple pieces of meat, closed the sack, walked over to the pan, and threw them in. The sizzling sound and smell were incredible. Chef could hardly believe that any human could reach such a level of refinement and power. It was wise of him to not attack this town head on; the cook’s skills were well beyond his own. Likely it was just a matter of class choice that separated them, but Chef wouldn’t assume that gave him the upper hand.

Once again, the intuit skill tried to get its user killed.

Stupid intuit, telling me that I’m stronger than the master chef.

“You flip and turn it while it cooks to make sure you’re gathering up all the oil and flour, use it to give the meat a crust, and then just let it cook until it’s done. That’s usually a few minutes depending on your fire, pan, and the cut of the meat.”

The human looked at him expectantly. Right, this was a trade. Chef was an incredibly powerful baker, a goblin capable of killing an entire forest and eating it in one night, a man that struck fear in the hearts of humans. But he had come to a startling realization today.

Oh shit, I can’t actually cook!