That Time I Got Sent to Another World Where All of the Girls Are Super Hot and Super Into Me Because I Am Super Strong and Have Very Powerful Abilities that God Gave to Me Because Me and Them Were Friends When I Was in Grade School and God Is Actually A Loli Who is Also in Love with Me Because I Am A Super Epic Person Who Will Defeat The Demon Lord Who Threatens The Entire World but the Demon Lord Actually is in Love With Me and the Demon Lord is a Super Hot Busty Babe Who is Actually Just Trying to Get My Attention Because I Have a Cellphone That Can Contact the Internet and Can Get Anything Shipped To Me Within 2 Days But I Barely Need It Because I Am Actually the Most Strongest Guy Alive Because I Have Super Strong Powers Like Being Able to Lift Your Mom Really Easily Which is Nearly Impossible Because Your Mom is So Fat But is Actually A Secret Anime Busty Babe Who is Really into Me Because I Am Super Cool and Better Than Your Dad Because He is Super Lame Which I Am Not:

Cycle 39 - That time I was reincarnated into another world and ran into a trap

Bonbon handed me one of the [Limoncello Slime Whips], and passed one over to Wanda. The Animal-Ears-Person-Folk (dog) eagerly reached out and snatched it, looking down on it in open gluttony, before giving a longing side-eye at the third dish, which Bonbon set to the side.

"L-let me know what you think," Bonbon urged us, her eyes trembling and hands subconsciously wringing the sides of her apron in supreme confidence.

I nodded. "Kind of weird how they make shampoo smell like fruit when you can't eat it."

"Um... about my food, I meant," she clarified. I looked down at the pudding or whatever the fuck it was, blinking in surprise. Oh! That's why she gave these to us. She wanted to be judged! I was glad she'd reminded me, because I'd been too distracted watching her fight to remember that this was a test. I looked down at the dessert and activated [Appraisal (but secretly infinite knowledge)] to appraise it.

[Limoncello Slime Whip]

Level 12 Food

Effect: Temporary Skill: [Acid Resistance - Lvl 3]

Boost Stat - Mojo

Remove Status: Fear

Minor Healing

Minor MP Restoration

Huh! This looked pretty useful. I hadn't even considered cooking food for tangible benefit rather than as a means to brag to strangers. Wait a minute...

Suddenly something clicked into place for me. If Bonbon could make consumables, then we DEFINITELY needed her on the party. Having somebody who could prepare healing or buffing items would be a necessity, otherwise we wouldn't be able to have a stack of 99 of each consumable to not use on the final boss fight.

I took a bite of the Slime Whip, determined to test out the effects of the buff. As soon as I put the spoon in my mouth, it was as if a lemon had taken a shit in my mouth, except it was delicious. I reeled back, staring down at the spoon in surprise and squinting at the unexpected sourness.

Whoah... this was really good. It had a soothing lemon-lime flavor, but a creamy, airy consistency, like a mousse or the Air-Enriched NeoMeat blocks they sold back in my old high school. I licked my spoon clean and dug in to finish the rest.

Well... the food was amazing, but I had some questions about some of the other things that happened earlier.

"I had some questions about some of the things that happened earlier," I informed Bonbon. "The food is good."

"Good?" she asked, staring at me as if she expected something from me, like exposition, or an explanation, or maybe headpats. I reached out to pat her head, but she leaned back out of the way, sighing. W-what?!

"Wanda?" she asked instead, focusing on my doggirl slave, who had ravenously consumed the pudding, setting the sparkling tongue-cleaned bowl to the side. Wanda licked her chops and held her hand out, making a beckoning gesture to the elf chef.

"More," she demanded. Bonbon's eyes crinkled into a grin, and she let out a sigh, grabbing the third pudding to hand it to Wanda.

"That good, huh?" she asked, handing it over as Wanda dove face-first into it, making an incoherent 'shaaa' sound.

"A-anyways," I said, blushing slightly at the awe-inducing sight of a dog-girl making an absolute fucking mess of a dessert. "I wanted to know more about that [Arte] you used. The one that crunches time."

"[Crunch Time]?" she asked. I nodded an affirmative as she cleaned up her prep. She tucked away the dirty dishes into a separate compartment of her knife bag, before rolling it back up and tucking it on her belt again. With her equipment cleaned up, I quickly gathered up the rest of the drops using my [Dimension Box], and we continued on our way. I rubbed my chin, and elaborated on my question.

"It has a pretty descriptive name, and from the way you used it, it also seemed like its effect was pretty obvious." I shook my head. "But I'd still like you to exhaustively describe it, how it activates, what exactly it does, and every other pertinent detail about the skill. I don't feel comfortable unless I know the exact bounds of what a skill can do, so that I can think of ways to abuse it and use it way out of scope."

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"Okay."

She made some kind of religious symbol in the air, or else some extremely involved gang sign. "[Crunch Time] is one of my most powerful Artes, a [Divine Cooking Arte]. It's mostly useful for when things get really hectic in the kitchen. If somebody's ordered food from me, then I can slow time until their food is done. It lasts until I finish cooking, but it also drains Stamina slowly, so time will go back to normal if I run out."

She stretched her shoulders, arching backwards slightly in a way that pulled her jacket and apron tight against her chest. I gave her a thumbs up, but she wasn't looking in my direction. I quickly sheathed my thumb before she unstretched.

"There's a few restrictions though," she continued. "If I leave the room I'm currently in, or if I do anything other than cook, time will speed up a bit. The Arte will also only activate if the order comes from somebody else, and if it's an order I can actually fulfill. So, I can't just declare that I'm making a sandwich, then go kill a bunch of monsters." She stopped to consider it. "Well, I mean, I could, but time wouldn't slow down while I did it. Plus that'd be kind of a weird battle cry."

She held up a single finger. "Finally, I can only use it once per day."

"Wan!" Wanda noted, arching an eyebrow in skill issue. "You blew your daily on the first battle of the dungeon?"

Bonbon shrank back a bit, her ears drooping down. "Um... yeah, I guess so, when you put it like that..." she replied meekly. She shrank into her coat like some kind of turtle, her pace slowing a bit. She stayed in her [Emotionally Defensive Curl] for an arbitrary amount of time, but no further attacks came from Wanda. The doggirl simply shook her head good-naturedly, like a frat boy watching his frat brother about to bobsled down a stairwell.

We soon entered into a small, steel-lined room. It looked like this room was important in some way, but I still couldn't shake something from my mind. Bonbon... her skill... was REALLY OP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (TL Note: !!!! means !)

"That's crazy!" I shouted, grinning a smile at the audacity. "Where'd you even get such a powerful [Arte]?!"

I pointedly ignored the scrutinizing look from my dog-girl slave, and ignored her further when she asked "Can't you literally [Stop Time], wan?"

Bonbon lifted her hand to show the faint glyph there. "It's a boon from Flavos, God of Cuisine. It was bestowed upon me when I received the [Chosen of Flavos] title, after Lord Flavos first spoke to me."

My pulse began to pound under my skin, both from the huge surge in blood sugar I'd received moments earlier, but also from her mentioning a title that super-appealed to my worst chuuni impulses.

"That's extremely sugoi," I replied casually. "Excuse me for a minute while I scratch my neck and do nothing else."

I immediately dropped to one knee and called Kamiko on my CODEC. After half a second of ringing, the call went through, and I was immediately greeted by the high-pitched voice of my childhood friend.

"Kamiko welcomes you, Hiro-kun, my old friend," she giggled, audibly blushing.

"Kamiko," I said, "Can you choose me?"

There was a silence for a second or two. My CODEC began to grow warm, and I heard a loud-pitched squealing sound from the other side. It sounded like a kettle, or something. I frowned.

"Sorry, did I interrupt your tea?" I felt guilty, suddenly. I hadn't introduced tea to these savage Isekai dirtworlders! I resolved to do that in the near future.

"H-Hiro-chan, w-w-what do you mean when you say that?" she stammered. "This is, um, this is so sudden!"

I nodded. Yeah, I guess it would be kind of random for me to ask her out of the blue. That's the sort of question that would confuse any omniscient, all-knowing deity.

"Well, like, there's a [Chosen of Flavos] skill, right? So I was wondering if you could choose me too."

"Oh... o-of course..." Kamiko said, her voice quiet and disappointed for some unknown reason. "W-well... I accidentally sent you to that world before I could pick a proper cheat skill for you. I would have given you [Chosen of Kamiko] if I'd had time, probably."

"Oh, nice," I said. "So there really is a [Chosen of Kamiko] title? I was kind of thinking maybe yours had a different name."

"Oh, no," Kamiko confirmed, audibly waving her hand. "If you mean [Divine Blessing], that's one that anybody who gets Isekaied gets automatically."

I nodded. "What about [God's Favorite]?"

There was a long, awkward silence. Maybe she hadn't heard me. I repeated myself, louder.

"WHAT ABOUT [GOD'S FAV-"

"I-I heard you! D-don't worry about that one, okay?"

"Okay," I lied, resolving to look it up as soon as I was able to, provided there wasn't something to immediately attract my attention away and make me forget as soon as I got off the phone.

"Anyways, is there any way you could give me that [Chosen of Kamiko] skill? My new party member has [Chosen of Flavos], and she got some pretty crazy cheat skills from it."

There was another awkward pause from the CODEC. I wondered if I was having connection issues or something.

"She?" Kamiko asked, her voice low and grave.

"Un," I grunted in affirmative. "She's a hot busty anime babe elf. And she can cook."

"That is bitter..." she whispered. "You're always teasing me, Hiro!"

I frowned. Teasing her? What was that supposed to mean? It's true that I may have poked fun at her infinite eyes or the color of her bow back in grade school, but how was I teasing her by what I said just then? Unless...

Suddenly, my eyes bulged wide like a cartoon wolf's as the realization hit me. Did she mean what I think she meant? My heart began to headbang in my chest as I thought back to all the time we'd spent together. Those chocolates she'd made me for Valentine's Day... those homemade cookies. That one time she'd made me bento for a week straight. Why hadn't I noticed it sooner?!

"Kamiko," I said gently, lowering my voice to an intimate whisper. "You... can't cook, can you?"

Kamiko let out a quiet little yelp, followed by an even cuter growl. "You! You! You are a stubborn thing, Hiro-kun!" she chastised me. "Geez!"

"So, can I be-"

There was a sudden iconic fizzing sound as the CODEC call disconnected. Geez... looks like I'd upset her. I'd have to give her headpats the next time I saw her to make up for it. I guess I should have known better than to insult a cute anime girl without poking her cheek.

I stood up with a sigh, looking from Bonbon, who had a concerned look on her face, to Wanda, who was busy punching some kind of drum solo on one of the steel doors sealing the chamber shut.

"Uh, did you have a nice... neck scratch?" Bonbon asked, clearly not suspicious of my behavior at all. I shook my head.

"No, I think maybe I upset her." I sighed and splashed over to Wanda, tapping a rhythm line on the wall to help out her cool music endeavor.

"Anyways, if you're done, we're kind of in trouble, Hiro-sensei," Bonbon alerted me. I turned and gave her a scrutinizing look, but she merely pointed down, at the knee-high water that was slowly rising in our sealed chamber.

"Huh," I observed. "Look at that."