Another day, another dinner that Lus had to somehow come up with.

He’d already done all his usual meals over the last few days, and he knew the crew would be grumpy if he repeated something he’d done too recently.

While everyone enjoyed his improved cooking, it was clear that they were ready for something new.

As he was thinking over what to make, the lights flickered. He looked up in surprise, then jumped as his name rang through the kitchen.

“Lusac Arten!”

He sighed and spun to face the cartoonishly devilish face on the interbox screen. “Leviathan.”

“Why are you wasting the wealth of knowledge and opportunity that I have benevolently placed before you?” the Demon boomed.

Lus clapped his hands over his ears and hissed. “Can you keep it down?” he whispered, as though lowering his own voice would balance out the high volume of the Demon.

“Foolish mortal! How dare you try to silence the all-powerful Leviathan!”

“Do you want to get both of us in trouble?” Lus asked, still keeping his voice low.

“Answer my question. Why do you mock my gift and neglect the recipes I have given you?” Leviathan answered, his voice dropping to a much more reasonable volume.

Lus straightened up and faced the screen, his brows drawn down in disbelief. He glanced around the kitchen, then back at the demon.

“I have to cook for an entire crew of people. I can’t just be giving them random stat boosts and special abilities if I don’t want to get caught,” he answered. “And in case you haven’t noticed, I’ve only got four recipes to choose from.”

“There are plenty more to buy.”

“Sure, if I had endless XP available. Do you know how long it takes to earn enough for a new recipe? You’re just going to have to be as patient as you’re forcing me to be.”

“What is of greater import than acquiring more [Recipes]?”

“Uh… [Skills], obviously,” Lus answered.

Leviathan did a simulation of rolling his red eyes.

“I’ll try and get another [Recipe] soon,” Lus promised, trying to placate the Demon.

Leviathan seemed to know that Lus was just telling him what he wanted to hear, but he still gave a small bob up and down, an impressive simulation of a nod, and disappeared.

“Now back to the problem of dinner,” Lus muttered. He sighed and pulled up his System, quickly moving to the [Recipes] tab. Hopefully something there would inspire him.

He saw the same list that always greeted him.

[Beginner’s Luck Soup]

[Galloping Scallops]

[Tasty Buns]

[Simple Sweet and Savory Sandwich]

“Pasta or bread?” he asked himself. That was usually the question he fell back on. He didn’t know how to customize the soup to make it something completely different, and scallops were obviously out of the question, so he alternated between pasta with different sauces; stir fries, which he had actually gotten pretty good at; and bread-based dishes like pizza and… really just different types of pizza.

“So maybe something with bread that isn’t just pizza? But what?”

Then he remembered that when he had first made [Tasty Buns], he had considered the idea of doing them again with a savory filling.

Heading to the interbox, he pulled it open and surveyed his ingredient options. He needed meat of some kind and the ground gervin called his name, so he tossed a large box of it onto the counter.

Vegetables, of course. They needed to restock, so he didn’t have a lot of fresh options, but there were multiple round, green balls of kabrage. He hadn’t ever used it because he didn’t really know how, but he knew that Wsr had often incorporated it with cooked meat.

“Today’s the day I learn, apparently,” he decided, pulling out all ten kabrage heads. They had a few dark spots, but he was sure he could just cut those out and they would be fine.

“Kabrage, gervin meat, bread dough… what else? Is that enough?” he wondered. He tried to think of something else to go with it, but all that came to mind was salt. And peppin. Maybe some powdered onnin and harvic.

Shrugging, he carried the kabrage heads to the sink and began rinsing them. He pulled out a knife to cut out the dark parts while he was there.

[Cut out the stem and rinse inside]

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With his usual nod of gratitude, he ran the knife in a circle around the large, pale stem. It took some serious hacking to get it out and it wasn’t a pretty cut, but it was his first try after all.

The tenth head was marginally better than the first. Apparently hacking out the stem of a kabrage head was not an easy skill to pick up.

He could only hope and pray that cutting it into pieces would be easier.

Pulling out a cutting board and his largest, sharpest knife, he set to work. It was easier to slice the kabrage lengthwise, but it took some work to get all the long shreds that resulted from slicing into small, even pieces.

By the time Lus finished the last head, his wrist was sore, and he was grateful that he hadn’t decided to include any other elements in this dish.

He moved to get the bread dough done next, but was interrupted.

[Cook the meat and add the kabrage first]

Shrugging, he switched tactics, grabbing a couple large frying pans and setting them on the stove.

He had cooked enough ground gervin at this point to do it quickly. He had to do two rounds in each pan, but the meat was well-thawed, so it went quickly.

Soon he had all the meat cooked and seasoned with salt and peppin. He pulled the last two panfuls out with a spatula so the grease could drain off, then added it to the large bowl with the rest. He dumped the grease and set the frying pans by the sink.

“Now how do I cook this?” he wondered aloud, looking at the large bowls of fresh kabrage bits.

[Add to a large pot with gervin meat, cover and cook for at least 45 minutes]

Lus whistled and glanced at the clock. Good thing he’d gotten in the habit of starting meals as early as he could. He would hopefully have just enough time to cook the kabrage, make the dough, assemble the buns, and bake them.

It took his four largest pots to fit all the kabrage. He split the gervin up between the pots as well, then added more salt and peppin, as well as onnin and harvic. The lids went on and he turned his attention to the bread dough.

He moved quickly through the now-familiar process. Measure the warm water, yeast, and sugar. Mix in the baking fat. Add the salt and flour and mix by hand.

Next came the kneading, working the sticky, powdery mixture until it became smooth and elastic.

Finally, he covered the large dough lump with a damp cloth and placed it in an oven set a bit above room temperature.

Before he could wonder what to do next, his [Chef’s Intuition] gave him the answer.

[Stir the filling]

With a large spoon, he lifted the lid off each large pot and gave them careful stirs. The pots that had been full nearly to the top were now only about ⅔ full. As it cooked, the kabrage was shrinking at a rate that Lus had not expected.

He replaced all the lids, then looked at the clock. He still had a few minutes before the dough needed to be checked and the filling was only half-cooked. Looking around, he tried to think up something useful to do.

As his eyes landed on the cupboard that housed baking sheets, he decided to pull out a bunch and spread them over one of the unused counters. That done, he leaned against the counter and relaxed for a few minutes before giving the pots of filling another round of stirring.

He continued to meander around the kitchen, fidgeting and rearranging random appliances, stopping every few minutes to stir the filling.

With another ten minutes left to wait, he realized that the buns on their own was a rather plain meal. He didn’t have time to make something else, but he could at least add some fresh fruit. If there was anything edible left, that is.

He dug through the fruit drawer and came up with a large bag of questionably fresh goinges. The orange fruits had a thick skin, but could be quickly sliced into quarters for easy serving. This would make the soft, juicy inner flesh accessible without having to peel off the entire outer layer.

Lus took a stir break, then washed the goinges. He grabbed a knife and began quartering them. He piled all the slices into another large bowl. By the time the timer for the filling went off, he had gotten all the goinges cut up.

Turning off the buzzing timer, he took the pots of filling off heat. The filling had shrunk enough for him to dump the two smaller pots into the two larger pots. He took the two full pots of filling and set them at the edge of the stove, then pulled the dough out of the oven.

It had been quite a while since he made Tasty Buns, so it took him a few rounds to get into the rhythm he had established then, but he eventually got it down.

Fill a sheet with rolls.

Take a finished sheet out of the oven and set it on a far counter to cool.

Put the currently rising sheet in the oven and set a timer.

Set the finished sheet on the other counter to raise.

Start filling another sheet with rolls.

Repeat.

The smell of the baking bread and the savory insides soon filled the kitchen, making Lus’ stomach rumble.

“If the taste matches the smell, these are going to be a hit,” Lus murmured to himself with a proud smile.

Soon he pulled the last of the seven trays of beautifully browned rolls from the oven and set it on the last flat surface in the kitchen.

[Cooking Complete]

[XP Gained: 50]

He sighed. The worst part about cooking his own recipes was that he got only half the XP, but the extra 50 XP wasn’t worth the hassle of cooking the System recipes properly more often.

While he waited for the rolls to cool a bit more, he moved all of his dirty dishes to the washing area, then carried clean plates and forks out to the dining room.

The bowl of goinge quarters went next, along with a small set of tongs to serve them.

Finally, he began bringing out the sheets of rolls. He briefly considered removing them from the baking sheets for presentation purposes, but a glance at the clock nixed that idea.

With all the baking sheets, some spatulas for serving, and dishes for the crew out, he was ready.

And just in time. Nippy stepped in, followed closely by Relf, Cewi-Bano, and Becky. The rest of the crew filed in after, all chatting happily as they picked up their plates and served themselves.

“Smells good, Lus,” Becky called as she walked past.

He smiled and nodded his thanks.

Once everyone had gone through and picked up their food, he stepped in and served himself. He joined Becky at her table near the back corner and found her already halfway finished with her second roll.

“These are great,” she said around a mouthful of food.

“Are they?” He smiled his thanks and took a big bite.

The gervin and kabrage filling was well-seasoned. The bread was still warm and soft, slightly sweet against the savory insides.

“It is good!” he said as he swallowed, mentally adding it to his meal rotation list. One more meal successfully finished, he thought with a satisfied smile.

He washed his bun down with a few fresh slices of goinge, which paired perfectly with the buns.