Green Monster Epic

The dwarf goblin Luwa rubbed his hands together, excitedly fiddling with the ingredients in front of him. Around him, dozens of his equally skilled chef colleagues were actively preparing.

Although being suddenly summoned this time meant his small restaurant would probably be closed for a long time, effectively losing a month's income, Luwa felt it was well worth it.

Firstly, as a member of the 'Food God Exchange Meeting,' he was finally able to get a close look at the very being he so greatly revered, which was an unparalleled honor for a dwarf goblin.

At the same time, it was rare for top chefs like them in the tribe to gather together like this. They could exchange culinary skills and learn cooking recipes that they wouldn't normally have access to.

Of course, as the most outstanding chefs, Luwa and the other goblins also had their own pride, believing their culinary skills to be the best. However, they hadn't had a chance to compete in years, so this was a good opportunity for them to have a showdown.

"…Next, according to the voting rules, everyone needs to cook the 'Nightfall' dish for the advancement of novice thieves. The required ingredients are three pounds each of fresh dark shadow leopard blood and meat, and the auxiliary ingredients are shadow flowers and night-blooming grass…"

"Everyone, please come up one by one in the current formation to collect the ingredients…"

On the balcony of the castle's second floor, Swala, the host of the event, calmly began to issue tasks and instructions to the fifty-three tribal chefs in the square below.

As his voice fell, the excellent chefs selected by the tribe, including Luwa, stepped forward one after another to receive the materials prepared for them.

Swala also took advantage of this opportunity to gain some practical benefits. Although these low-level magic dishes didn't provide much enhancement to a legendary figure like him, even a mosquito's leg is still meat. The earth goblin sword dancer, now focused on improving his own strength, didn't mind the changes brought about by these dishes, which could be considered low-level.

Moreover, as the difficulty of the recipes increased, the required ingredients became more precious, and the enhancement effects of the magic dishes also greatly improved. It couldn't be said that they had no effect on legendary powerhouses.

At least those dishes that permanently increased speed and agility allowed Swala to feel the changes and impact they brought, which were no weaker than several months of his painstaking basic training.

If he continued to cook like this, and more excellent magic dishes were served for him to taste, the effect would definitely be more considerable. It wouldn't be a waste of his time to host this gathering of chefs instead of practicing.

Perhaps it was a coincidence, but nearly half of the mature recipes preserved in the tribe were related to permanently enhancing certain characteristics. Among the low and mid-level dishes, many sustainably and effectively changed individual characteristics, unlike the legendary dishes that Allen cooked for Figlas, where many only had a significant effect the first time. Subsequent dishes with the same recipe, even if they still had some effect, were far less significant than the first time.

On the contrary, most of the recipes eliminated by the tribal chefs were for short-term enhancements of certain characteristics. When cooking, they often tested the quality of the ingredients and the skills of the chefs, with fluctuations far greater than mature cooking recipes.

These were some of the rules that a group of chefs and Allen had come up with together through discussion and research during this period.

It wasn't to say that those eliminated recipes were truly useless, but rather that the dishes cooked from these recipes were mostly used during adventures. For chefs, they probably rarely took risks like Allen.

And in the absence of dimensional pockets, which adventurer would carry these finished cooked foods during an adventure and chew on them during battle?

Moreover, the best time to eat magic dishes is when they are freshly made. Unless there is a dimensional pocket or a specially sealed magic box or similar item, the longer the finished dish is carried, the worse the effect.

Of course, magic dishes also have their advantages, which are that the enhanced special effects are stable and lasting, generally calculated in days, and they cannot be dispelled by dispelling magic, giving them an absolute advantage over potions, magic, and divine arts in these aspects.

However, compared to these advantages, its shortcomings are too significant. For adventurers who are used to light and convenient equipment, carrying such troublesome things would not be considered unless it was a clearly defined challenge.

Over time, the chefs of Green Lake Town eliminated these types of recipes, leaving them to gather dust in the tribe's warehouse.

Only after Allen had a conversation with these chefs did he understand the tribe's various considerations for eliminating recipes. If he hadn't been preparing to establish a magic chef system, he probably wouldn't have known these things for a long time.

And after understanding these reasons, Allen was no longer worried about the lack of recipes after establishing the Food God Guild.

Before the establishment of the magic chef system, even if the chefs who learned magic dishes didn't go on adventures, they could often find suitable ways out through the recipes they learned, and they wouldn't have to worry about life at all. When the magic chef system is established in the future, and magic chefs are promoted and expanded, adventurers will inevitably take the initiative to try to learn these recipes, so that they can obtain more stable and powerful enhancements during adventures and reduce the risks of adventures.

At the same time, just like before the development of magic potion alchemy, they also struggled with the fact that potions could not be preserved for a long time, until the appearance of tools like magic sealing bottles allowed various potions to be promoted among adventurers. Sooner or later, the dishes cooked by magic chefs will have people start to specialize in preservation methods because of their effects. Perhaps it won't be long before there are storage tools similar to magic sealing bottles specially designed for preserving magic dishes.

And by that time, the spring of these recipes will truly arrive, and naturally there will be chefs who actively use resources and contributions to exchange for these recipes.

Luwa had a lot of experience in cooking the 'Nightfall' dish. Every one or two months, thieves and combatants would specifically come to his small restaurant, which could only accommodate 6-7 tables, to order this dish in order to use its characteristics to help them advance to the intermediate level or deepen their connection with the shadow plane.

And every time he cooked this dish, Luwa could always earn a considerable amount of money, which was much higher than the income he earned from cooking home-style dishes for the people around his restaurant.

Luwa's family life was able to be better than that of ordinary people, thanks to the twenty-odd magic dishes he learned in the cooking academy and the tribal library, which established a considerable reputation among adventurers.

At this time, among the fifty-odd chefs in the field, apart from a dozen teachers working in the cooking academy, most of the other goblins, like Luwa, relied on the dozens of magic dishes they had learned to exchange for a comfortable life.

Many adventurers active in Fort Murl were also attracted by the characteristics of these magic dishes in Green Lake Town, trying to break through their bottlenecks and gain more powerful strength. To this end, these adventurers were willing to spend a lot of money. Even if the prices offered by these magic chefs were high and the conditions were relatively harsh, there were still many adventurers who booked meals.

Carefully cutting the congealed shadow leopard blood into neat, square pieces and placing them into the scalding blood water remaining after the blood congealed, Luwa's eyes never left these square blood cubes. Just as a faint grayish-white color began to appear on the surface of the blood cubes, Luwa quickly removed the iron pot containing the blood water from the stove. He then gently scooped out each piece of blood tofu from the pot with a pre-prepared strainer and placed them into the cold water aside.

"Phew!!"

Having done all this, Luwa looked at the blood tofu, not a single piece broken or overcooked, and finally breathed a sigh of relief. At least the first hurdle in cooking this dish had been overcome. Next was the pan-fried steak step.

Although each step had been drafted countless times in Luwa's mind, when it came to actually cooking, adjustments always had to be made in a timely manner due to various factors. For example, if the steak lost too much water and appeared stiff, blood water and luminous grass needed to be added to soften the meat. Or, for example…

Cooking magic dishes is like magic potion alchemy. Although there are complete recipes to refer to and the cooking techniques are understood in advance, when it comes to actual operation, fine-tuning and controlling the heat are always required in order to successfully create the most excellent magic dishes.

"Damn it!!"

Suddenly, an unlucky person let out a low curse, presumably because they accidentally broke the surface of the tofu while scooping it out. Not only did that piece of blood tofu lose its effect, but even the surrounding blood tofu pieces were affected by the damaged one. Although the surface was unharmed, the magic power within had fluctuated, and whether the dish could be successfully cooked next was unknown.

A serious expression lingered on Luwa's face for a long time. Tiny beads of sweat had appeared on the tip of his nose, but he didn't dare to wipe them away easily, fearing that he would ruin all his previous efforts.

Until both sides of the steak, and the surrounding edges, were perfectly seared to a fragrant crisp, Luwa quickly took it out again. With a flick of his hand, a sharp, long-bladed knife appeared, and under the skillful operation of Luwa's right hand, he began to carve the steak with a *shua shua shua* sound.

When the blade stopped moving, the tip of the knife gently lifted on the seemingly intact front of the steak, and square grooves appeared on the surface of the steak, revealing the red muscle inside.

The kitchen knife was inserted into the knife rack, and Luwa replaced it with a pair of chopsticks. He then deftly picked up the blood tofu that had just been rinsed in water and carefully moved it towards the groove on the steak.

The chopsticks steadily held the grayish-white blood tofu, placing it in the groove of the steak. With a gentle release of the chopstick tips, the blood tofu was perfectly placed into the steak, the surface flush with the surface of the steak, not a bit more or less…

Repeating this many times, until the grooves dug out on the steak were filled with blood tofu the size of a fingertip, and a beautiful geometric pattern appeared on the surface of the steak, Luwa, who had been as gentle as treating a lover in every move just now, finally breathed a long sigh of relief once again.

Next, the steak was placed back into the pan that had been soaked in shadow leopard oil and luminous grass and re-pan-fried…

The entire cooking process wasn't actually very long, but in the minds of these serious chefs, the time was so long and torturous. Even chefs who considered themselves to be very proficient in this dish couldn't guarantee that they would succeed every time.

Some unlucky chefs had already failed in their cooking, abandoning the tools in their hands, dejectedly and annoyedly reflecting on which step had gone wrong and how to deal with similar problems in the future…

"Alright!!"

"Except for one person who failed in the cooking, the remaining fifty-two people have completed the 'Nightfall' dish. After sending the dishes you cooked to the tasting area, next is to score the difficulty of this dish. I hope everyone will take it seriously."

After a magic hour, all the chefs had completed the cooking of 'Nightfall'. As Svara's voice rang out again, all the chefs, finally with a hint of weariness, carried their respective dishes to the long snake-like table next to them.

Plates of fragrant, vaguely magical pan-fried steaks were placed on the table. The surface of the steak was gray with a hint of golden yellow, and the grayish-brown blood tofu inlaid in it was integrated, as if gray pearls were inlaid in the light golden sky.

"Tasters, enter!!"

A team of level 8 thieves, who had been preparing for a long time, was summoned from the periphery and stood in a row in front of the table.

These fifty-odd level 8 thieves were all selected from the gnome branch, with basically the same physical qualities and no innate abilities. In the past, when the Green Field Tribe was weak, it would have been difficult to find such a team of tasters. But now, as long as Allen made a request, finding these lucky guys only took Tris and the others less than five days.

The reason why it took a full five days was because Tris and the others needed to screen and select the closest members from nearly five hundred low-level gnome thieves.

"Get ready to taste!!"

"Researchers, get ready too!!"

"Start eating!!"

… … … …

Under Svara's order, the gnome thieves solemnly raised the chopsticks in their hands and began to devour the rare dishes in front of them.

As the special effects of the magic dishes began to manifest in the bodies of the thieves, the researchers, who had already recorded the thieves' physical data in advance, began to re-statistically summarize the current qualities of these thieves according to the previous methods of testing the thieves' physical qualities, shadow affinity experience, and so on.

Every step seemed bland, but it was crucial for Allen's future plans.

After all the data was collected and handed over to the tribe's most excellent team of gnome scholars, after more than a dozen careful calculations and discussions, the final difficulty score of the 'Nightfall' dish was fixed at a base number of 3.4 points.

"Alright, today's task has come to a temporary end. Everyone, rest early tonight and recharge your batteries. Tomorrow we will prepare to cook…"

After everything was recorded, Svara had people file it away, and he issued the last order to the hundred or so gnomes in the square.

"Disperse!!"

The crowd did not disappear because of Svara's order. Most of the gnome chefs would gather with familiar companions to discuss today's gains and their skills. The gnome thieves who tasted the dishes began to digest the dish energy they had absorbed today on the spot. When they woke up from their meditation, the research members waiting aside would once again test their strength, eliminate unsuitable members, and add new members.