Chapter 91: The Weight of a Restaurant (4)
Chapter 91: The Weight of a Restaurant (4)
“...My head is ringing. Don’t shout.” Jo Minjoon forced out a groan and barely managed to speak.
Kaya looked at him with reddened eyes. Tears had gathered in them, threatening to fall at any moment, but she held them back. When she opened her mouth, her normally rough, hard voice trembled. “I’m sorry. I, I...”
“The tap was the one at fault. Why are you sorr—ugh...!”
A burning sensation tore through his neck. Jo Minjoon squeezed his eyes shut and bit his lip. The pain was so terrible that he could not control his expression. Grinding his teeth, he quickly pulled off his cooking uniform and threw it aside. For a moment, the cool air seemed to ease the pain, but before long, the burning returned.
The doctor, who had hesitated to approach in case the oil splattered again, came over with a tense expression and helped Jo Minjoon up. Startled by the accident, Chloe asked in a trembling voice, “D-Doctor. He’s all right, isn’t he?”
“I don’t know whether I should call this fortunate, but the injury isn’t severe. There are blisters in a few places, but most of it is first-degree. If he takes proper care of it, there shouldn’t be any infection. The problem is the pigmentation...” The doctor spoke with an uncertain expression. “I’m sorry. It seems a scar will be unavoidable.”
Kaya clenched her fists, her face twisted with anger, but she was not angry at anyone else. She hated herself. Korea? Immigration? There was no point worrying about things like that if she kept causing accidents like this.
The doctor soaked a towel in cool water, laid it over the injured area, and said, “You’ll need to keep replacing the towel. Once it starts warming up, rinse it again with cold water. You should keep doing this for at least thirty minutes.”
“I’ll do it!” Just as Kaya was about to speak, Chloe stepped forward first. She looked at Jo Minjoon with tearful eyes. “My God... It really hurts, doesn’t it?”
“It does hurt. But things like this happen sometimes.” He tried to force out a calm laugh, but his face only convulsed instead.
Chloe sighed and changed the towel. The water covering his skin helped suppress the pain. Jo Minjoon spoke in an exhausted voice.
“Thanks.”
“...Don’t make me worry. It’s hard for the people watching you too.”
“Sorry.”
“And don’t apologise.” Chloe pouted.
Kaya merely watched him, and only then did she become aware of the pain in her hand. Perhaps she had been slightly burned while wiping the oil from his neck; her palm stung a little. Without saying anything, Kaya went to the sink and turned on the cold water.
Jo Minjoon, who had been watching her, frowned. “Kaya, did you get burned too?”
“This much doesn’t even count as a burn. Don’t worry about it.”
“How can I not worry? Doctor! Please check Kaya’s hand too.”
At his words, the doctor examined Kaya’s hand, then shook his head. Only after hearing that it was not really an injury did Jo Minjoon sigh in relief.
Chloe’s expression became complicated as she watched him. She spoke quietly. “How gentle can you be? You have an injury this bad on your neck, and you still have the leisure to worry about someone else... no, about Kaya?”
“...It’s not a matter of worrying or not. I can see it with my own eyes.”
Chloe said nothing. She felt that whatever she said next would only make her feel worse. And she knew very well why she felt that way. Letting out a sigh, she changed the towel again.
“Worry about your own body for now. The doctor already said there’s a high chance you’ll be left with a scar. How upsetting would it be to have a scar on your neck?”
“...You sound just like my mum.”
“I know very well that isn’t a compliment.” Chloe answered with a serious expression, as though this was no time for jokes.
At that moment, Martin approached with a face caught between worry and bewilderment. “Minjoon, is the pain any better now?”
“It is, thanks to Chloe.”
“Should we go to a nearby hospital?”
“No. I’m fine. We can’t do that over an injury like this. Besides, the mission is right in front of us.”
Martin looked towards the doctor as if asking whether that was really acceptable. The doctor sighed.
“It isn’t serious enough that he absolutely needs to go to hospital, and we can provide basic treatment here. The pain will be severe, though. On top of that, he shouldn’t go near any fire.”
“...Even so, Kaya was the one in charge of the fire, so it shouldn’t matter too much.”
From Martin’s position, this was not a bad development. Jo Minjoon shielding Kaya from the exploding oil had been quite heroic, and the viewers would probably like it. The problem was who would be held responsible for the oil explosion. The sink failing to function properly was clearly a restaurant management issue, but... ordinarily, a faulty water pipe would not cause oil to explode. There were too many complications for him to sort through easily.
“I’m sorry.”
“I told you already. You don’t need to apologise.”
At Kaya’s words, Jo Minjoon answered gently. Kaya worried her lip with her fingernails before speaking in a heavy voice.
“I’ll definitely do well.”
“Right. Let’s do that.” Jo Minjoon held out his fist.
Kaya hesitated for a moment before bumping hers against it.
Watching the two of them, Anderson opened his mouth. “I think even if they sent you two to a graveyard, you’d still manage to film a melodrama.”
He had probably said it without thinking much of it, but Chloe, who heard him, could not control her expression. Ivanna, standing beside her, placed a hand on Chloe’s shoulder.
Chloe looked back at her and smiled awkwardly. Ivanna whispered in a low voice. “Just because she set off first doesn’t mean she’ll arrive first.”
Chloe could not answer.
-
Regardless of the accident in the kitchen, time continued to pass, and night arrived. Fire rose from Kaya’s frying pan as she flambéed the fish. Jo Minjoon handed her a plate he had finished decorating and watched what she was doing. Not once had she failed in her cooking. Considering her skill, that might have seemed obvious, but when customers’ orders came rushing in all at once, maintaining that level of consistency was something you practically had to fight for.
“The fried sea bass is done. Pour the sauce.”
“Right.”
Jo Minjoon spooned a garlic purée resembling tangsuyuk sauce over the fried sea bass and fried spring onions. Looking at it, he admired what was obviously an eight-point dish. He was now level seven himself, but he was not confident he could consistently produce eight-point dishes. On top of that, some of the dishes Kaya had cooked scored higher than the versions they had eaten in the dining hall. Rather than Kaya simply having a better recipe, he wondered whether she was catching details that even the chefs of this restaurant had missed.
You really are...
Jo Minjoon’s eyes grew complicated. Would he ever be able to reach her? Would he be able to walk beside her? Every time he managed to find a little hope, it felt as though Kaya took another step ahead of him. He did not think he could close that gap.
Kaya had complicated thoughts of her own. Of course, she was concentrating on the cooking, but beneath that concentration lay regret and anger. She wanted Jo Minjoon to recognise her strengths at least once. In the previous elimination mission and in the team mission, she had always relied on him. She did not want that anymore.
I have them too. I have skill and determination. I also...
Fire rose from the frying pan once again. Seeing the faint violet flame within it, Kaya’s eyes shone clearly. She could not let Jo Minjoon be eliminated. At the very least, she did not want him to be eliminated after teaming up with her. She did not know whether the losing team would be given an elimination mission or be eliminated on the spot... but either way, it would be bad for Jo Minjoon. In his current condition, completing any kind of mission would not be easy.
She wanted to protect him. Just as Jo Minjoon had helped her until now, she wanted to repay him. Perhaps thoughts like that were what had made her think about immigration in the first place. That determination showed in every part of her face: her tightly closed mouth, drawn brows, and sharp eyes.
Jo Minjoon watched Kaya for a moment, then calmly returned to chopping vegetables. They could have been chopped in advance, but their freshness would inevitably suffer compared with vegetables sliced immediately before use. There were many times when rushing made it feel as though time was passing faster, when in reality it only made things feel longer. He wanted to tell Kaya that, but... this was not the time.
As he received the dishes from Kaya and plated them, he began to appreciate the beauty of French cuisine. His decoration level was five. Of course, if he was being honest, it was not that important. Aside from Anderson, most of them were around level five or six. He suspected that to go beyond that, a person would need to be capable of carving a dragon from a carrot. At that point, the ability seemed more suited to a food coordinator than a chef.
With his current skill, Jo Minjoon could drag sauce across a plate with the back of a spoon so that it resembled brush calligraphy, or arrange it with the feel of modern art. Most dishes simply had the main food placed in the centre with sauce spread around it, but even that looked quite impressive. At the very least, it gave the impression that you were dining in an expensive restaurant. Jo Minjoon smiled in satisfaction.
“This one seems to have turned out well too. You did a good job.”
“...Yeah.”
Kaya neither looked pleased nor grumbled. She simply wore an odd expression. Her eyes briefly flicked towards the gauze covering Jo Minjoon’s injury. Still looking at the plate, Jo Minjoon spoke as though tossing the words out casually.
“Don’t worry about me.”
“How can I not?”
“I knew something like this could happen when I decided to work in a kitchen. And it wasn’t really a mistake. It was an accident, so don’t worry about it so much. I’ll feel more comfortable if you don’t.”
Even though she knew she probably should not, Kaya grew angry at Jo Minjoon’s blunt tone. She took the cod from the steamer and said, “I’m going to worry.”
“I told you there’s no need.”
“There was no need for you to do what you did either, but you still did it. And now you’re telling me not to worry?”
“I’m...” Jo Minjoon started to answer, then closed his mouth. Thinking about it, he had nothing he could say in response.
Kaya snorted. “See? You’re the same.”
“...”
“So don’t say anything even if I worry about you. It can’t be helped.”
He opened his mouth as though he wanted to say something, but in the end, all that appeared was a smile.
Kaya blushed all the way to her ears and turned her head away, muttering sulkily, “And don’t smile like that.”
Kaya focused on the pan again. Since joining this competition, it had been quite a while since she had cooked for someone. Of course, making breakfast and lunch for Jo Minjoon also counted as cooking for someone, but... this was different. Her dishes would determine whether Jo Minjoon was eliminated.
The pan in her hand therefore felt heavier. Yet it was not an unpleasant feeling. She did not know why, but every time she completed a dish, the sense of satisfaction was immense. And there was a good reason for that. The customers in the dining hall were certainly important, but she liked knowing that if she cooked well now, she could save Minjoon. There was some pressure involved, of course... but compared with the days when she had to worry about whether she could eat three meals a day, this was nothing.
The sea bass fat mingled with the olive oil and sizzled. Oil seeped into the score marks cut into the flesh, and she could sense the fish cooking more clearly than usual. It was not the feeling of cooking with a joyful heart. Perhaps it was closer to what the head of a household felt.
Responsibility.
The weight of that short word became Kaya’s strength.
...This one seems to have turned out particularly well.
She handed the roasted sea bass and apricot purée to Minjoon, then turned back towards the frying pan.
Jo Minjoon frowned. It was not because there was a problem. No—if anything, the problem was that it was too good.
...Nine points?
The cooking score was nine. Roasted sea bass with apricot purée flavoured with ginger and cinnamon. It was certainly a good combination, but he did not think it was special enough on its own to earn nine points. Yet it had. More than the sauce, it would have been impossible to reach that score without roasting the sea bass perfectly.
Jo Minjoon was so surprised that he even forgot the pain from his injury and stared at Kaya. His eyes nearly twitched, and a crooked smile spread across his lips.
[Kaya Lotus]
Cooking level: 8
Baking level: 6
Tasting level: 10
Decoration level: 6