They Finally Came Out
“……”
Su Ning looked down at Kim Tae-hyun, then spun around sharply.
After suffering through Tae-hyun’s endless taunts and harassment, Su Ning had grown—mentally, at least.
He wasn’t going to fall for it anymore.
“Hey! You not coming out?”
“……”
Not a word in response.
Su Ning knew that if he answered at all, he’d only get dragged into Tae-hyun’s pace.
The other guild members were itching to move, but with Su Ning holding them back, they had no choice but to endure it.
“Don’t go out there and fight. There’s no reason to hand that bastard an advantage. We’re the ones with the advantage!”
“Yes, sir!”
When the Su Ning Guild showed an unexpected amount of restraint, Tae-hyun looked mildly surprised.
“They’re not coming out. I thought they would.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Just wait. They’re the desperate ones, not us.”
The instant Tae-hyun showed up, the Su Ning Guild had cursed him out and cut off any conversation.
So they had no idea what he’d come to negotiate with.
They simply assumed Tae-hyun was threatening to drag an army over from somewhere and attack them.
“What are those bastards doing?”
“Why aren’t they attacking?”
Murmurs spread through the guild.
They’d expected Tae-hyun to charge in at any moment, but instead he’d gathered on the hill in front of the castle and was just… waiting.
Fwoosh!
“He’s cooking too?!”
Now he’d set down a cauldron and started cooking.
Tae-hyun lazily stirred it with a ladle.
“……What the hell is he actually thinking?”
The Su Ning Guild members were confused.
A few of them contacted guildmates elsewhere who might know something.
“G-Guild Master! This is bad!”
One guild member had asked in case someone knew anything, and when the answer turned out to be far worse than expected, he shouted in alarm.
“What is it?”
“K-Kim Tae-hyun, that bastard—he’s threatening to bring in an Orc army…!”
“What kind of nonsense are you spouting? How would he bring one here? Those Orcs behind him? Don’t worry about them. We can handle that much.”
“Not those Orcs! The main force—the one led by the Great Chieftain!”
“What? How?”
“They say he sent a messenger to the Great Chieftain saying Kane is here…!”
“!!!”
Only then did Su Ning understand what Tae-hyun was after.
He was using Kane as bait to summon the Great Chieftain’s army here.
Crunch!
The cup in Su Ning’s hand shattered on the spot.
His hand trembled with rage.
“Guild Master!”
“Prepare to attack!”
If they weren’t going to negotiate, then the only option was to attack Tae-hyun and his vile little gang and drive them off.
Even if Fantasy Online 2 shuts its servers down tomorrow, I’m raising my skill level today!
With that level of determination, Tae-hyun cooked on.
As a result, the ones getting more and more restless were people like Lee Da-bi and Cain.
“T-they’re all staring at us from up there…”
Da-bi had stolen Cain’s shield and was hiding her face behind it.
Unlike Tae-hyun, it would be a huge problem for her if the Su Ning Guild marked her as an enemy.
The Power Warrior guild members were all equally busy trying to avoid Su Ning Guild’s gaze.
“Don’t worry. It’ll take them a while to come down from there. Huh? We’re short on ingredients. You got anything?”
“Pardon? Like what?”
“Cooking ingredients.”
“Uh… no.”
“We don’t either.”
“What? That makes no sense. You’ve been out hunting—how do you not have a single cooking ingredient?”
Tae-hyun immediately started rifling through the Power Warrior members’ pockets.
What came out was…
◈ One-Eyed Monster Tentacle
◈ Weak Paralysis Leaf
◈ Diluted Essence of Boiling Lava
Ingredients that, no matter how you looked at them, did not look like cooking ingredients.
Of course, Fantasy Online 2 had the kind of freedom where even non-ingredients could still be used in cooking.
And Tae-hyun was showing that freedom at its absolute peak.
Anything he could get his hands on went straight in.
He wasn’t following any of the recipes he already had.
He was just trusting his cooking skill and his luck, then making whatever the hell he wanted.
“Not enough volume. You got any more?”
“……”
The Power Warrior guild members looked genuinely terrified.
“Can’t be helped. Cooking’s done!”
An Experimental Divine Dish has been completed.
A Fortifying Meal for Warriors Before Battle has been completed.
Your cooking skill has increased.
“You guys come eat too. I made plenty.”
“N-no, we’re okay…”
The Power Warrior members recoiled in horror.
A meal made by a highly skilled cook was a luxury beyond anything you could taste in real life.
But a meal made by a cook with poor skill was basically torture.
And looking at Tae-hyun, there was absolutely no way he seemed skilled enough to overcome those ingredients.
But Tae-hyun was cold about it.
“Eat. I need to level the skill.”
“……Yes, sir.”
Tearfully, the guild members lined up before the food.
It looks decent enough.
Smells pretty okay too.
Maybe it’ll taste good? Even if your cooking skill sucks, if the ingredients are good and you keep it simple—
For something simple, that looked like a pretty complicated recipe. And you saw what went into it. How are you calling those ‘good ingredients’?
“What, are you eating with your eyes? Eat!”
The moment they hesitated, Tae-hyun barked at them.
The Power Warrior guild members squeezed their eyes shut.
At that moment, someone was already slowly putting distance between herself and the food.
Lee Da-bi.
“Guild Master! Where are you going?!”
“Ah, I’m just not hungry…”
“If you’ve got no appetite, then all the more reason you should eat this!”
“Good things go to the Guild Master first! If we eat before you do, people will talk! That guild over there will say we’ve got no tradition!”
“Since when did our guild ever have tradition?! And you guys never take care of me the rest of the time!”
Da-bi snapped at them, eyes brimming with outrage, but Tae-hyun simply stared at her.
His gaze said it all.
You dare think you’re not eating this?
“……I’ll eat it, okay……?”
Da-bi and the Power Warrior guild members all shut their eyes and took a spoonful.
And then the wave of flavor hit.
“Th-this taste…!”
One guild member’s eyes flew open.
No way… did he really draw out some hidden flavor beyond those ingredients?
“……It tastes absolutely terrible!”
“Guaaaargh! Guaaaaaaaargh!”
Of course not.
No amount of Tae-hyun’s luck or cooking skill could salvage ingredients like that.
There were limits to what a human being could do.
But while their tongues burned in agony, the message windows said the complete opposite.
◈ After eating the Experimental Divine Dish, your Divine stat increases. You temporarily gain holy-attribute defense.
◈ After eating the Experimental Divine Dish, your Wisdom and Luck permanently increase by 1.
◈ After eating the Fortifying Meal for Warriors Before Battle, your combat power temporarily increases. Strength, Agility, and Constitution are buffed.
◈ After eating the Fortifying Meal for Warriors Before Battle, your Strength permanently increases by 1.
◈ You have eaten too little. Eat more to gain additional effects.
Those message windows made it impossible to throw the spoon aside, even if they wanted to.
If they wanted to raise their stats this much by any other method, they’d have to suffer for it.
And yet this much effect was coming from just eating food.
And if they ate more, they could get additional effects.
The Power Warrior members looked at one another.
They understood each other instantly.
We eating? Really eating this?
Of course we’re eating, you idiot! Think of it like herbal medicine and shove it down! You couldn’t buy this even if you wanted to!
Gobble, gobble!
“Seeing you all eat so well, it must be tasty.”
“……”
“Su-hyeok! Feed the Orcs too! They need buffs before the fight.”
“Yes, Sunbae-nim!”
Jeong Su-hyeok called over the Orcs sitting blankly in the back.
“Chwik! What are you giving us?”
“Chwik! The great shaman is giving it to us, so it must be something good!”
The Orcs crowded over and started eating.
When it came to food, Orcs were a race that would chew rocks if you handed them one.
“Chwik! This taste…!”
“Chwik! Truly amazing! I want more!”
“??”
The Power Warrior members, forcing the food down like bitter medicine, stared at the Orcs in shock.
They think this is delicious?
Bizarre Chef
Huh?
The title, Chef Who Knows an Orc’s Taste, was a common one.
Other cooks had it too.
If you fed Orcs at all, they were usually satisfied with whatever you gave them.
But Bizarre Chef?
You are not the sort of cook who approaches food with a cold head and strict reason.
You are a cook who has always cooked with a burning heart and raw instinct.
Unafraid of conventional methods, you have forged your own path. You possess the talent of a Bizarre Chef.
Bizarre cuisine is not simply failed cooking. It is the essence of extracting the maximum possible effect from ingredients that should never have been edible in the first place.
Of course, the price may be taste.
But isn’t there a saying?
What’s good for the body tastes bitter on the tongue.
Will you walk the path of the Bizarre Chef?
Reward: Class change to Bizarre Chef.
The Avatar of Archisus cannot change to another class.
The Bizarre Chef class quest has been canceled.
I wasn’t going to take it anyway.
That was what Tae-hyun thought to himself.
Of course, even if he had no intention of taking it, being told by a message window, You can’t leave the Avatar of Archisus! didn’t exactly feel good.
Cooking that dragged every last bit of potential out of impossible ingredients.
Depending on prerequisite skills, the skill’s effects would change.
Prerequisite skills—Divine Cooking, Lucky Cooking.
Judging by the description, it seemed the skill had appeared because of the cooking skills he possessed, plus all the bizarre food he’d made up to now.
Better than not having it, I guess.
While everyone was enjoying—or enduring—the feast, the Su Ning Guild was finally crawling out of the castle.
“KIM TAE-HYUUUUUUUUN!”
Killing intent poured off Su Ning’s entire body.
—Monster Control. Spread Deadly Poison.
—Paranoia.
Tae-hyun moved immediately.
They were on a hill right now.
His plan was to hold the high ground.
The Su Ning Guild was charging in under the assumption there was nothing around the area.
That assumption was wrong.
Given even a short amount of time, Tae-hyun’s skills could turn the surroundings into hell.
Using the vampire authority that let him control small monsters, he had already stationed rats and sparrows in front of the castle.
Then, from above, he triggered the skills at once.
“Poison! Use antidote potions!”
The Su Ning Guild had plenty of gear and consumable items.
A little poison wasn’t enough to make them retreat.
But Tae-hyun’s attack was only just beginning.
The next blow came from his specialty—Mechanical Engineering.
BOOMBOOMBOOMBOOM!
Small Orb Bombs explode and attack the enemy.
Your Mechanical Engineering skill increases.
The small bombs tied to the rats and sparrows went off in a chain.
These weren’t in the same league as the bombs other players learning Mechanical Engineering made.
It wouldn’t have been an exaggeration to call Tae-hyun a bomb artisan.
And yet the result was unexpected.
Not a single Su Ning Guild member died.
They’d all taken hits, but they glared back and endured.
“Did you chug some kind of potion?”
“That’s right, asshole. How long did you think we’d keep falling for your pathetic Mechanical Engineering tricks?”
Naturally, the Su Ning Guild had already spent time figuring out how to prepare for Tae-hyun.
One of those preparations was specifically for his Mechanical Engineering—and his bombs.
Every relevant potion they could find, including ones with effects like Explosion Resistance and Impact Reduction, they had already used.
Kim Tae-hyun isn’t a magic type!
The Su Ning Guild members braced themselves for another round of attacks.
But then—
“Su-hyeok.”
“Yes, Sunbae-nim!”
Jeong Su-hyeok stepped forward with his staff and took his place in front of the Orc shamans.