Gourmet Experience
“You little bastard… you’ve really gone and done it!”
Cheon Su-gong’s booming voice rolled down the narrow alley. Even with a qi barrier raised, the sheer volume of it made the walls thrum.
Gone was his usual silent tread. He came charging like an enraged bull, snorting with fury as he barreled into the alley.
“So you truly wish to become a eunuch, do you?!”
“H-Hup—!”
The cutting gesture that accompanied his words—clearly implying a certain amputation—made me suck in a sharp breath.
That was scarier than any death threat.
I dove behind my reliable older sister’s back for cover.
“Dang Yeohye shield!”
“……Hey. Have you lost your damn mind?”
Dang Yeohye, shoulders seized in my grip, whipped her head around and snapped at me. Her eyes were full of pure incredulity.
“Idiot. There’s no way you’re hidden.”
“Damn it. Why’d you have to be so short?”
“……I’m not short!”
She bounced on her toes, bristling with indignation.
In the meantime, Cheon Su-gong’s heavy footsteps thudded closer until he was right on top of us. He stared down at my body—far too large to cram behind Dang Yeohye’s back—with a long, silent look.
“What the hell kind of man are you?”
The question was half bewilderment, half sheer disbelief.
“New eunuch Muhong, at your service.”
I answered because he’d asked. His face twisted even darker.
“Until the poisoner is found, stay out of sight. Do not get involved with the Princess. Were those two rules so hard to follow?!”
Just quietly catch the real culprit—why did I have to do exactly the things I was told not to? Cheon Su-gong was furious, and the fact that I’d gotten tangled up with the Princess in particular seemed to sour his mood the most.
“Things just… sort of happened that way.”
I explained, step by step, that none of it had been intentional—how I’d ended up in the flower garden on the first day, how we’d come to walk together.
“Her Highness… stepped forward first to guide you?”
At my description of her unexpected meddling, his expression slowly turned strange.
“Yes. I think she took a liking to me.”
Cheon Su-gong snorted as if that were impossible.
“Hah. Liking you? The Princess simply frets over her subordinates far too much. Even when there’s no need.”
Her nature was too kind, he said, for the filthy power struggles that lay ahead. Worry clouded his face for a moment.
“In any case. You only escorted her to her quarters. Nothing more happened… correct?”
His eyes said: if anything had, he would kill me on the spot.
“Yep. Nothing.”
I shrugged to emphasize the point.
“You’re certain? If you ever cause trouble later, or so much as lay a finger on a single hair of the Princess’s head…”
“……Then what?”
He delivered the threat with the look of a man who’d been holding a grudge for a long time.
“You’ll leave one of your body parts behind.”
“……”
Probably a joke…?
Given how many times I’d put my foot in my mouth lately, I couldn’t be sure.
In the end, I spent a good long while that night under the moonlight, listening to Cheon Su-gong’s scolding.
Morning in the Imperial Palace began early.
Especially for the palace servants who supported the high and mighty—there was a mountain of work waiting the moment they woke.
I had just rubbed the sleep from my eyes and started listing the day’s tasks when an unexpected visitor arrived.
“Muhong. You will take on the role of taster.”
It was Cheon Su-gong, the same man who had roasted me with lectures all the previous night. He approached with a sour face, a single maidservant in tow, and casually offered me a rather strange assignment.
“Is it all right for you to come find me this openly?”
Wasn’t I supposed to stay out of sight? He’d told me not to acknowledge him once I was inside.
“You walked around with Princess Dohwa. That’s reason enough for me to seek you out.”
Fair enough. The whole “quiet infiltration” plan was already shot anyway.
“But a taster…? Why all of a sudden?”
Dang Yeohye, dressed as a maid, stepped in to explain.
“That maid who was found poisoned? She was the previous taster.”
A taster’s duty was to sample every dish before it reached a member of the imperial family—literally a human shield whose life stood between the royals and poison. Flip the logic, though, and it meant that if you could somehow trick or bypass that one person, you could pour poison straight down a royal throat.
Which made it a vital post: one that required knowledge of poisons and carried the weight of imperial lives.
“Why give a job like that to me?”
The previous holder had been murdered by poison. The whole situation reeked.
“Because the investigation into the poisoner hasn’t made any real progress. Someone has to take the role.”
No progress? Had he expected me to find the culprit in a single day?
The Imperial Palace was nothing like the Eunseong Merchant Group. Ingredients were sourced separately, cooked in separate kitchens, and carried by separate hands. My Heavenly Killing Eye—which could only read murderous intent at close range—had its limits here.
“And on the first day, the other eunuchs tore into me for getting a personal tour from royalty.”
He’d looked so flabbergasted while grilling me about it.
“That’s your own doing.”
Cheon Su-gong snorted as if it were the most natural thing in the world. This man was impossible. I glanced sideways at Dang Yeohye.
“The poison expert is standing right here. Shouldn’t she be the taster?”
Dang Yeohye hung her head, looking ashamed.
“Sorry… I can’t withstand a poison on the level of Ten-Pace Soul-Seizing Powder. I’d probably die.”
She only had Thousand-Poison Immunity so far—no true resistance. Only someone at the level of the Dang Clan head could neutralize that kind of toxin with poison arts. Her pride clearly stung; her lips were pressed tight.
“But you…”
She had watched my absurd regenerative power up close. The look she gave me said that this poison was weaker than the Human-Faced Spider’s, so I should be able to handle it. Of course, I didn’t have resistance—I just regenerated. It would still hurt like hell.
“I considered assigning another maid as taster, but we still don’t know how far the poisoner’s reach extends. I can’t trust anyone lightly.”
You can know the bottom of a ten-fathom pool, the saying went, but never the bottom of a single human heart. Cheon Su-gong was trying to account for every possibility and avoid the worst case.
“Oh? So you trust me, then?”
“No. You’re merely the least-bad option.”
“……”
Would it kill him to just say he trusted me?
Every word out of this middle-aged man’s mouth was pure sandpaper.
“Do well and I’ll add silver to that shelter of yours. So put some effort into it.”
True to his position as Director of the Eastern Depot, he had already dug up everything about me before hiring me—including the brand-new shelter work. Looking at me like I was an unmannered brat who at least had a decent heart, maybe?
Not that he needs to send money to the shelter.
I was the one taking the risk. He could just hand the cash to me.
“All right, then.”
More money was more money. No reason to refuse.
And so I accepted the role of imperial taster—the royal family’s living talisman against poison. When noon came, I made my way to Princess Dohwa’s quarters.
By the time I arrived, the table was already groaning under dishes so lavish that just looking at them made my mouth water.
“Whoa. So this is what royalty eats…”
Extravagant court cuisine, lavish with spices from the Western Regions and the finest ingredients from every corner of the empire. Even ocean seafood rarely seen in Beijing had somehow been hauled inland and laid out on the table.
A true banquet of mountain and sea delicacies, no expense spared.
“This is a buffet. An actual buffet.”
The palace servants standing around the feast watched me steadily. Their gazes held less envy or jealousy than quiet worry and pity.
“Isn’t that the new eunuch?”
“I heard the last taster died under… unfortunate circumstances.”
“Grim. A newcomer and he’s already stuck with a job like that.”
Apparently a taster was someone to be pitied—someone who could easily end up dead or crippled. But for me, a Heavenly Killing Star, that hardly mattered.
I picked up a steaming bowl of meat broth first, then a bowl of glossy, pearly rice. Broth plus rice. In other words: soup-rice. And to a Korean, soup-rice was basically soul food.
“Kraaah. Hell yeah.”
The hot, rich stock scraped down my throat together with the grains of rice and a moan of pure pleasure tore out of me. After days of nothing but dry, crumbly rations, a little oil in the belly felt like coming back to life.
“……”
The surrounding palace folk seemed to lose the power of speech as I inhaled the food with zero concern for poison, mouths hanging open as they stared. But other people’s reactions weren’t my problem. They’d set the table so I could eat.
I loosened my belt and finally, properly, dug in.
While everyone held their breath and watched, the sound of a spoon scraping the bottom of a bowl rang out.
Clink. Clink.
“Ahhh.”
Having polished off every last drop of the meat broth, the young eunuch called Muhong set the bowl down on the table with a solid thunk. Still not satisfied, he picked up his chopsticks and began freely sampling the other dishes as well.
The palace folk wore expressions of pure disbelief—this no longer looked like tasting for poison so much as wolfing down an entire meal. Only one person among them watched the scene with genuine interest, chuckling softly under her breath.
“What a hearty appetite for a young eunuch. Watching him almost makes me feel full myself.”
Princess Dohwa’s voice carried real amusement, as if she had finally found something entertaining in the stifling, stuffy life of the palace.
“Princess Dohwa… that isn’t simply… a man possessed by a starving ghost?”
Beside her, Cheon Su-gong watched with a devastated face and muttered the words. In the meantime another dish was wiped clean. A spoon scraped wistfully across the empty plate. Plenty of variety remained, but at this rate it was no longer tasting—it was lunch.
“Haa… that absolute savage of a boy…”
Had he lived as a beggar once? What kind of appetite was that? Cheon Su-gong shook his head, thinking what a hopeless case the kid was.
“Better than trembling and choking it down, wouldn’t you say, Cheon Su-gong?”
Most tasters did not behave like this. Especially when the palace atmosphere was this dark—usually they went pale and forced each bite down with visible dread.
“Compared to that, this eunuch Muhong… heh.”
Just watching him was restoring her own appetite, the Princess said, smiling faintly as she took his side. At those words, Cheon Su-gong’s eyes flew wide and he stared hard at Muhong.
Surely the Princess hasn’t taken a liking to that boy?
She had always been generous with her people, but seeing her this delighted was rare. A great many thoughts raced through Cheon Su-gong’s mind.
He would have to drive the brat out as soon as possible—before the Princess grew any fonder of him.
Just then, Muhong suddenly froze mid-chopstick with a sharp “Huk!”
“Wh-What? Don’t tell me it’s poison?”
Cheon Su-gong asked, startled. Muhong swallowed hard, looking thoroughly shaken, and answered:
“It’s just… too delicious…”
This dish of abalone and bird’s nest, he declared, melted on the tongue. Then he went right back to eating. Cheon Su-gong’s face twisted into something murderous. He wanted nothing more than to rush over and thrash the boy—but of course the kid knew he couldn’t, which was why he was acting up.
“This little bastard who’s begging to die…”
Princess Dohwa found Cheon Su-gong’s reaction so funny that she started chuckling again beside him. Cheon Su-gong cleared his throat, looking awkward.
“…This is not a laughing matter, Your Highness.”
“It’s rare to see you react like this.”
“Hah. That new eunuch is truly… troublesome.”
Once this was over, he swore, he would thoroughly discipline the brat. While he was making that resolution, the boy’s head snapped up again with another strangled “Keuk!”
“What is it this time, you idiot?”
Cheon Su-gong muttered, already exhausted. But this time it was no joke. Muhong’s face went ashen, foam flecked his lips—and he collapsed where he stood.
Thud.