CHAPTER 140
CHAPTER 140
Cooking King Idnia?
The taste had become clean and refined.
There was no longer that dreadful fishy smell, and one could taste the sweetness of the vegetables inside along with the natural sweetness and rich umami of the fish meat.
Moreover, weren’t the fish balls made by grinding fish flesh and bones quite edible?
“It’s edible… no, it’s delicious!”
Sedia was not the only one who was surprised.
“Oh my goodness!”
“It’s good?!”
“How is this even possible?!”
“Wow. So this is why Idnia-sama chose the kitchen?”
“What are these balls? They look like meat….”
“They must be fish balls!”
The Euros students marveled at the meal prepared by Idnia.
There was no fishy odor at all, the umami was overwhelming, and there was even a subtle sweetness to it.
“How can such a difference be achieved with such garbage ingredients….”
At that, Atos began to puff up with pride as if he himself were being praised.
“Well, that’s because vegetables and seasonings from Idnia-sama’s personal funds were used here. It’s on a completely different level compared to the seasonings from Nothos. Do you know how much seasoning you have to dump in if you’re trying to disguise garbage food with flavor? On the other hand, if you start with clean, well-prepared food and then add seasoning, the taste becomes on a completely different level. What’s better, eating this, or wasting money on Nothos just to dump seasoning into a bowl of trash soup?”
“Indeed….”
“There’s no comparison….”
Everyone came to agree that it was better to eat properly prepared food from the start rather than buying seasonings on the black market and adding them to garbage food.
“Right? You don’t really think Idnia-sama is trying to take advantage of Euros students, do you? If everyone participates in assigned duties, you can eat much better food for free than before. In fact, Idnia-sama is the one taking the loss here. Do you think preparing vegetables and seasonings costs nothing? Cooking this isn’t free either. Idnia-sama set this pricing system while taking a loss in order to maintain order among Euros students. If the goal was to make money, she would have sold seasonings separately like the Nothos black market from the beginning, regardless of whether people ate trash or not. That would be far less effort and much easier.”
Atos, who already had a sharp tongue, grew even more talkative once he started “selling” his argument. But everything he said sounded plausible.
“Yeah, that makes sense… if she had those kinds of seasonings, she could’ve just sold them to make money.”
“Right. The moment Idnia-sama proposed the coupon system, that was the reason. Otherwise, do you think we’d volunteer to do labor in the kitchen? She had no choice if she wanted to maintain control over the students.”
The Euros students gradually began to accept it.
Up until now, they had been suffering through terrible food, and their body weight had been steadily dropping. In such a situation, how could they not appreciate proper meals?
Students who had unintentionally been on a diet found themselves, almost as if enchanted, taking their food and then lining up again.
“See? People are already coming back for seconds. We should be charging for this. Honestly, if we were trying to make money, we would’ve set up an auction. An auction.”
Atos chuckled as he distributed the food.
“One more bowl!”
“Me too, another bowl!”
The Euros students eagerly devoured their meals, while other students watched from a distance in confusion.
They understood that Euros had chosen the kitchen, but since there shouldn’t have been any way to obtain extra ingredients, how had they managed to make something even more delicious?
“…What should we do, Fiona? Prince Lorenzo is absent.”
The Nothos students, with Prince Lorenzo absent, turned to Fiona for guidance.
“Send those who have connections with Euros students to obtain some of that soup. If necessary….”
Fiona pointed toward the Euros students who were indebted to Nothos.
She meant that if needed, they should be coerced into obtaining it from the debtors.
Prince Karl was bound to a pillory installed in the rear garden connected to the student plaza.
The pillory was a punitive device used to shame someone by fixing their neck and hands so they must stand exposed in the square.
For the heir of an elector house to be tied up like a common criminal in such a place was unthinkable, and Boreas students were shocked.
“Kuh….”
Karl’s face was flushed with humiliation.
He had only been bound for about twenty minutes.
Moreover, his subordinates were surrounding the area to prevent anyone from approaching. Even so, being bound to the pillory alone was enough to make him want to bite his tongue and end his life out of sheer shame.
But then….
“Are you alright, Prince Karl?”
A beautiful girl’s voice called out.
Idnia Katze Betelgeuse.
For Karl, the last person he wanted to see him in such a disgraceful state had entered the garden.
Ah. He’s dead, this one.
Idnia clicked her tongue inwardly as she looked at Karl bound to the pillory.
Nibles, being a lecturer who even in the original game died early in the semester… it seemed he was faithfully following his original fate.
He had clearly chosen death. Binding the son of an elector house, not even an illegitimate child but the rightful heir, to a pillory like this—how did he plan to handle the aftermath?
It could only be described as someone desperate to die.
“Kuh!”
Seeing Karl channeling aura out of humiliation, Idnia shook her head and raised her hand.
With a sharp crack!
Idnia immediately struck and shattered the pillory.
Karl flinched in surprise as he looked at her.
“Ah.”
The pillory, made of red oak wood, was extremely hard and sturdy. Even an axe would not easily break it, yet Idnia had effortlessly smashed it with the edge of her hand.
And that was not all.
Clap!
Idnia raised her hand and struck her own cheek.
“What are you doing!”
“Prince Karl. Please forgive me for barging in and seeing you in this state.”
Idnia said this, then struck her cheek again.
A sharp slapping sound echoed, like a whip striking.
Of course, the sound was louder than the actual force.
Idnia had adjusted her technique to protect her face while only pretending to hit herself. Striking her face was no different from clapping.
However, Karl, startled by her actions, grabbed her hand.
“I-it’s alright! Idnia! Your body is far more precious than something like this humiliation! There’s no need for a duke’s daughter like you to harm yourself just because it was seen! But….”
Karl held Idnia’s wrist and felt her body shift slightly. In stopping her hand, he was the one being pulled along.
What incredible strength is this?
At that moment, Rudolph and Lorenzo, who had arrived late, entered the garden.
“Hmm….”
“Ah….”
They froze upon seeing Karl holding Idnia’s hand.
“Tch. What are you all crowding around to watch?”
“We heard there was trouble, Karl. Surely….”
Rudolph trailed off mid-sentence.
The sight of Idnia and Karl holding each other’s hands was distracting.
Of course, he reasoned, there had been sounds of something breaking and striking, so perhaps Idnia had been caught while breaking the pillory, and Karl had grabbed her. It didn’t seem like Karl would be that tactful. Nor Lorenzo. But still… it bothered him.
Rudolph found himself conscious of the relationship between Idnia and Karl.
“What exactly happened?”
“I got into an argument with a lecturer, and the lecturer got injured.”
“Did you hit them?”
“No! I didn’t lay a hand on them! More precisely, I stepped forward to object, and the other party seemed intimidated, so I was turning away without pressing further… but we collided and they fell. Then Professor Magram showed up saying they were seriously injured.”
“Magram?”
Idnia felt suspicion upon hearing that name.
In the original game, Magram was a character who was not very involved in the academic schedule and was more focused on business. Yet he suddenly appeared and had Karl bound to a pillory?
“Why did you accept this? You could have refused. You are the rightful heir of a ducal house of Oxbach and a pillar of the Holy Eldar Empire. No one but an imperial court could subject you to such humiliation. At worst, solitary confinement would have been more appropriate….”
Rudolph asked with a serious expression. Such humiliating treatment of Karl was something he, as the crown prince of the Holy Eldar Empire, could not overlook.
“They said a punishment that wouldn’t go on the official record was necessary.”
“Not on the official record?”
“Yes. Since observers called auditing students were present, if the punishment were official, it would show outsiders that the son of an elector house assaulted a lecturer. So they suggested handling it quietly, even if it was a bit inconvenient. I agreed, and then suddenly I was transported here and bound.”
Karl’s explanation was that he had agreed to an off-the-record handling of the matter to avoid public exposure, and then ended up being bound to the pillory.
“Magram did this?”
Lorenzo seemed taken aback upon hearing this.
“Why would you agree to that? Are you an idiot?”
“What?!”
Karl bristled, but….
“...I have nothing to say on this matter.”
Even Karl realized he had made a foolish decision.
Handling the academy issue discreetly might sound reasonable at first glance, but as the heir of an elector house, he should not have so easily placed himself in such a position.
“Alright, that’s enough. Perhaps while the conversation was going on, you absentmindedly agreed and ended up like this. As proof, even after breaking the pillory, there’s been no response, right? Isn’t that so, Professor Magram?”
Idnia called out toward the sky.
There was no reply from Magram. Naturally, since he wasn’t present, there could be no response. But the fact that he had bound Karl and yet gave no reaction after the pillory was destroyed was odd.
He was likely staying hidden because the situation wasn’t going as planned.
“Still, just in case, shall we go and protest? Everyone gather and—”
“Protest, you say….”
“Where exactly are you going to protest?”
“To the principal’s office, and we will protest directly.”
“The principal’s office. Where is that?”
“I know.”
As Idnia said that, Magram finally appeared, as if conceding.
“There’s no need for that. Haha, my apologies.”
“Professor Magram?!”
“Oh, everyone seems to be misunderstanding. Since Lecturer Nibles is also my former student, I was aware of the full circumstances and simply got involved. This is not an attempt to insult the Holy Eldar Empire. And Karl here also agreed to it. Haha. There’s no need to make a big issue out of this, is there?”
“…No. This kind of punishment is unacceptable. If anything, solitary confinement would have been better, but public humiliation like this….”
“So we deliberately applied a perception-blocking spell in this secluded area so that other auditing students could not come. The intention was only to simulate punishment while the investigation was ongoing… In fact, this kind of disciplinary approach is also partly at the discretion of Professor Sadia. The idea is to give students of high status a shocking experience that they would not normally encounter in their lives, to broaden their perspective….”
Magram continued to make various excuses, and while not entirely reasonable, it wasn’t completely nonsensical either.
The intention seems suspicious… but there’s nothing concrete to accuse him of.
So Idnia decided to approach the matter from a different angle.