Grinding is a strategy in gaming whereby you repeat an easy action many times to build up wealth, power, abilities or status.
For example, a player who kills easy monsters to collect coins, items and experience would wait for them to respawn to repeat the process.
The player would do this for long periods of time to gain wealth and power in the game world.
After gaining the knife skill, I am determined to max it out.
I became a machine, I would routinely wake up every day at the same time and do the same thing.
After waking up, my mom would help me put on my little chef uniform.
It took some effort to get my parents to buy me an entire wardrobe of it; This allowed me to wear one every day of the week.
The 15% bonus experience too cooking-related skills were too good to give up.
Once I finished getting dressed, my mom would then carry me downstairs and prepare breakfast.
After finishing breakfast, I would get placed in my playpen where I would start grinding.
I would move toward my chef's play kitchen and straighten my back before placing down the cutting board on the counter space and gathered my knife and ingredient.
I kept using the play-doh as a replacement ingredient.
I would practice my cutting techniques and reform the play-doh, just to rinse and repeat.
The experience gained was small but never-ending.
My knife skill was leveling at a steady pace.
I would switch my hands during practice to train them hoping to become ambidextrous.
I believed two hands were better than one.
It was also a safety precaution; This would allow me to continue working if I ever lose function in one of my hands.
I realized early on that the play-doh was game-breaking.
Many issues would have occurred while using real ingredients.
You could only cut an ingredient so many times before it becomes minced.
You can't reform and reuse real ingredients like play-doh.
It would have cost an arm and a leg to grind my skill to the maximum level.
I doubt my parents would let me waste real ingredients practicing.
My grinding journey continued for months on end.
Leveling began to slow, and I started to seek new knowledge hoping it would help raise my skill level faster.
I asked my parents if they knew any knife techniques; Unfortunately, they only knew the basics.
Therefore, I asked them to buy a few books on knife skills.
They gave me a weird look.
After a little begging, they purchased the books for me.
I often read the books together with them; it was an activity we did together.
I insisted they read it to me as a bedtime story.
I was trying to memorize and assimilate the knowledge and my parents were kind and didn't mind fulfilling my weird requests.
With newfound knowledge, I began to try to put them into practice.
I was glad the accessory set included many types of knives I could practice and familiarize myself with.
I would often switch between knives and readjust my knife grips.
Each grip I learned had a specific purpose.
The pointed finger grip was best for traditional Japanese knives; It helps control the slice.
The hammer grip is strong but without so much control, it's used for cutting ingredients that require strength such as a watermelon.
The pinch grip has a natural feel and gives a great feeling of control; It's often used for cutting delicate ingredients.
Last but not least, the combo grip is a mixture of the hammer grip and pinch grip; it's often used for small knives.
During the past few months, I have mastered many basic cutting techniques such as the slice, chop, back-slice and rock-chop.
I am still trying to master advanced techniques such as carving, boning and filleting.
My skill levelling speed increases whenever I properly perform something new.
I can assume the more knowledge and practical skill I have, the higher the knife skill level.
I began to increase my cutting speed and improve my ability to cut different shapes and designs.
It became my obsession, I would attempt to do anything to increase my knife skill.
I smuggle my toy knife and play-doh into my crib, so I could practice though the night.
My parents discovered what I was doing after a few weeks, and they promptly took away my toys for two weeks.
They worried about me; All I was doing the past months was grinding my knife skill by cutting play-doh with my toy knife and reading about knife skills.
I struggled to continue grinding.
It was boring, repetitive, and tiring.
But I remember my dream and my previous life.
I sucked it up and kept going after realizing my current free time was precious.
Soon I would have to go to school and I wouldn't have as much free time to grind.
I got too desperate; I had to have looked crazy.
I spent those two weeks with my parents; I felt bad for worrying them.
It was relaxing and my parents eventually gave me back my toys.
It took lots of time, but I reached my goal.
[Ding, ding]
[Knife Skill Level Up!]
[Master Knife Skill Lvl 10 advanced to Perfect Knife Skill!]
Just in time for my second birthday.