Ebraham finished his bowl of ginger chicken soup with relish. He even had an extra serving after his first bowl was finished. His beard almost stained by the soup because of his action.
Actually, ever since Ebraham arrived at this world and occupied the life-like vessel, it was unnecessary for him to consume any food. It was unnecessary for him to sleep, either.
He could taste and digest the food he had consumed as the structure of his vessel was very close to human structure, yet, the energy replenished from food was basically non-existent which defeated the purpose of consuming food.
Nonetheless, Ebraham still accompanied Alicia during meal time and ate the same meal as her since it would make her uncomfortable if he, the host, did not touch any food at all. Moreover, it was proper for host to entertain their guest.
Whereas today, after experiencing the level of Alicia's cooking, Ebraham had opened a door of wonder.
'How can a simple cooking be this good?' Ebraham silently thought to himself.
It was to be expected for him to think so, since his field of study which includes cooking… or nutrition management, only focused on efficiency of created product instead of its taste.
But Alicia was also having the same thought and was surprised by taste of her cooking.
The ingredients available that she recognized were very limited, so she had only used the necessary ingredients. She had only used ginger, chicken meat, salt, spring water and a few spices. She did not even use garlic or black paper. Other supplementary ingredients were not used, either.
In spite of that, the ginger chicken soup still came out delicious. To be precise, it came out even more delicious than she had expected.
'The ginger had covered the spiciness. The chicken meat is fragrant and tender. The soup contained a perfect blend of all flavour. This is as if the taste of ingredients was enhanced' Alicia made an analysis while savouring the soup. She could not understand why this had happened.
"I smell something delicious!" Star suddenly cried while appearing out of nowhere. He circled the dining area before stopping at the pot on the stove.
"This smells delicious. Can I have some?" he said with a begging face.
Seeing such a cute little fairy begging for food, Alicia was immediately defeated.
"Of course. Here, have some" Alicia poured a bowl of soup for him.
By the time Alicia noticed that the bowl was too big for the fairy that he could bath in it, Star had already happily sipped the soup with his hand. The heat of the soup did not even scald his hand.
"Ah!"
Alicia was surprised by his action, but seeing that he was okay, she could not do anything about it. After all, even if she gave him a spoon, he could not use it as it was also bigger than him.
"Whoa! Something smells delicious"
Other fairies were also attracted to the dining area. They also wanted to try the ginger chicken soup.
Since there was not enough bowl for every fairy present, Alicia only served 4 more bowl of soup and had them share among them. Since all 255 fairies were present, it suddenly became lively as 51 fairies had to share one bowl.
Alicia only made 3 adult portions of soup, so she was worried that there was not enough soup for everyone.
But a fairy could only drink a handful of soup before their stomach became bloated, and their handful of soup would only amount to less than a drop, so only a small portion of soup actually devoured by these fairies.
This sudden turn of event had shocked Ebraham. Not that he was shocked because he did not notice Star's or other fairies' movement, he was shocked that the fairies wanted to taste the food.
Ebraham knew that although the fairies seemed like to eat fruits, they did not actually eat the fruit. Instead, they absorbed the magical energy in the fruit and become full because of that.
He did not know how the magical energy taste like to the fairies, but now, the food that Alicia cooked had enticed fairies' appetites.
They even went as far as physically consuming the soup which caused their little stomachs to be bloated.
To uncover the mystery behind their behaviour, Ebraham carefully checked the ginger chicken soup.
At a glance, it seemed like the food was the same as the food cooked by the maid automata.
However, at granular level, Ebraham discerned that a portion of magical energy in the ingredients were preserved in the food. This was the reason that the food was delicious.
Generally, by preserving the magical energy inside the ingredients, the ingredients would stay fresh for along time. The freshness of the ingredients would remain even after it was processed.
However, it had to be highlighted that the ingredients used; the wild chicken, the ginger and the spices, were just normal ingredients, instead of magical one. Although magical energy resides in everything in this world, the amount of magical energy in these ingredients were not considerable for a change.
The effect was even more abbreviated as the magical energy leaked out of the ingredients after being processed.
Take the wild chicken for example; it had to be slaughtered, skinned, gutted, processed, and cleaned before being cooked. It was losing the already minuscule magical energy it has at every step of the process.
But Alicia managed to contain a considerable amount of the magical energy in her cooking.
The reason that she managed to do so was because of her special magical energy produced by her special ability.
Ebraham came to that conclusion after finding a trace of Alicia's magical energy in the food.
Furthermore, her special magical energy even amplified the minuscule magical energy in the ingredients which enhanced its taste.
The more surprising fact was that, Alicia had unintentionally achieved this result without knowing about it. It was hard to imagine what she could achieve if she could control her power and use it with full intention.
'If this ability is used when concocting a potion, the potion efficiency will surely soar. This young lady has great potential in pharmacology' such thought ran through Ebraham's mind.
Ebraham anticipated the day when Alicia succeeded in controlling her special ability and at the same time, powered with necessary knowledge and skills.
While Ebraham was thinking so, he did not notice the minute changes in the fairies' magical energy.
After they had finished having dinner, Ebraham retained Alicia for a cup of tea.
Although the food made by the maid was barely palatable to Alicia, she actually like the unique taste of tea brewed by the maid.
Ebraham asked Alicia about her day and made some other pleasantries, he moved on to the main subject.
He placed on the table the three items that he made during the day.
"These are the things I intended to give to you as meeting gift, but…"