Start off by slicing the pork thickly. Once that's done, mold the rice on a deep dish and layer the pork on top of the rice so that the rice is no longer visible. With that done, pour on a quick ladleful of stew.
After that, garnish with a marinated soft-boiled egg that's been cut in half, and the dish is complete.
◇◇◇◇◇
"Here you go."
All three of them dug in heartily.
"Ohh, this is great! The meat is soft enough to melt in my mouth. Also, this flavoring is pretty well done." It seemed like Hati liked the pork.
[So goooood! What is this meat, it's so soft it melts! Man, the stuff you make really is always amazing!] It looked like Razsegath was in favor, too.
[This sweet and salty flavor is so good all soaked up unto this soft meat.] Seemed like Groot liked it too. 'Groot does like this salty and sweet flavoring, doesn't it?
Thank goodness it went over well. That means that making this was worth it. Now then, I should eat too.'
For my share, I layered on the pork after also adding a bed of shredded cabbage, since doing so would make it much more refreshing.
'Now then, a bite... Ohh! I probably shouldn't be saying this about something I made myself, but it's pretty damn good.'
The orc general's meat had been stewed until it was almost melted, and the sweet and salty tare was properly soaked into the meat and paired well with it. The mix of rice, cabbage, and pork created the greatest flavor. Even I started to unconsciously eat with gusto. The marinated soft-boiled egg was also great, with its soaked-in flavor.
"More." [More!]
Hati and Groot asked for more. When I served them, they went to town once again. They had several more helpings after that, and by the time Hati and Groot were satisfied, the pork was all gone. 'I'd made quite a bit of it, too... Still, the stewed pork was quite well done this time. It might be worth it to make again.'
After fitting in a post-meal rest and digestion, we once again set off through the forest. Hati, Razsegath, and Groot took their turns mowing down the monsters we encountered. While I retrieved the huge amounts of drops, we decided to stop for the day once the forest became dark.
"So the dungeon gets dark and light too, huh?"
"Indeed. On these types of floors, the day-and-night cycle follows the outside. Also, nocturnal monsters will start to show themselves at night."
"Geh, really? Hati, your barrier's still fine, right?"
"Hmph! Of course it is. Just as I have told you before, as long as a dragon does not come knocking, we are fine."
'Then I can rest easy, I think. No, wait...'
"You say that, but there aren't any dragons here, are there?"
"It would have been nice if there were. I do not feel anything as powerful as a dragon on this floor."
'No way, no way man. It's better that they aren't here. That way I can actually sleep.'
"Still though, this floor is huge. If this keeps going, it'll probably be impossible to see the entire floor."
"If we were to search the entire floor, even we would need about a month, I think."
"Huh? Really?!"
"Yes. That sounds interesting as well, but for now we should hurry to fight the behemoth. We are moving towards a powerful presence that is probably the boss of this floor. With Razsegath and Groot here, we are making quite good progress, but it will probably still take another two days."
I did think that this floor was huge, but to think it would take more than a month... I didn't expect it to be that big. 'It'll probably be impossible to look around this floor for treasure chests, won't it? Oh well, I guess I should just give up.'
'But still two days at our quick pace... wait, what is the boss, anyway? I'm more worried about that.'
◇◇◇◇◇◇
For dinner today I brought out Hamburg steak cutlet and karaage as the main dish, as well as the rest of the pork miso soup, since Hati and Groot both loved the fried stuff like karaage and cutlets.
They ate it with gusto. It looked like Razsegath also loved the food, and he filled his cheeks full of karaage.
After finishing dinner, when I was about to raise the box house using Earth magic, for some reason I couldn't use magic.
"Huh? What? I can't make a house..."
"Of course you would not be able to use Earth magic in a dungeon, much less something like making a house."
'Huh? What?'
"I told you before that dungeons are living things, no? So, in other words, this "earth" is not earth, but a part of the dungeon's body. In a dungeon, the most you can do with Earth magic is make pebbles and use spells like Stone Bullet. So those who use Earth magic are considered unfit for dungeon diving."
'Whaaaat? No one ever told me that! Actually, it's just unfair that I can't use Earth magic in a dungeon!'
◇◇◇◇◇◇
The next morning, we quickly started moving through the floor after breakfast.
We navigated through the forest, aiming for the floor's boss. The monsters we encountered along the way were dealt with in the order of Hati, Razsegath, and Groot just like yesterday.
We saw murder grizzlies and giant killer mantises just like before. This time, a swarm of giant killer mantises numbering thirty appeared, as well as a giant centipede, just like we saw in the forest of Ishtam. This one was bigger than the one we saw back then. Other than that, there was also a troop of almost fifty wild apes, a B-ranked monkey monster. There were other beast-, bird-, and bug-type monsters that seemed like they'd be at home in a forest that like the one we saw yesterday, but of course they were all destroyed by my children.
Since it was the 26th floor, they were all high-ranking strong monsters in the A and B-ranks, but they were all swept aside with no problems. And once again we went through the forest while I picked up the enormous amount of drops. There were so many drops that I could no longer keep track of how much I had of what. Not every monster dropped something, but the drop rate for high-ranking monsters really was high. Thinking about the number of monsters everyone had defeated up until this point, it might be considered a matter of course that I'd accrued a frankly absurd amount of drop items by now, though. Still, everyone was so strong and kept killing everything, so the number of items just kept increasing.
My Item Box still probably wouldn't get full, but it might be quite the problem when we went back up, since I'd have to sort all of the drop items.
While I was thinking about that, Hati stopped walking.
"There is a killer hornet nest ahead..."
'Killer hornets... is that like one of those giant hornets?'
[Gah, killer hornets? I hate those things. There's so many of them, and they all fly around like I do...] Razsegath complained hatefully.
'They must be just that bad for Razsegath to complain like that.'
"Truly. They are not strong, but with that many of them, and with them flying around like that, annoying does not even cover half of it..." Hati also made a hateful face.
'Ahh, so it's like that. It's true that wasps come in swarms of tens or even hundreds, I guess.'
"Wouldn't it be best to do this like normal?"
"It might. It would probably be best to destroy the nest first, then take care of the killer hornets that are outside."
'So we should destroy all the hornets in the nest first, huh? Well, if we didn't, they'd just keep coming out and attacking us, after all. Wait, where is that nest, anyway?' When I asked Hati, we moved until I was in a position to see it.
What I saw was a nest the size of a whole wagon. The nest itself was built attached to the roots of a large tree, and around it, wasps around 30 cm in length were buzzing around.
[Next is Groot's turn, but Groot's only attacks are Acid Bullets and Water magic... it would be a bad match for trying to destroy the nest from far away...] Hati said telepathically.
'It's true that Acid Bullet doesn't seem like it would destroy the nest immediately, and using Water magic or Water Cutter would...'
[No! No! Groot will do it alone! Groot will do it!] Groot was throwing a fit.
[Hey Groot, you need to stop being so selfish, you know? Hati's right here. You're just a bad match for it, be patient,] said Razsegath, backing Hati up.
'It's true that what Hati and Razsegath are saying is correct... But I really want to do something for Groot.'
[Ughhh, but it's Groot's turn...*sniff*...]
'Ahh! Groot's crying! Don't cry, Groot... Acid Bullets and Water magic... Water... Water... Water... Hmmm... Ah!'
"No, Groot can do it by itself easily."
"You... you need to stop coddling Groot like that already."
'I can't help it, okay? Groot's so cute! Wait, no, it's not like that's a problem.'
"I won't deny that, but it'll be fine if we use my strategy." I explained exactly what I thought up to the three of them: enclose the nest in a large water ball. And then just leave it until all the hornets inside die. In other words, drown them.
[...You know you think up some pretty cruel things,] said Razsegath in reaction to hearing my strategy.
'I don't want to be told that by you, Mister Covers-himself-in-magic-to-ram-straight-through-monsters!'
"Drowning them in water is not a bad idea. Groot, try it."
[Got it, Uncle Hati!]
'Groot, I'm the one that thought of it, you know?'
Groot made a ball of water large enough to fit the nest inside of it, and moved it so it was engulfing the nest. Several killer hornets left the attacked nest and tried to leave the water, but they were unable to fly in the water and so just kind of wriggled around a bit. Then, Groot finished them off with an Acid Bullet.
"With this the nest should be destroyed with a little time. All that's left are the ones outside of the nest... Hey, everyone here's hungry, right?"
"Indeed."
[I'm hungry too.]
[Groot's tummy is also empty.]
'Thought so. I figured it should be about time for food.'
"Hey, Groot. You'll probably destroy the nest if you just leave it like that for a while. So can you let Razsegath and Uncle Hati help you beat the ones outside? That way we can eat sooner."
[Yeah okay! Groot wants to eat too, so it's fine!]
'And so, Hati, Razsegath, I'm counting on you guys.'
The killer hornets must have sensed that there was something wrong with the nest, but Hati and Razsegath killed all of them as they came back, one after the other, and I picked up the dropped items. All that the killer hornets dropped were poison needles, though.
Once all the flying killer hornets were killed, it was time for food. We ended up having Groot leave the water ball where it was just to make sure the nest was extra dead.
We ate the wyvern meat beef bowls that I had prepared earlier.
'Beef bowls really just aren't complete without this...' Since there were no other adventurers on the 26th floor other than us, I decided to use my skill to buy some warm soft-boiled eggs. I served Hati and the others' portions without the egg first, and then with the eggs upon extra servings. I wanted to eat it both ways as well, so I had a smaller portion by itself, and then with an egg.
'Man, the wyvern meat beef bowls are good.'
I even got Razsegath a second helping, and both Hati and Groot went through multiple servings again. After eating so much food, we took a break.
[Ah! Looks like Groot beat it!]
When I looked over at the killer hornet nest in response to Groot's voice, it had disappeared. I had Groot get rid of the water ball, and checked on the drop items.
"It's all poison needles, huh?" 'They're bugs after all, I guess there's just not much to be had materials-wise.'
"Ah, this is..." I picked up something white that was in a bottle. When I appraised it...
[Killer Hornet's Royal Jelly]
Extremely nutritious.
'Royal jelly, huh? Is it that stuff that's in health foods? It says it's extremely nutritious, but with just that much explanation...'
"Ohh, you have found something great there. That stuff will make you energetic and healthy just by licking some of it."
'Looks like Hati knows of it. If it makes you healthy and energetic just by licking it, I should probably keep it just like this, huh?'
Storing the poison needles and royal jelly in my Item Box, we once again set off through the forest. After that, we kept moving towards where Hati said the floor's boss was while beating beast-, bird-, and bug-type monsters and collecting their drops.
Once it went dark, we decided to stop for the night.
The next day, we once again moved through the forest while beating all manner of beast-, bird-, and bug-type monsters and collecting their drops. In the middle, we discovered a treasure chest and opened it, but other than that we proceeded uneventfully. By the way, there were two types of gems in the chest, sapphires and alexandrite.
According to Hati, we were just about to run into the floor boss. Hati also said that it was fairly strong, judging by its presence.
'I wonder what kind of boss is waiting for us...?'
◇◇◇◇◇◇
Finally, we were going to challenge the floor boss.
'If that's the case, for breakfast...'
"Hati, we're fighting the boss after this, right? So I'm thinking of making food with stuff from my world. How about it?" 'If we're going to fight something boss-class, then it would be better to buff ourselves with food from my world.'
"You are planning to make us stronger by feeding us food from your world?"
"That's right. The boss is pretty strong even from your perspective, right Hati? If that's the case, I should use my skill to make you even stronger to ensure safety."
"Indeed. Even as we are now there would not even be a million to one chance we would lose, but eating food from your world is a good idea."
'...Wait, Hati said that it was a good idea, but that's just because he wants to eat the food, isn't it? I don't know what the boss will be though, and I need them to beat it no matter what (otherwise I'll die) so I don't mind at all that he's getting stronger...'
"If that's the case, then what about the same steaks as last time?"
"Yes, that would be good."
'Yep, knew he would go for the wagyu steaks. I don't think steaks are a great idea first thing in the morning, but it shouldn't be a problem for them.'
I opened my Online Supermarket, and bought the necessarily enormous amount of domestic wagyu beef steaks. Even though we would just be eating food from my world, I figured just steaks would be a bit boring, so I bought some other foods as well while leaving the focus of the meal on everyone's favorite thing: meat.
The first thing I bought was Korean barbequed pork, with both salty lemon flavoring and salted onion flavoring. Nowadays, there were quite a few flavors of pre-seasoned meat, and they were all very convenient since all one had to do was grill them.
I also bought some minced meat wieners, something called black pepper roasted duck, lots of grilled chicken thighs and livers, and some tare and salt, as well as sandwiches for my own personal breakfast.
'First, remove the precooked chicken from their skewers and put them on a plate. Next, cut the black pepper roasted duck to serving size and serve on a plate.'
I tried a little bit of it, and it was delicious, with a good combo of the duck's deep flavor and the kick of the black pepper.
"Food!" I served the grilled chicken and roasted duck to my three familiars. "You guys'll be fighting the floor boss after this, so eat up and get strong."
While everyone was eating, I used the magic stove to cook the wagyu steaks, pork, and minced meat sausages.
"More." [More!] [More!]
Everyone ate their fill right from the start of the day.
I served them all domestic wagyu steaks, grilled pork, and minced meat sausages when they asked for more.
I started them off with simple steaks seasoned with salt and pepper; the pork was already seasoned. When I tried them, they were tasty and refreshing. The minced meat sausages were only seasoned with salt and pepper, but they were bursting with flavorful juiciness, and the casing was nice and crisp. Razsegath was full after a little bit, but Hati and Groot were insatiable as always.
While Hati and Groot were eating, I finished my simple breakfast of sandwiches and coffee.
"Whew, just as I remembered, the food from the other world is delicious."
[Hohh so this is from the other world? It's pretty great.]
[It was good!]
'That's nice to hear, but I have something else to be more concerned about. Just how high are their stats now?'
I appraised everyone.
[Name] Hati
[Age] 1014
[Race] Fenrir
[Level] 911
[HP] 9890 (+5002)
[MP] 9534 (+4675)
[Attack] 9118 (+4483)
[Defense] 9814 (+4907)
[Agility] 9732 (+4856)
[Skills] Wind magic, Fire magic, Water magic, Earth magic, Ice magic, Lightning magic, Holy magic, Barrier magic, Rending Claws, Body Reinforcement, Physical attack resistance, Magic attack resistance, MP Efficiency, Appraisal, Battle Boost
[Name] Razsegath
[Age] 116
[Race] Proto-dragon Dragon
[Level] 129
[HP] 915 (+459)
[MP] 3935 (+1448)
[Attack] 3703 (+1342)
[Defense] 886 (+445)
[Agility] 4345 (+1673)
[Skills] Fire magic, Water magic, Wind magic, Earth magic, Ice magic, Lightning magic, Healing magic, Bombardment, Battle Boost
[Name] Groot
[Age] 2 months
[Race] Big Tree seedling
[Level] 21
[HP] 1079 (+538)
[MP] 1063 (+529)
[Attack] 1058 (+533)
[Defense] 1061 (+525)
[Agility] 1080 (+540)
[Skills] Acid Bullet, Potion Creation, Cloning, Water magic,
'Ah, all three of them have leveled up. Well, they've been killing a lot of monsters while we've been in this dungeon, so it's not really surprising, I guess. But still, with how fast their stats grow... I-I might have gone too far, maybe? ...Ahaha..... A-Anyway, we're going to be fighting the floor boss now, so it's good, right? ...Right? A-At any rate, let's just go.'
We proceeded just like yesterday, with them defeating all the monsters we encountered and with me picking up dropped items. After a while, Hati stopped.
"It is the floor boss."
When I followed Hati's gaze...
There was a huge coiled cobra. It flicked out its thin and long tongue, trying to intimidate us with a hiss.
"W-What the heck..." I tried appraising it.
[Vaasuki]
An S-ranked monster.
'What? S-ranked...? Actually wait, just how many tens of meters is that thing? That's not a monster, it's a Kaiju! Not to mention it's spewing out some kind of mist from its mouth.'
When I tried appraising the mist, I got the result, [Vaasuki's Poison Mist].
"A vaasuki, huh? How unusual. Even I have only fought one around three times in my life."
It seemed that our Hati had fought it before. "Y-You've fought one of those things already...? It's huge, and even spits out poison mist..."
"Hmph, those things are easy pickings as long as you watch out for their bite and their constricting attacks."
'I see...'
"Well, I can go and finish it off by myself, but Razsegath and Groot would probably complain. Razsegath, Groot, let us go."
[If that's the boss it's worth of being my enemy. Awesome, let's go!!]
[Groot will try hard too!]
After looking at the Vaasuki, not only was no one else cowed by it, they were blazing with motivation. Personally, I probably wouldn't be able to handle that thing.
'I'll be waiting in behind a tree, yeah... Go get'em, everyone.'
My three familiars jumped in front of the vaasuki. When it spotted them, it started spreading its poison mist. They all ignored that and started attacking over and over.
*Bodooooommm!* *Cracklecracklecracklesnaaaaap!*
Hati's lightning magic burst against it.
*Thudshh* *Thudshh* *Thudshh*
Razsegath, wrapped in fire magic, was opening large holes in the vaasuki's coiled body.
*Plort* *Sploosh* *Baloosh*
Groot's Acid Bullet attacks hit the vaasuki and steadily dissolved it.
"Gyuooooohhhhh!!!"
*Kerthud!!*
...O H...
The vaasuki, now ragged and dead, fell flat in front of everyone. The battle didn't even last a minute. Actually, it was so one-sided I wasn't even sure if it could be called a fight. All the vaasuki did was spread some poison mist. After that, it wasn't allowed to do anything as it was beaten to death.
'Sorry, vaasuki.'
[YAHHAAHH! We did it!!] Razsegath was performing aerial maneuvers in celebration.
[We did it! We defeated the big snake!!] Groot was also excitedly hopping around.
"Heheh, of course we would." Hati's face was dripping with smug happiness.
I left the shadow of the tree and went towards my familiars. Looking at the burned and melted corpse of the vaasuki that was also littered with holes, I felt so sorry for it even though it was a monster that it almost brought tears to my eyes.
'Ahh, sorry, vaasuki.'
There was absolutely no need to feed them food from my world after all. The dead vaasuki disappeared.
'Truly, I'm sorry. Please rest easy, namusan. Well, I'll still help myself to your drops, though. Let's see... Ohh, what a glossy blue snakeskin. And a huge magic stone too, and fangs! Just what I'd expect out of not only a floor boss, but also an S-ranked monster!'
I put the vaasuki's drops into my Item Box.
"Hey, we've beat the boss so we can go down to the 27th floor, right? I don't see the stairs anywhere, though; how are we supposed to do that?"
"In these types of floors..." Leaving those words in the air, Hati inspected a rock that was near where the vaasuki was. "Ohh, here it is."
Lured by Hati's statement, I approached the rock.
"If you let your magic flow into this round pattern here on the rock, then we will be able to proceed forwards." The round pattern Hati was referring to was a magic circle.
'By that, does Hati mean that this thing will teleport us or something?'
"However, all those who wish to go down will not be able to unless they are in physical contact, so be careful about that."
'I see.'
"Razsegath, Groot, we're going down, so come over..."
When I explained to Razsegath and Groot that we had to be touching to go down...
*Glomp*
Razsegath clung on to the back of my head.
[This is good, right?]
'Razsegath... Oh fine.'
I was on top of Hati, with Groot in my arms.
"Okay then. Do it, Hati."
Hati placed his right front paw onto the magic circle and let his magic flow. When that happened, for a moment, I Felt a floating sensation, like I was in an elevator.
"So this is the 27th floor, is it? It's the same as the 26th, though."
"Indeed. It seems this is the 27th floor. Now then, we are going to use the same methods to track down the floor boss. Let us be off."
After that, we started to make progress through the forest, but I wasn't sure how I should react to it. Thanks to the ongoing effects of the food I served them, everyone was just hustling through the place. They were absolutely trampling over everything. I was even wanting to apologize to the monsters for what was happening. And just like that, I obtained another huge batch of drop items.
Not only that, but since everyone was so energetic, we went so fast that according to Hati we would see the floor boss before evening tomorrow. Yep, apparently we're seeing the floor boss already tomorrow.
'This time I'm not going to let them eat purely stuff from my world. I've learned restraint.'
◇◇◇◇◇
Meanwhile, somewhere very far away, a big fight is just ending. The smaller participant is visibly losing.
He is taking a critical strike from ´Big Dragon, other person is defeated, deflating out of his form and collapsing. Big dragon is unhappy with being given an unfair advantage, Big dragon directs his rage at person who intervening in the battle. He accepts Big dragon's rage as he is struck down.
Transforming into his dragon form, Big bad dragon returns to the other battlefield, declares victory against person in straw hat, and demands the alliance's unconditional surrender. He declares his intentions to continue the New Onigash*** Project, moving Onigash*** to the Flower Capital and subjecting the remaining citizens of certain samurai Country to forced labour.
The remaining allied forces, despite being devastated by news of person with straw hat's alleged death, refuse to surrender, continuing the battle against the remaining Pirates. Momo**suke, despite being demoralized after noticing straw hat person's voice go silent, also decides not to end his struggle, continuing to move the island away from the capital.
And then it hapens!!!
*boom* sounds of drums echoing
*boom*
On the rooftop, starw hats's unconscious body suddenly regains a heartbeat. His body undergoes a mysterious transformation. Meanwhile, certain elephant is celebrating.
// im sure every men of culture eagerly wait for agust 6th*wink wink*