Frontier Chef: My Cooking Skills Are Broken-Chapter 27: The Dust Kitchen

The commons was busier than it looked from the corridor.

People moved between the low volcanic buildings in strides that didn’t quite match their sullen faces.

A smith hammered something at a forge that probably added more steam to the air than any vents could. Down an aisle, a merchant was re-stacking the same crates he’d probably stacked yesterday.

The buildings sat low against the wind, slab stacked on slab, and the dry fountain at the center of the crossroads still had firewood stacked in its cracked basin.

Everything was dry, which tracked for a settlement built on sand and volcanoes.

Ezra walked the main road with Patches and let his eyes track the buildings until he found what he was looking for.

The kitchen.

It was the same one he’d clocked last night when they dragged him past. Well, it was more so him letting them if anything.

The front was open to the commons. Past the opening, a stone counter ran the entire length of it. Iron pots hung from a crossbar and a coal pit sunk into the back wall. A set of knives sat in a wooden block with blades dull enough to spread butter and not much else.

Nobody was using it.

In fact, nobody had used it in a long time.

The dust on the counter was thick enough to see individual boot prints where someone had leaned against it months ago. The coal pit was cold and the pots were still filled with leftover soup from the night before.

An entire head of a Gigaworm was floating just above the surface of one of the pots.

’Yeah, me too buddy.’

Ezra walked in and put his hands flat on the counter. The stone was warm from the heat running underneath Harken, and that warmth traveled up through his palms and met the low hum of Ember Arts sitting idle in his fingers.

He inhaled as hard as he could and blew it all at the dust on the table.

The dust scattered to the ground, revealing old marble engraved in symbols and marks that translated to gibberish.

’This’ll do.’

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The golden text followed his face as he checked out the back rooms behind the kitchen. Three barrels sat in a corner. He pried the lids open and cursed as the last one split and gave his finger a splinter.

> HP: 239/240

"Ouch."

In the barrels were dried root vegetables. Leaning against the barrels, a sack of grain that smelled like dung had recently been opened. Whoever cooked last forgot to tie the sack, and Ezra had to kick a rat the size of a football out of the room.

Hidden in a corner, a clay jar of salt that was more rock than seasoning sat open-lidded. The dried meat hanging from the ceiling beam was so stiff he could’ve used it as a weapon, and Patches was already eyeing it from the doorway.

’This is what they’ve been eating? No wonder nobody uses the kitchen.’

Ezra grabbed ingredients that fit into his palms. It was less of his idea and more so Palate Arts pinpointing exactly what mixed with what, and which didn’t make a person throw up. 𝚏𝐫𝚎𝗲𝕨𝐞𝐛𝕟𝚘𝐯𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝗺

He laid everything out on the counter. The roots were dense and chalky, somewhere between a yam and a turnip. The grain, while musky and old, would serve its purpose later when he found water.

Ezra didn’t take the salt. That shit was beyond saving.

The meat also needed water to reconstitute, which he didn’t have, so he set it aside.

He turned Ember Arts at a low dial, palms flat on the stone until the surface held an even heat. The symbols on the counter were starting to glow now.

The roots had sugar buried under the starch. On the other hand, the grain would caramelize if he got the moisture out first. Which brought him back to his main problem again: no water.

So he started with the roots, slicing them thin with the least terrible knife in the block. Even as dull as it was, Culling Arts autocorrected his grip and the weight of each slice.

’This thing is fucking sharp. It shouldn’t be.’

After cutting up a dozen or so, he fanned them across the heated stone and let it sizzle. The glowing symbols were burning brighter now, aiding the heat or just there for show Ezra couldn’t tell.

The smell took about thirty seconds to clear the kitchen and another thirty to reach the road.

It was a small thing; fat rendering out of a starchy root on hot volcanic stone. Back on Earth, it would’ve been the least impressive thing at a farmer’s market. The old Ezra would have agreed too, being a fast food eater and all.

Here, it stopped a Harkenian in the middle of the road.

The smith came first, standing at the kitchen’s open front with his hammer in his hand and a beard that masked his open mouth. Then a woman carrying a water jug paused behind him.

Two guards who’d been walking patrol broke formation to look—the same ones who confronted him when he and the bird girl had first arrived here.

Theron, the one who had a cape once, stepped forward and crossed his arms.

Nobody said anything. Why would they? A man in ever-shrinking clothes was manning a kitchen that barely anyone but the older women used to cook.

They just stood there breathing it in.

Ezra flipped the root slices and let Palate Arts guide the timing. The roots crisped at the edges and went golden brown across the flat. He poured grain for the hell of it and it picked up a nuttiness that mixed with the aroma of the sizzling roots.

By the time he plated the first batch on a stone slab he’d scrubbed clean, there were nine people watching.

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[ Event Summary ]

> Crafted: Meal (★) x1

> +75 Frontier Tokens

He pushed the slab to the edge of the counter. "Bon appeti... whatever the fuck. It’s food."

The smith took the first piece and bit into it. He stopped chewing, letting the crumbs of vegetable nestle into his beard.

"This is the same shit from the barrel?"

"Yessir."

He chewed and swallowed and reached for another piece. The woman with the water jug stepped forward next, mouth watering and not even trying to hide it. The jug fell on the black stone and was completely empty.

Ezra cooked three more batches that came and went in the time it took the crowd to grow by a dozen. They lined up at the counter with bowls and plates and, in one case, a helmet turned upside down because the guard didn’t have anything else.

[ Event Summary ]

> Crafted: Meal (★) x3

> +225 Frontier Tokens

Theron was still standing at a distance, arms crossed and eyeing his comrade who was biting down on golden-roasted vegetable chips and dry-roasted grain. Theron’s helmet hid his expression, but Ezra could feel the stare well enough.

That didn’t stop him from continuing.

The crowd of Harkenians parted like water does for a fin in the ocean. In the middle, a girl was writing excessively in her ledger. Mumbling to herself, her baby blue eyes locked onto Ezra mid-flip.

It was the fucking registrar.

She planted herself at the side of the kitchen with her ledger open. Her bangs were pulled back now, strands tied into a tight ponytail. If Ezra didn’t know any better he’d take her for a quiet library girl.

But he knew better.

"You told me you didn’t have a class," she said, scanning for a chair among the rubble that was apparently his temporary kitchen.

Not a chair in sight. That seemed to bother her more than whatever she was here for.

Ezra half-smiled to a little old lady running off with her plate of roasted veggies. The line was gone now. Most of the Harkenians were finishing their plates or already on about their day.

"I didn’t." Ezra wiped the sweat off his brows. "You got it all wrong, missy."

The registrar’s eyes outlined the glowing symbols on the counter. She wrote something else down, then let out a sigh before looking back up at Ezra.

"Class."

She sounded pissed.

’Should I play dumb again?’

Theron stepped into the kitchen and rested his spear against the wall. He unhooked tubes from his chest that ran under his helmet and lifted the helm up. He was quite younger than Ezra, or rather, Ezra’s new body. Jaw square and taut, he set the helmet on the counter careful not to brush the heated surface. He had long hair that went past his ears, a color that glowed red under the sun. Blue eyes, too.

"Ezra, right?"

Ezra nodded.

"Go away, baboon. I’m cataloguing his class right now," the registrar hissed.

He didn’t even flinch. "Ignore her, she can be annoying."

Her protest died on her lips, probably because Theron’s eyes had gone still.

"Anyway," he continued, "Did you touch my sister?"