Good morning. I’m Ren.

Ah, I’m exhausted… Really, my blood pressure was ‌low… That’s how it is, but waking up every morning was hard. It makes me feel down…

But I regained my spirit and woke up! I quickly got up and neatly dressed myself… Okay, I’m awake.

I might feel better if I sleep for a few more hours, but I chose not to do that since it would be bad if I ruined the rhythm of my life.

Now then, I boiled hot water while clearing the snow away and prepared for breakfast appropriately like the day before. I hunted a few horned rabbits when I removed the snow, so I used them to make bone soup broth and made rabbit meat pot-au-feu. Together with many vegetables. For the staple food, they could eat their own bread. Triela and the others bought a fair amount of hard bread, so we should eat them before they become spoiled…

By the way, I hunted the rabbits using a sling. Several people woke up early in the morning, so I had to watch myself and not use [Sword Magic]. But then, using a magic sword would blow off the rabbit, and I wouldn’t be able to get its meat anymore. I could just use a sword I hadn’t bestowed yet? I didn’t think there would be much difference, though.

As I was preparing for breakfast, Ryuu woke up early as usual. We had small talks while drinking tea. However, today the leader of the caravan woke up early and joined us, so I also served him the tea.

“Haa… This tea is delicious… It makes me wonder about the blend ratio…”

I didn’t know how to respond if he said that. Do your own research, please. Anyway, why did he come here? It’s more productive to wake up his friends and prepare various things, right?

I gazed at him full of suspicion, and he turned away from me awkwardly. What the heck?

I’m tired of dealing with this experienced merchant, so I left him alone and continued with my breakfast preparation. Hmm, let’s go with this… it’s a hassle to make elaborate items every morning, so I did it appropriately.

“This dish looks delicious too.”

Even if you said such a thing, I wouldn’t sell our breakfast this time, okay?

I had so many ingredients in my [Storage] that I could even open a store, but the more I took them out, the more unnatural the amount would be. Naturally, I wouldn’t want to stand out for nothing.

This time, I used the rabbit I just caught, but it didn’t mean I could buy it conveniently every time… It’s a bit troubling that they got interested in my cooking.

Anyway, I finished the preparations while brilliantly ignoring him, waking up all the sleeping members to have a meal. By the way, Arle, who couldn’t get up early in the morning, continued to regret not being able to help with cooking. Arle’s blood pressure was worse than mine… I tried to wake her up in the morning, but it had no effect.

When we finished our meal, we prepared to move immediately and continued our journey, still trailing the other caravans.

And today, early in the morning, a flock of stray hungry wolves attacked us. Since there were few of them, the escorts easily defeated them alone. The wolf’s fur could be sold, but the meat was so nasty that they buried it randomly.

It would be nice if a beast or a monster that could be eaten appeared.

While taking a few breaks along the way, we had lunch. Hmm, what should I make… Everyone’s eyes were glittering with expectations, but there were too many things I couldn’t make in this situation. If I feel like it, I could even make a full course meal here. But let’s not do that…

Personally, I wanted to eat sea fish. I had lots of it in my [Storage]. I ate them little by little secretly, but they didn’t decrease at all since I only ate alone… It didn’t really matter since it would not rot, though.

I also had river fish, but hmm… No, it’s too troublesome. Let’s make something else.

I made a pork bone porridge using the orc bone soup I prepared last time. I put in some vegetables and some meat. I made it in a sizable amount, so there’s no way this wouldn’t be enough.

When I took out the saucepan filled with soup, I hid behind the carriage and sneaked it out to make sure I wouldn’t stand out, but the scent caught everyone’s attention. I guess this scent was amazing. But I ignored them.

And the undernourished kids ate quickly. Ah, but there’s a few more left. What should I do… Give it to Norn?

“Um… excuse me. If you have any leftovers, can you give it to us?”

When I was going to give the remaining porridge to Norn and Bell, the leader of the merchant came again. Ah… oh well, whatever.

“There are about five portions left. Are you fine with that?”

“Yes, that’s fine! The soup I had yesterday was very delicious, and I’m starving after smelling this dish… Thank you very much!”

Therefore, I moved the porridge into the pot brought by the merchant. When I washed my saucepan, I heard a cheer from them… Maybe I shouldn’t sell it to them? But it’s leftovers…

As I prepared for our departure, the leader came over again. Yes, yes. What is it?

“Actually, I have a request for you. Could you make our caravan’s meal starting tonight? Of course I will pay the bill. We will also bring all the ingredients. I don’t mind if you cook your friends’ share‌. We will also prepare the ingredients for that. What do you think?”

Ehh… That’s ‌troublesome… Did they like it that much? And delicious meals directly related to morale? Ahh, I could understand that.

Hmm, what should I do? With our current situation, I couldn’t even take my ingredients. It would be appreciated if we could use their ingredients. I only had to be careful, so ‌they didn’t find out about the ingredients, but…

Since they were escorting a parasite like us, refusing this request would spark a lot of problems. Hmm…

“Hm… Are you worried about your friends? Please rest assured, we will protect you properly! And we won’t take any fee for that!”

Mmm… Even if he could force me to cook for him, he didn’t mention about us being parasites and even offered a bonus of a free escort fee! Maybe he also tried to curry favor like what I did?

If possible, I wanted him to raise the offer, ‌but I should know when to stop. I mean, it was great that we could get escorts and free ingredients just by cooking for them! And I’m not great at negotiations, anyway.

“Okay, then I’ll accept that… By the way, all I have to do is cook for your caravan personnel and my friends, right?”

“Yes, go with that. Don’t worry about those people.”

Yeah, apart from this guy’s caravan, which was very nice to us, ‌there were also two other caravans. By the way, both of them didn’t like my tea bribes yesterday. So I didn’t give them any tea during today’s break. Naturally, I’m not that stupid.

There’s no doubt that some people were glaring at us, but I was already under the protection of this leader. There’s no problem.

This person would handle the troublesome negotiations with them, so I should accept his request. Also, he would lend me several people to help in the preparation. I asked if Arle and the other kids could help me, and he agreed. It would take too much time to prepare lots of food, so it would be troublesome if he didn’t approve of that.

With 10 carriages, this person’s caravan had over 30 personnel. I didn’t plan to work myself to death.

Actually, now that I have [Cooking] LV10, I could easily do it if I feel like it. But it’s a hassle…

That’s why I was temporarily hired as a cook. After that, we continued to move, arriving at today’s campsite with no problem.

Starting from today, I left the night camp preparation to everyone else, so I prepared the meal immediately. We had one freshly caught orc, so I wanted to make something from it. This orc was a stray monster that attacked us when we arrived at the campsite.

By the way, the goods in this caravan were food. They brought a sizable amount of wheat or something like that. They told me I could use them as much as I like, so I didn’t restrain myself. That being said, I had to make food for around 40 people including us… What should I make?

I found something familiar when I looked inside the cargo. It was a pasta machine.

Hmm, let’s just make pasta. Pasta was filling, and I was already tired of thinking too much, so I went with this. After that, let’s go with vegetable soup? I asked the caravan’s person in charge of cooking to make the soup.

It’s a pain to make elaborate foods, so let’s go with my specialty meat sauce. I asked those who had nothing to do to make a large amount of minced meat, then I made the sauce. Fortunately, they had dried tomatoes, so I could make do with this. Next, I kneaded a sizable amount of wheat to make the dough, made noodles using the machine, boiled it, then completed. I made the portion for each person slightly bigger, so they couldn’t ask for the second serving. If that’s not enough, please eat your own hard bread, okay?

The dinner ended with great success. Many people unreasonably begged for another plate.

No way, everyone got a big serving of pasta before… The leader scolded them, saying that they couldn’t eat too much of the product, and they finally became quiet.

The next morning, I made another dumpling soup using the boiled orc bone soup from yesterday as the base. If I wanted to make something that filled the stomach and warmed the body, my options were limited. Plus, the ingredients and the recipes I could use were restricted. It’s annoying….

We had to hurry during the day, so I made the lunch appropriately and tried cooking Peperoncino at night. As usual, I left the soup to someone else.

At first, many people were dissatisfied that I only added bacon in my cooking. But after eating a bite, they all shoveled it into their mouth silently. Fufu.

The next day, we were attacked by three orcs in the afternoon. However, the escorts were experienced and skillful. We had twelve escorts with us, so they beat the orcs easily after cooperating with each other. Let’s make these orc meats into today’s supper… What should I make?

The leader told me ‌we would arrive at O’Neill tomorrow afternoon, so this was the last supper… Hmm. Maybe I should make a nourishing dish? Should I go with that?

I collected the hard bread from the caravan and grated it to make bread crumbs. Then I cut out the meat from the orc and beat it to soften it. I taught the procedure to other people so I could leave this to them.

I added some seasoning to the meat and let it rest for a while, then I fried the orc fat to make a large amount of oil.

They gave me permission to use some eggs, even if those were high-class items, so I used the eggs and the breadcrumbs to dress the meat.

When I finished preparing lots of meat, I fried it in turns. Yes, this was a pork cutlet.
For now, I kept frying the meat. I cooked the meat of the three orcs, so everyone could have another serving. I had secured my portion, so there’s no need to worry. It seems like the remaining portion would be sold.

The stomach would hurt if they only ate meat, so I didn’t forget to prepare shredded cabbage. They could eat it as much as they wanted, be it sandwiching it between bread or directly.

Some tough guys insisted on only eating the meat, but it would be painful when they wake up tomorrow… But I didn’t really feel like taking care of them that much. I wouldn’t take responsibility. Let’s leave them alone.

“Is this the specialty food of Harula’s inn? But what I ate there wasn’t so tender. The taste and the texture are also ‌different… What I ate back then was greasy. The taste was more… how should I say this…”

“Oh, oh! Why are you making such a hard face! You shouldn’t eat this delicious food while using your head! Stop thinking so much and just eat it!”

Hmm. From the leader’s mutterings I heard, it seemed like he had eaten this at Harula? Fortunately, thanks to the bearded uncle who was the leader’s escort, he concentrated on eating without making any strange guesses… I guess I should be thankful that he didn’t misunderstand me? But if he asked me anything, I would play innocent.

The next day proceeded smoothly, and we could see O’Neill’s town wall from afar before noon. When we were approaching the branch road going south, I parted with them here.

“Are you sure? O’Neill is just right there. If you’re tired, we can take a short break here?”

“No, I have my circumstances…”

The leader of the caravan was worried about me, but I refused him. I couldn’t enter the city.

“Haa. I guess each person has their own situation. It can’t be helped… I understand, we’ll part here. Don’t worry about your friends since I’ll send them to O’Neill.”

Then I’ll leave them under your care.

Anyway, I received the payment for cooking and left. I crept to the south with my carriage, and when I couldn’t see them anymore, I took a rest for a while. From there, I returned to the branch road on foot, entering the forest northeast of O’Neill.

I planned to take my house out there when I reached the depths of the forest.

I already told Triela and the others that I would camp there. And they would come to tell me about the town every two days, so this was perfect.

Now that my arrangements were complete, I should also prepare myself for the worst…