“This is a carrot field! From here, such huge golden carrots have grown!”
“Ooooh!”
Ara’s words were translated by Junichi, and the Japanese chefs, hearing the translation, eagerly jotted something down.
Their behavior made them seem less like visitors and more like students here to learn.
“From here on, this is the potato and sweet potato field. We thin out the sprouts here.”
“Ooooh.”
“Sometimes, we even boil these sprouts and eat them. It’s actually a pretty nice delicacy.”
“Ooooh.”
Every time Ara said something, people nodded with admiration, which made her explanations grow more confident.
Seeing her like that was so adorable that Ryu Cheon had to resist the urge to hug her right then and there, covering her face with her hands.
“She’s just too cute…”
The field was vast, and the number of slimes managing the field was also immense.
As Junichi realized this was a slime dungeon, he discovered something new and felt his curiosity about slimes surge.
What if slimes could be used in farming on Earth?
Of course, it was an extremely difficult idea.
First of all, bringing slimes out of a dungeon wasn’t easy.
Monsters only came out in two scenarios: a dungeon break or being tamed as a familiar, and both were rare occurrences.
A slime dungeon break?
There were barely any dungeons where only slimes resided, and even if there were, a break was unlikely to happen.
As for taming them, that was even harder.
To tame a familiar, the monster had to have a certain level of intelligence, and only an Awakened with taming abilities could do it.
For some reason, the slimes here were all quite sharp, but ordinary slimes had extremely low intelligence.
Their intelligence was akin to insects or reptiles that couldn’t recognize their owner, which made taming nearly impossible.
‘Even if you could tame one, how would you give it commands?’
Even if you somehow managed to tame one, it wouldn’t be of much help.
In the end, only Kyu-seong could handle all of this.
Knowing that, Kyu-seong seemed to reveal these details without worry.
In reality, he had simply invited them without much thought, just because he liked them.
“We are currently harvesting paprika. Would you like to give it a try?”
“Hahaha! Sounds good!”
“You can eat the paprika we harvest right away! I give you permission!”
“Ooooh! That really gets me excited!”
While everyone was enjoying the farm experience, Kyu-seong finally finished preparing for the dinner party planned for the next day.
“Good work, everyone!”
“Alright, everyone, great job! Hahaha!”
“Now, all we have left to do tomorrow is have a blast. But since you all came a day early, you deserve a reward, right?”
“Reward!”
Even the usually unreadable sub-team leader, I Hae-sol, looked expectant alongside Kang Hanul.
For them, Kyu-seong briefly stopped by the storage.
Soon, he returned with dried crop snacks, dried fish, and a homemade sauce.
He didn’t forget the most important thing—alcohol.
“I don’t drink, but I thought I’d bring some just in case anyone enjoys it. What do you think?”
“No way! Kyu-seong, you had this much stocked up?”
“I don’t drink, so I’ve just been collecting it whenever the brewery sent some.”
“Well done, Kyu-seong!”
“Did I… do well?”
Soon, they gathered in a circle and started enjoying the drinks. There was plenty of alcohol, but knowing they had the next day ahead, they decided to savor it lightly.
“Ahhh.”
“Wow, this is amazing, isn’t it?”
“Your tongue’s already getting loose.”
“I’ve never had such delicious alcohol before.”
“Same, I don’t usually like alcohol, but this taste and aroma… I could keep drinking it.”
Kyu-seong’s father, Lee Hyun-woo, also subtly checked his wife’s reaction before joining in. Soon, he was mingling with everyone, chatting comfortably.
“Hey, father. I have to say, meeting Kyu-seong was one of the best things in my life. I mean, I’m really grateful you raised such a good son.”
“Our Kyu-seong is quite something, isn’t he? Whose son do you think he is?! Of course, it’s only natural.”
Watching Kang Hanul and Lee Hyun-woo bond and chat, Kyu-seong smiled wryly.
Meanwhile, the others who had finished the farm tour returned, only to discover the gathering.
“Hey! How could you leave us out!”
Junichi jumped right in, and before long, he too was naturally mingling with Kang Hanul and Lee Hyun-woo.
“Hahaha!”
“Hahaha!”
“Hohoho!”
Seeing this, Kyu-seong thought that alcohol actually played a good role and quietly stood up to head somewhere.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m going to prepare something and bring it back.”
Kyu-seong smiled at Hae-sol’s question as if telling him to look forward to it.
However, Hae-sol, feeling awkward just sitting there, followed behind him.
“This is…”
“It’s doenjang (soybean paste). I was actually planning to show you tomorrow, but I’m going to make doenjang soup, add some chili peppers to make it spicy, and boil it with rice. Perfect for a hangover cure, right?”
“Gulp.”
Just hearing the description made Hae-sol’s mouth water, and his brain seemed to go numb.
At the same time, he once again realized the power of Kyu-seong’s cooking.
‘This is why, when something happens to Kyu-seong, everyone rushes to help.’
Of course, there were many other reasons, but if, after experiencing Kyu-seong’s food, people heard something happened to him…
If they could never eat his food again, it would surely cause chaos.
Splash.
While he was lost in thought, Kyu-seong was already making the doenjang soup.
Because there were many people, Kyu-seong filled a large pot with water, mixed in the soybean paste, and added dried fish like anchovies.
“Would you like to try some? It was part of the snacks earlier too.”
“Thank you.”
It was a fish he had never seen before, but its size was similar to the commonly known dried anchovy. When he chewed it, the taste was also similar—salty and addictive.
Kyu-seong added kelp, dried fish, onions, garlic, potatoes, and carrots.
Finally, he added a generous amount of spicy chili peppers!
Bubble, bubble.
The doenjang soup quickly started to boil.
Soon, Kyu-seong took out a large batch of rice from one of the cauldrons.
“Kyu-seong, is this the same rice we had back at the guild?”
“That’s right. Did you try it too, sub-team leader? I thought you weren’t there.”
“Thanks to you preparing enough for the entire team, everyone got to try it.”
“How was it?”
“I felt like I could die without any regrets.”
Hae-sol said this sincerely.
Normally, he wasn’t a big eater, but Kyu-seong’s food was on a different level.
For him, Kyu-seong’s rice was almost like a form of faith.
“I was thinking of adding the rice to the soup and letting it simmer into a porridge, but some people might not like that, right?”
“Anything is fine for me.”
They decided to leave the pot separate and let people help themselves.
“Whoa?”
“Oh no, Kyu-seong! Let us handle that.”
When Kyu-seong and Hae-sol appeared carrying the pot, everyone jumped up in surprise, rushing to help. After a bit of chaos, they finally managed to set the pot down.
After telling them to wait for a moment, Kyu-seong also brought the rice.
Thud.
“Here it is, doenjang soup for your hangovers. I actually wanted to make a stew, but since I don’t have any gochujang (red pepper paste) yet, I made it into soup.”
“Can’t you make stew with just doenjang?”
“Can you? I only know how to make it with gochujang, so I’d like to make it that way if possible.”
Just how good would the gochujang be?
The doenjang and soy sauce that Kyu-seong made had an incredible umami and flavor.
They couldn’t even be compared to store-bought products.
So, once the gochujang was complete, he would be able to make most Korean dishes.
“Alright, help yourselves.”
“Wow! The smell is amazing!”
“Did you add a lot of peppers? It smells like the perfect spicy doenjang soup I love!”
Everyone received a bowl of soup and mixed it with rice.
As they made their rice soup, they toasted with their drinks and took a bite.
“Gulp.”
As the soup passed down their throats, everyone was moved.
Oh, if only this moment could last forever.
If only it would never end.
The taste of great alcohol, paired with the spicy doenjang rice soup made for hangover relief.
Even the Chinese and Japanese guests, who weren’t Korean, were moved to tears.
“This is not human food.”
“This is not from this world. This is the food of the gods.”
“To think we’ve had the privilege of tasting the food of the gods…”
Famous figures in the culinary world, people whose names everyone would recognize, were praising it.
Of course, since they were speaking in English or Japanese, Kyu-seong couldn’t understand, but he could get the general sense of it.
“Slurp.”
“Gulp, gulp.”
Ryu Cheon, completely focused on eating the soup rather than drinking, and Ara, who was also slurping up the soup with rice next to her.
Yu Bihong, surprisingly, was hugging an empty bottle of alcohol, looking content.
-Heheh.
Nearby, Kkumuris and the slimes had also found their own spots to enjoy the festival, looking adorable.
“These cute little things.”
“Can I pet them? Good, good. Oh, they’re so cute.”
“This one’s eating well, isn’t it? You must be enjoying only the best food under such a great owner. If I could be reborn, I’d want to be a slime…”
It was a scene of paradise on Earth, where no one was left out, and everyone was happy.
Watching this, Kyu-seong enjoyed his own bowl of rice soup.
“Ah!”
Spicy and savory.
At the same time, the deep, rich flavor of the soybean paste.
The kelp and dried fish added to the umami, and all the ingredients balanced perfectly with each other.
The grains of rice, dancing in his mouth with every bite, enhanced the flavor with each chew.
“Kyu-seong, Kyu-seong.”
“Oh, Ara, you’re here?”
Before he knew it, Ara had come running over and plopped down into Kyu-seong’s arms. She looked up at him with a bashful smile.
“Hehehe.”
“Haha.”
Just looking at her made him smile. Then, suddenly, a small regret crossed his mind.
‘I really want to introduce everyone to Goblin and Gnoll.’
It was a shame.
He wanted to introduce them, but the repercussions would surely be significant.
Gnoll might not be an issue, but Goblin could potentially be linked to the Dungeon of Avarice.
‘By the way, do they even know that Gnoll is the master of the Dungeon of Wrath?’
The Gnolls had moved to this place before anyone could properly raid the dungeon.
Had the European Union even noticed?
***
“Captain! We’ve finally discovered something!”
At the urgent words of the returning team member, the captain of the fourth exploration team received the report with a stern expression.
“What did you find?”
“It’s an artificial structure. But it’s not ordinary!”
“Let’s go together.”
Soon, the entire exploration team entered a cave.
They had already invested a tremendous amount of manpower and resources to get to this point.
But they had yet to pinpoint the location of the boss.
Then came this unusual report, and the captain couldn’t help but feel tense.
As they ventured deeper into the cave, they found lava flowing alongside them.
It was clearly a cave where monsters should have been living, but the absence of any was strange.
‘Could it be…’
A place even powerful monsters avoided?
Could this be the long-sought habitat of the boss?
Finally, the captain and his team saw what the lead explorer had found.
“T-This is…”
A massive door.
It was a mysterious door, intricately adorned with massive patterns and carvings.
The door, wide open, exuded an overwhelming sense of majesty.
“C-Contact the research team immediately! This is the discovery of the century!”
“Understood!”
Thus, the European Union’s exploration continued to progress steadily.
Cliche Novel 