Chapter 113: The Lunar Banquet
Silence filled the kitchen as we got ready to cook.
First up on our list of things to prepare was spices.
Not all the spices we had on hand would actually serve to improve the flavour of our curry bread, so we had to sort them and put the ones we weren’t going to use aside. It wasn’t an exaggeration to say that our choice of spices could either make or break the final product altogether. Next, we began mixing the spices with as much care as humanly pos—
— Or not. I’d planned on proceeding with caution, but Urushi totally chucked that out the window by sniffing at our ingredients. Normally, that alone wasn’t much of a cause for concern, but it caused a chain reaction by sending a few spices flying towards Fran, who in turn sneezed and then caused more spices to go all over the place.
『Alright, how about you guys go do sothing else while I get all the spices prepped?』
「Nn.」
「Whimper…」
I’d honestly wanted to use a doppelganger so I could check the taste and sll as I went along with the whole cooking process, but I ended up dropping the idea altogether. I couldn’t maintain my doppelgangers for all that long, so it’d be better to keep the skill off cooldown just in case we happened to run into so sort of ergency.
I asked Fran to focus on prepping the other ingredients. It’d not only prevent any additional incidents, but also help a lot in the long run, as I wouldn’t have to deal with nearly as much prep work myself later.
「Will prep well.」
「Woof?」
『Hmm, yeah, it doesn’t really look like there’s anything for you to do. Sorry Urushi.』
「Whimper whimper…」
『Yeah, I know you want to help, but it is what it is.』
「Woof woof woof!」
『I know, I can see that, but I’m not really sure how trying harder’s going to change anything.』
「Bark!」
『It’s not a matter of how many limbs you use to walk so that’s not going to help either.』
Urushi seed to be trying to stand on his hind legs as if to demonstrate that he could use his front paws in much the sa manner as a human being. His legs were clearly shaking though, so it evidently wasn’t what you’d normally call the best idea.
That said, seeing him act all gung ho really made want to find him sothing to do.
Let’s see… he’s much pretty limited to using only his mouth and front paws. The forr was much more reliable than the latter, so we’d need sothing that wouldn’t suffer from him holding it in his mouth all the ti.
『Oh, I know. How about helping make the butter?』
「Woof?」
『One sec.』
I grabbed a barrel out of the dinsional storage. Inside was freshly squeezed milk, obtained from none other than our friend at the Luciel Conglorate. The plan was to use it in order to create butter which would then be used for the chicken broth we needed to flavour the spiciest variation. I was originally planning to just use of space/ti magic, but this was one of the few things that Urushi could actually do, so might as well leave it up to him instead.
To begin, I had him return to his usual size.
『Hey Urushi, open wide.』
「Bark.」
『Catch.』
「Woof?」
『Make sure you don’t bite down, alright? The barrel’s made out of wood, so it’ll probably break if you do. 』
「Woof.」
『Alright, you don’t actually need to do anything super complicated. All you have to do is start shaking it as hard as you can and not stop till I tell you to.』
「Woof…?」
『Hey, you’re the one who said you wanted to help, so get to work already.』
「Woof!」
Urushi obediently started to reproduce the ever so well known phenonon of violent headbanging in response to my commands. All he had to do was keep that up for an hour, and we’d have butter! Though, he’d also probably be a bit more than just a bit dizzy, but hey, whatever. He asked for it.
And with that, both Fran and Urushi had sothing to keep them busy, so I went back to working on the spices.
Ti flew as we concentrated our assigned tasks; the evening had almost seed have blindsided us.
Urushi was, as one would expect, no longer able to stand on his feet. He’d been wobbling about in one of the room’s corners ever since he completed his task.
『You guys want to take a break and go check out the Lunar Banquet?』
「Nn. Will visit food stalls.」
『That’s not really what I ant. There’s going to be a parade and stuff. I was thinking we might as well go see what it’s all about.』
「Nn. Lots of delicious food.」
『Well, that works too I guess.』
The city had already shifted gears into festival mode. The streets were lined with stalls, and filled to the brim with people.
『Things sure did get lively around here.』
「Nn. Nom nom.」
『Wait a second, you’re eating already!?』
「Nn. Grilled Squid.」
「Crunch crunch.」
『Man, and now Urushi’s even got himself a chunk of bone-in at? Aren’t you guys being a little too quick about this? It hasn’t even been a minute since we got outside, you know?』
And wait, wasn’t Urushi totally about to collapse because of how dizzy he was just a second ago?
「Heard the call of tasty food.」
「Woof.」
I guess stuff like that doesn’t matter so long as their stomachs are involved, or sothing like that.
Fran moved through the street whilst weaving in and out crowd and going back and forth between the two sides. She visited every stall she pleased, and didn’t let anything stop her food-filled advance.
It didn’t take long for us start to hear the sound of music, and I wasn’t talking Japanese style festival music. It most closely resembled sothing out of Europe, but seed to have a bit of an African-ish flavour mixed into it as well.
We started moving towards the sound’s source, and eventually found a five mber band playing a performance by the roadside. Their instrunts actually looked quite like what I used to seeing back on Earth. That is, the musicians were making use of violin and pipe-like objects to create their lodies.
Enjoying ourselves once again caused ti to fly right by, and before we knew it, the sun had vanished below the horizon.
Dusk was promptly followed by a loud cheer from the festival’s participants.
『Oh? Looks like sothing’s happening.』
「Over there. Really big.」
『Looks like a float. Wait, is there soone on top of it?』
「Priestess.」
『Huh, now that you ntion it, her clothes do give off that whole sacred type of vibe.』
Appraising her inford that she was an oracle. Wait, so can she really hear the gods’ voices? If so, then I guess they really do exist, or at least they do in this world anyways.
We wanted to follow the float because they were apparently going to perform a dance for the sake of so sort of ritual, but everyone else seed to be thinking the sa thing, so it ended up getting a bit ssy. We ended up more or less being stuck because of all the human traffic, and at this rate, it looked like we’d probably end up missing the ritual altogether.
『Let’s get ourselves a birds eye view so we don’t have to deal with this anymore.』
「Nn.」
Fran slipped out of the crowd and leapt atop a nearby building. She continued to traverse from rooftop to treetop to rooftop whilst skipping ahead of the float. I felt like we were kind of cheating seeing as how everyone else still had to put up with the crowd and all that, hey, might as well use what you got.
Our final destination ended up being on top of a clocktower that oversaw the square in which the ritual was to take place. I had to say, we had a pretty damned good view.
It seed that our timing had been pretty much spot on. The float turned into the square right as we finished settling ourselves down.
It didn’t take long for them to start the ceremony. The shrine maiden began to offer her prayer in the form of a song, to which the crowd imdiately responded by quieting down. Soon the square was filled with nothing but the the sounds of the priestess’ voice and the instrunts that supported it. This ti around, the lody was much more gentle, and seed to have a bit of a Japanese quality to it.
Six beautiful dancers entered the spotlight as the priestess sang; their silver, shoulder-length hair swayed through the night as they wholeheartedly imrsed themselves in their performances.
「Pretty.」
『Yeah.』
I couldn’t help but note how practiced and efficient their movents were. It felt as if the dance itself was sothing usable in battle.
_______________________________________________________________
General Information
Na: Charlotte
Age: 16
Race: Human
Job: War Dancer
State: Normal
Status Level: 30/99
HP: 146
MP: 198
STR: 68
VIT: 77
AGI: 141
INT: 96
MGC: 100
DEX: 111
Skills
Evasion: Lv 6
Singing: Lv 5
Wind Magic: Lv 3
Blink: Lv 3
War Dance: Lv 7
War Dance Techniques: Lv 6
Hand to Hand Combat: Lv 3
Close Quarters Combat: Lv 4
Dancing: Lv 8
Water Magic: Lv 3
Vigour Manipulation
Magic Manipulation
Innate Skills
Captivating Dancer
Titles
Priestess of War
Equipnt
Magic Steel Ring of Combat
Macaque’s Cold Resistance Wear
Pearl Wolf’s Mantle
Pearl Wolf’s Sandals
Anti-Charm Bracelet
Ankle Bracelet of Beauty
_______________________________________________________________
It looked like the dancers all had the War Dancer job. I assud that the job’s main skill would then be War Dance. Hmm, let’s check a few things out in a bit more detail.
War Dance: A martial art that allows one to fight while dancing.
War Dance Techniques: A dance that charms onlooking enemies and invigorates one’s allies.
Captivating Dancer: Amplifies the effects of any dance-related skills.
So apparently they can fight at dance at the sa ti. What’s with all these manga-like abilities that’ve been showing up lately? I an, their weapons were literally the tal rings they were wearing on their persons. I honestly can’t say I’m not interested. That looks hella aweso.
Fran pulled out a warm glass of ginger ale as she continued to watch the ritual. She really seed to have taken a liking to the stuff as of late.
This world’s ginger wasn’t as spicy as the ginger we had back in Japan. It was much sweeter overall, so most people just straight up ate it as a vegetable instead of using it as a spice. I’ve never actually seen anyone cook with it, and apparently, Fran had never even heard of ginger ale or ginger pork before.
「Yum.」
「Woof!」
Fran’s facial expression relaxed as she leaned onto Urushi and sank into his fur whilst drinking her ginger ale. She was showing a rare, happy smile.
And so, we continued to watch. We watched the singers sing and the dancers dance; we observed the epheral scene play out as we overlooked it from what could what could only be described as a VIP seat.
『Looks like it’s over.』
「Nn. Was really pretty.」
That wasn’t a bad show at all. The ritual ceremony was beautiful to behold, and I felt as if it’d really drawn in. Seeing it made feel both relaxed and invigorated enough to return to the kitchen and keep up the ever arduous task of preparation.
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