YOU STILL GET HUNGRY IN UNFAMILIAR FOREIGN LANDS, DON’T YOU?
Hello, it’s me, Halkara the elf.
I know this is very sudden, but I have blinked and found myself standing in front of Harajuku Station.
My memory as to why I am here is fuzzy and hard to recall, but…I can read the word Harajuku. They are quite strange letters, but I know what they mean.
Two people passed by me—one person wearing an angel-like outfit and one dressed like a demon.
“Hey, is that a new spin on mori-girl fashion?”
“More like elf loli, don’t you think?”
I had a feeling that others were talking about me, but they didn’t seem bothered. I paid no mind to them.
I didn’t have much of a destination—I had no idea where I was in the first place.
“I suppose I’ll walk.”
Sometimes, a walk could tell you plenty about where you were. As a businesswoman, learning more about where I am was a basic skill.
I walked down a path called Takeshita Street, which was most crowded.
Along the way, some young girls stopped me.
They are wearing dark clothes like the demons do, but they seem to be human.
“Excuse me—you’re so cute! Can I get a pic of you for my Insta?”
“You’re getting a pick of me for… Am I being ritually sacrificed?”
“Oh my god, she’s totally in character! No worries; this won’t steal your soul!”
I wasn’t quite sure what was going on, but she captured an image of me.
“You wanna take one of me? Today, I’m going for the dark panda look. I came out from Matsudo!”
“Oh, I don’t have anything to capture images with. I don’t think any elf does. I’m from Nanterre Province.”
“You really have your character down! And your ears look so real!”
My incredibly mundane answers still earned me a compliment. I suppose this was a culture of positive reinforcement.
Afterward, many girls asked me for my image in a similar fashion. Everyone was so young, so perhaps they felt I was a kindred spirit.
Still, I had no idea where I was…
My memory was so muddled, I couldn’t remember…
I remember going to pick a rather large fruit, only to have it fall on my head… But after that, I’m not sure.
My next memory was of suddenly flying through a strange place, where I spoke to a divine-looking woman… And she said—
“You’re a member of Azusa’s family, aren’t you? Oh dear, you’re unconscious~ I doubt you’ll die from this, but why don’t you take a little trip to the era where Azusa lived until your memory comes back? Time gets all twisted in other worlds, so it won’t be any harm~ Let’s put you in a spot with plenty of other cute girls~”
—Or something like that.
This was a supernatural phenomenon, wasn’t it…?
I doubted I would find Madam Teacher in such a strange land.
But my thoughts of her were soon superseded by a much more pressing danger!
“I’m……………………hungry.”
In my aimless wandering, I soon found myself with an empty stomach.
But there were so many people that walking even a short distance took a surprising amount of energy, both physical and mental.
I must find a place to eat! There should be something good nearby!
A clothing store.
No, that’s not it.
Another clothing store.
No, still not it.
A general store.
That’s not it, either.
Haunted houses and escape rooms…? What are those?
Ah, it seems this area doesn’t have many dining options…
All the establishments I’d seen were overall very cutesy and well decorated, too. I tended to trust restaurants that were sparser in decoration. Were there no places here run by a silent boss and a genial proprietress?
As I searched for a suitable place, a sweet scent wafted my way.
SWEETS BUFFET: PARFAIT DU CHERIE
“Oh, what’s this? ‘All you can eat for two hours! Welcome to a girl’s dream’—”
The inside was overdecorated—most certainly not a spot a quiet old man would inhabit—and I could see groups of similarly overdecorated girls.
This was the opposite of what I expected, although I couldn’t tell you exactly what made it so. Life was long for me, so perhaps I could afford to indulge my sweet tooth from time to time?
There was also something strange about this land, which meant I had a good chance of encountering many treats I had never seen before.
Time to go in! Everything is an experience!
I entered alone, and one of the staff members immediately guided me to my table.
I was informed that I could take as much food and drink as I liked.
Now that the buffet was open to me, I went straight for the sweets.
My eyes went wide!
I’d never seen any of these before! And they looked so cute!
To my side, there were girls capturing images with their special device—their smart phones.
From what I could tell, it was a special artifact for taking records. It also appeared to sell for about fifty million gold, so perhaps this establishment was a place for noble ladies? Or perhaps the excess of decoration was how they expressed their status as renowned mages?
Well, I had to eat my sweets.
I filled my plate with every single thing they had on offer. All the women around me had their sweets nicely arranged on their plates; I wanted to focus on my own plate, but I was a bit embarrassed about how sloppily mine were piled on. But I would keep going anyway!
The best thing about an all-you-can-eat buffet was that you could snag anything that caught your eye.
There was no need to worry about whether or not you would actually eat it. That was a big advantage.
Perhaps my company should try testing out a shop that offered Nutri-Spirits in an all-you-can-drink system. Although drinking ten in a row would certainly not be good for anyone’s health… Never mind that one, then.
Time to sit back down and start round one of my buffet experience!
First, the macarons—I’d eaten these before. There was a shop that sold them in the Wellbranch Marquessate, but those were not so colorful.
The texture was wonderfully crispy! And it was so light; it felt as though I were eating a cloud.
Next was the apple pie.
Hmm, I’d unconsciously started with eating things I was already familiar with… Was this instinct? At least nothing on my plate looked particularly grotesque, so I wasn’t worried about that…
Gosh, this must be the best apple pie I’ve had in my life!
How delicately sweet! And the crust was delicious… This was most certainly the golden ratio of flaky and moist!
Had I finally found the perfect establishment?
I see. Of course it would be filled with rich-looking young ladies!
Next up was a very luxurious-looking thing. They called this one a chocolate “parfait.” It sat inside a tall, narrow glass made just for this purpose.
It is said that chocolate originated in the demon lands. It was originally not that sweet but apparently became sweeter and sweeter and eventually fell under the category of candy. We now occasionally ate it as such.
Though these were foreign foods, everything else had been sweet thus far, so I assumed this would be equally so.
Yet, I had picked something very large for a first-time taste test… The glass might be narrow, but it was still quite tall and filled to the brim…
I used the spoon to take my first bite.
“Why ish it sho cold?!” I exclaimed inadvertently. Several customers turned to look at me. Oh dear, was that uncouth…? Had I acted inappropriately for a high-class establishment? Was I going to be banned? But there was plenty of noise in the restaurant!
“Is she pretending she’s never had ice cream before?”
“I’m starting to think she’s the real thing.”
“Dang, what a pro.”
It seems it went over well with everyone else. Were elves this unusual around here? It was nice to be complimented simply by being an elf, at least. Even if I had startled myself eating something so cold.
This chocolate parfait was truly incredible.
The sweetness came right after the chill, and the white cream both softened the chill and changed the flavor slightly. The cookies stuck into it were also of high quality. This had been put together with the utmost care, down to the smallest details. It was almost maddening.
It was entirely possible that this city developed by specializing in sweets.
By the variety in the lineup alone, I could tell this was far beyond the efforts of one single chef. The only explanation was that this establishment received generous government funding.
I was going to leave the chocolate parfait for a bit and go for the pitch-black coffee jelly.
I was not entirely sure what “coffee” was—perhaps the mysterious ingredient that made it all black.
Oh, this was much more bitter than anything I’d had so far.
But it was the perfect amount of bitter, followed by a faint sweetness.
“I see, I see. I see how this is going~”
I finally understood. One’s mouth would grow numb from the overwhelming sweetness of things like the parfait, so this jelly was here as a palate cleanser. I was a genius for recognizing this on my own, wasn’t I? I could thrive in this foreign land!
The next thing on my list was this pink item called a strawberry milk crepe.
It was much too sweet. They put in an unbelievable amount of sugar into this!
And there was far too much cream in it as well, although the sweetness wasn’t terrible, either. All told, it was an elegant dish.
If I took this back to the house in the highlands, I could get Falfa and Shalsha hooked on this flavor. This was a devilish temptation indeed…
All right. I still had some chocolate parfait left, but my stomach would cool down if I stuffed myself with any more. I would tackle it a bit at a time. Now, it was about time for my second round at the buffet.
I might never get a better chance to eat however much I liked of whatever I liked.
But everyone else was desperate to get some sweets into their stomachs, too; the dessert corner was quite crowded.
I was feeling generous, so I decided to wait. I would wait as long as need be. Well, my all-you-could-eat time was limited to two hours, so maybe not that long.
But then I heard an unexpected name from the line by the buffet.
“Hey, I had no idea you’d show up, Azusa.”
What?!
Did I just hear Madam Teacher’s name?
“Well, I’m here. I know I’m a part of Aki’s group, but we’re not that close. It’s fine.”
“But won’t it be bad news if Aki finds out that you’re here with us?”
“Hmm, well, if that happens, then we’ll just say that the Wu and the Yue will still work together in the same boat.”
“Wait, then which of us is Wu and which of us is Yue?”
“That’s what you’re most curious about?! Is one of you better than the other?!”
It definitely sounded like her.
I looked over toward the conversation.
The group all wore the same clothes, and they all had long black hair. Perhaps they were a military group or a religious group.
She looked nothing like the Madam Teacher I knew. Even her hair color was different.
But the eyes of the woman named Azusa reminded me of Madam Teacher.
But I was probably only imagining that after hearing the name.
She must have realized I was looking at her, because our eyes suddenly met.
I looked away, uncomfortable.
And that was it. She was not a drunken adventurer, so she wasn’t going to approach me simply because our eyes had met.
“What is it, Azusa?”
“Oh, nothing. I’m all good.”
“Okay, I know I’m the one who invited you here so maybe I shouldn’t say this, but you’re too nice, Azusa. Definitely say no to things that make you uncomfortable.”
“What is this, the buffet line lecture?”
“Listen to me. You’re fine now, but when you get a job, you’re the kind of person who’ll get dumped with all the extra work. People die from that.”
“Yeah, yeah. We appreciate your concerns, and we will do all we can to remedy the problem as soon as possible.”
“You sound like a crappy customer service operator, ha-ha!”
By then, it was time for the girls to choose their sweets, and their conversation came to an end.
It was hard to get my mind off it, but I knew I was thinking too much. More importantly, I needed to consider how I was going to approach round two. A course meal is like a story, and I had to be conscious of what I was going to tell.
—I ended up with a mountain of food on my plate anyway.
I-it was all right, really! It was an all-you-can-eat buffet, so I didn’t break any rules!
First, I chose the strange, yellow-colored thing I did not manage to snag the last time. It was called kabocha squash pudding.
It appeared to include some kind of fruit I had never heard of, although they sometimes called it kabocha and sometimes pumpkin. Or at least, I believe it was a fruit. Did it not exist in my world?
I took a bite with a small spoon.
How soft! Just as soft as Madam Teacher!
How do I describe it—it was sweet, but the aftertaste was refreshing. It did not linger in the mouth at all. A blend of the feminine and the masculine. Very impressive, kabocha squash.
And so that led me to choose something called pumpkin pie next. Again, it was unclear whether the star ingredient was kabocha squash or pumpkin. I really wished they would label them consistently.
This was just as delicious! Pumpkin, you are truly mysterious—but you are good!
Next was sweet potato.
Its form was rather simple; are we sure this wasn’t the one thing the reticent old man was making?
A job well done, then~!
This tasted as though it had taken a full hour to puree! It truly struck me as something a stubborn old man would make. I would eat plenty of it if I had it in my room.
I was next moving on to the core of my second round, which was a treat with a bit of height on it. This was called Mont Blanc.
I was unsure of what the name meant. Why was it capitalized? Was it a person’s name? A place name? I was unsure. But what made it unique was the chestnut right on top. Perhaps the word meant chestnut or something of the sort.
It had also been placed in a very good spot. A CAKE CLASSIC! the sign had said. If it was a classic, then it must be good.
I quickly took a piece into my mouth with my fork.
Ah yes~ This one is soft, too~
Its texture was nothing like the pudding, but it was just as gentle and mild. It was the same with the sweet potato, but they were likely a break in flavors from the parfait.
The Mont Blanc cream was mild, so in between, I decided to take bites from the remainder of my chocolate parfait. It was the perfect thing to counteract its sweetness.
The final pieces of round two were cherry blossom mochi and mitarashi dango.
Mochi and dango—I’d heard those words before. Madam Teacher had mentioned them when she was making her edible slime treats. I could see now how similar they looked.
The reason I chose these to end the round was because they were at the farthest spot on the plate from me. If that is too mundane for you, then I have another, more uniquely elf-like reason, too.
The cherry blossom mochi was wrapped in a leaf. I suppose, as the name suggests, it was a cherry blossom leaf.
Also, it seemed there were two very different schools when it came to cherry blossom mochi, and the one I had on my plate belonged to the Domyoji temple school. I could tell that they were given names of temples for some reason.
I wasn’t entirely sure about my theory, but perhaps they were given to those who visited the temple.
I ripped the cherry blossom leaf as I cut the mochi into pieces.
If all the other sweets were ones that made a dash along the elite highway, then this sweet was like a hard worker who had pulled themselves up from nothing…
Though its overall level was not much different from the others, its fundamental lineage was different. It was as though it had only reached great heights by incorporating a unique method of study…
But the mochi itself was flowery and gorgeous. It was pink, after all.
Meanwhile, the mitarashi dango were brown! They had no intention at all of decorating it! And it was on skewers! Was it going to be like fried meat?
I suppose the best thing to do was take the skewer by hand and then pull them off. Pulling it off with your teeth could injure you…
I pulled one off the stick and popped it in my mouth.
It was so…elastic… It was like a monster with absurdly high defense that was almost impossible to defeat…but why…?
This type of sweetness was also different from everything else… The aftertaste was almost salty-sweet!
I knew why I restrained myself at the end. These types of sweets were not strictly desserts, but they might have been related to some historical main dish. They sat quite heavily in the stomach.
Afterward, I ate so many different kinds of treats. Once my mouth was tired of the sugar, I reset my palate with some tea.
I had not been entirely comfortable here at first, but now I had a grasp on things!
A lady who worked for the shop approached me. “Excuse me, but your two hours are almost up. Please be ready to pay.”
“Yes, of course.” I reached for my wallet.
Hmm?
My wallet was gone. Wait, would I even be able to use royal currency in this strange land? Probably not…
…
………
Oh dear, oh my! I’ll be arrested…
I might not be able to prove my identity in this strange land…
Oh no.
This was bad.
I’ve made a mistake.
Please help me, Madam Teacher… Help me!
I clasped my hands together and prayed.
Please! Save me from this strange land!
“Oh, good, good. You’re awake.”
Madam Teacher’s face appeared in front of me.
“Was I…asleep…?”
I seemed to be in my bed. I suppose that meant everything was a dream.
“Halkara, you went to go pick fruit, but it fell right on your head and knocked you out. I gave you first aid by casting recovery spells, but you didn’t wake up right away.”
“…I remember now! Right, right.”
Laika had flown me to the south, where I went to study fruit.
And the one that fell on my head was both massive and hard enough to knock out an elf from Hrant… But I did get a very good sense of how firm it was right before I passed out.
“Boy, I was starting to worry you might not wake up at all~ It wouldn’t be very funny if you went straight to your next life in another world, huh~”
Another world? The land I dreamed of was most certainly another world.
But that was the world Madam Teacher used to live in, wasn’t it?
No, it couldn’t be. Because even if she was there, then it would have to be her past life. If I had been reborn there, then time would be flowing backward, which would mean some basic principle of…something had gone very wrong. That was something only a god could do.
Oh… But I do remember meeting someone who seemed like a goddess…
And she told me that she was sending me to the era in which Madam Teacher used to live…
She also said that she was picking a city with a lot of cute girls…
And then I woke up in that place called Harajuku… And while I was worrying about how to pay my bill, I awoke from my dream.
It was not exactly clear where the dream started and ended, however. Dreams were often strange patchworks stitched together, so maybe everything after the fruit falling was a dream.
I suddenly realized that Madam Teacher’s face was rather close to mine.
“Oh! What is it?! Are you giving me a kiss to wake me up?!”
“No. I thought you were awake, but you’re still all spacey. I’m checking to see if your pupils are working.”
“My mind is perfectly clear now. I believe I’m better.” I stood up from my bed, and my legs were cooperating.
Madam Teacher patted me on the head. “Yeah, you look all better. Well, dinner’s ready now, so let’s go to the dining room.”
All the usual suspects were there.
I saw Laika and Flatorte, who had taken me on my business trip the other day—the dragon duo. There was Falfa and Shalsha. And Rosalie the ghost floated above my head.
And Madam Teacher, right by my side.
“Just in time for dinner. What a relief,” she said, and I noticed no one had touched their food yet.
“You’re better, Big Sis Halkara. That makes Falfa happy~ ”
“Congratulations on your recovery.”
Falfa and Shalsha offered their felicitations.
“Thank you! I will not die so easily!”
“I was a little scared, Sis Halkara. I couldn’t see your soul at all…,” Rosalie said. What an eerie idea…
“Ah-ha-ha… I will not die so easily…”
“I’m glad you’re alive, Halkara. You’re gonna have to wear a helmet at work from now on,” Flatorte joked.
I’ll take that as loving teasing…
“Miss Halkara, shall I make something extra for your meal to celebrate your recovery?” Laika was as prim and proper as ever.
“How about something sweet? Hmm… You know what was good…Mont Blanc.”
Everyone stared at me blankly.
To be honest, I was not entirely sure why I said that word, either. That was the name of a treat I had in my dream, wasn’t it?
“‘Mon blan’? What is that? I have never heard of it…,” Laika remarked.
“Must be an elf food. We don’t have it in the blue dragons land,” Flatorte said.
“Huh, so you have Mont Blanc in this world, too. Wait…isn’t Mont Blanc a place name…? Is this a coincidence…?”
Judging by Madam Teacher’s reaction, I hadn’t just made it all up myself.
Which meant that the dream world was indeed where she used to live…
Was the girl I met there her when she was younger—or even in her past life…?
Oh, no, it couldn’t be. What are the chances?
“My apologies, please forget I said that! I will have my regular meal as I always do! Just as usual! Yes!” I exclaimed, trying to patch up my strange memories.
Meals at the house in the highlands typically consisted of some bread, soup, salad, and then boar meat fried with spices. And alcohol for those who wanted to drink. It was a rather common combination of foods, but it was nutritionally well-balanced.
“As always, thank you for the meal.”
Whenever Madam Teacher ate, she would put her hands together and give her thanks for the food. Perhaps it was a common practice in the land where she used to live.
“Ooh, there are a lot of vegetables today…” Shalsha sat quietly staring at her salad.
“You have to eat them, Shalsha. Here, add some dressing; that’ll make it taste better. And you won’t even notice it if you eat it with your meat.”
“Shalsha will eat it if Big Sis eats it.”
So her strategy was to drag her sister down with her.
“Falfa’s the big sister, so…so Falfa will eat it!” Falfa shoved her salad in her mouth.
Aww, this was wonderful. Just like a family, eating together at home in their natural environment~
As I watched them, Laika completely cleaned her plate of the salad. Wow, that was fast! And though she elegantly drank her soup, it vanished in an instant, too. Was it possible to eat something so elegantly so quickly?!
“Heh-heh-heh, this is the Flatorte Special!” Flatorte had ripped her bread lengthwise in the center, then stuffed her salad and some of the boar meat inside. It almost looked like junk food.
“Sis Halkara, you’re not eating at all. Are you okay?” Rosalie asked from above me.
Ah, I’d been enraptured by the usual sight at the dinner table.
“Oh, I’m eating, I’m eating! I’ve recovered! Truly, I have!”
Both the salad and soup were familiar flavors. I saw that it was Madam Teacher’s turn to cook today.
The boar meat was seasoned as it usually was, with the spices masking the gamy taste.
Ahhh…
It was fun trying out all sorts of new dishes, but a happy family get-together was also just as wonderful.
Home-cooked meals did not invite failure. It truly was serenity.
“I am perfectly happy with this. In the end, I will always come back here.”
“I can’t tell if you’re complimenting me or insulting me, Halkara…” Madam Teacher was looking at me with scorn in her eyes.
“Oh! I did not intend for it to be so strange! It means the taste helps me relax!”
Meanwhile, Shalsha was staring intently at Flatorte’s creation.
“By doing that, Shalsha can eliminate the sensation of eating vegetables with meat and bread. Shalsha should try that out.”
“I don’t think it’s very good table manners, but I’m glad you’re eating your vegetables.” Though Madam Teacher’s smile was strained, she was still praising Shalsha.
“You always come up with the most abnormal things,” Laika said in astonishment just as she was finishing her meat. She moved so neatly, but she was still so fast.
“I, the great Flatorte, am full of ingenuity! Unlike your hard head, Laika!”
“I would not call that ingenuity. You simply lack proper education.”
The two stared at each other without any real anger on their faces.
This was also part of the usual routine. Though I saw them do this every day, it left my heart strangely warm today.
“All right, you two, no fighting. You’ve already been living together for such a long time. Like Wu and Yue in the same boat, can’t you just put it all aside, please?” Madam Teacher said with a strained smile.
That was what I heard in my dream…
“Oh right. You wouldn’t understand that… Neither Wu nor Yue exist here…”
Which means… Could it be—?
Had I truly, even briefly, met Madam Teacher in her past life through a goddess’s power?!
—And if not, then did I have the power to see dreams of the future?!
I’d found a new power within myself as I flitted between life and death! That was indeed a divine revelation—I’d even met a goddess! It was all coming together!
I took a big gulp of my drink.
All had been settled, so it was time to celebrate.
“You sure are enjoying that, Halkara,” Madam Teacher said.
“The best drinks are the ones I can enjoy at the table with the family.”
The End
No Comments Yet
Post a new comment
Register or Login