MAKING MANJU IN ANOTHER WORLD
That day, I went all the way to the southern part of the country to pick herbs.
“Madam Teacher, what turn of events brought you out here?” asked my apprentice, Halkara, who was there with me. I sometimes forgot, but Halkara was still an apprentice of mine. She was saying it herself, so there was no mistaking it.
“I remembered what the purpose of being a witch was and decided to do something witchlike. Lately, I feel like we’ve been dealing with unemployed undead, starving minstrels, and the like—all things that have nothing to do with my real job…”
Pondeli the undead was currently running a card game shop in the demon castle town. Kuku the almiraj had also recently undergone a change of character and was gaining tons of real experience as a singer.
I was glad both of them were turning out well. But neither of those things had anything to do with my witchy work.
I was the Witch of the Highlands, after all.
“I completely understand. I have to create new products that can beat out that Witch of the Grotto.”
“It must be rough having a rival now…”
After Eno, the Witch of the Grotto, made a hit out of her Mandragora pills, she released a product called Forest Elixir. It was a concentrated drink meant to be diluted in water for daily use, so now Halkara had competition for Halkara Pharmaceuticals.
“Now, I will just have to find an herb that contains incredibly healthy ingredients to widen the lead! I must venture farther afield for my herb-gathering!”
Let’s do this! said Halkara’s expression as she struck a fighting pose.
Her motives didn’t seem totally and wholly pure, but it wasn’t really a bad thing.
By the way, Laika was following behind us, and for some reason she was riding on an elephant.
No, really, she was riding on an elephant.
Laika didn’t have any knowledge of plants, so she’d looked bored out of her mind until she discovered and befriended an elephant as we were walking around the forest. It let her ride on its back.
“It’s just as fun as a horse but in a different way!”
“Bareeee! Bowa-bowa-bo!”
Baree etc. were the sounds the elephant made. Its cry was strange, like the air itself was splitting.
There were apparently monsters lurking around this forest, but with an elephant following behind us, they were all getting scared and running away. We didn’t spot a single one. It was the elephant’s seal of safety.
I would be fine with whatever came at us, but it was still considerably dangerous for Halkara.
Our search for herbs wasn’t going so well, though. Especially for Halkara.
“Eeeek! The spiders are so big! This stinkbug is so stinky!”
It even felt like we were carefully setting off each and every one of the forest’s natural traps.
It was at times like these that Halkara never defied my expectations.
“This is strange… I’m the one leading us along this path with Halkara behind me, but she’s the one always getting hurt… Maybe she should be leading the way through the forest instead…”
“Ah! There’s a dangerous snake! Please stay away!”
Maybe we should put a rain check on our herb search… Halkara was going to get hurt sooner or later.
“Why do these snakes keep going after me?! And if I run away, more of them come! Why are there three of them now?!”
Are you wearing perfume that attracts snakes…? You’re just a magnet for trouble.
Halkara changed her course across the forest, so I gave chase. There was the risk of losing her if I didn’t keep my eyes on her.
Then suddenly, everything opened up before us.
There was a magnificent pastoral view.
Plants that looked like rice were growing from pools of water.
It was like home in Japan. I mean, my hometown wasn’t a farming village, so I didn’t have any experience with fields, but it felt nostalgic.
“Wow! It’s a rice-growing region.”
Laika followed us on her elephant.
“The southern part of the kingdom cultivates something called rice. Other regions depend largely on bread, but they also eat rice here.”
“Man, this brings me back. I lived in a rice-eating culture in my previous life.”
And Halkara, by the way, appeared to be a big hit with the snakes as they wrapped around her arms and legs. They didn’t seem like they were going to bite her.
“Awww, they’re cuter than I thought. What lovely round eyes they have!”
She sure sounded calm. I guess I wouldn’t have to cast any Cure Poison spells.
“Oh yeah, would there be any shop around here where we could eat some rice?”
“I believe so. But what should we do about our herb hunting?”
“We’ll put it on hold.”
We entered the nearby town and went into a restaurant. Our seats were at a table outside beneath an awning, probably because it was so humid. It felt nice and open.
What came to us was a dish of red beans and rice with spicy chicken sitting on top. I forgot what it was called. The language in the south was somewhat different, so I didn’t understand it very well.
“Okay then, I’m digging in!” Like the ex-Japanese person I was, I pressed my hands together and started to eat.
I took my first bite and noticed a slightly different texture from what I would call a normal bowl of rice.
The combination was so gummy. No, that wasn’t the right word—maybe doughy. It was like red bean rice but even softer. And the rice itself was more like red rice, too.
It wasn’t that the rice was cooked wrong—that was just the kind of rice it was. In Japanese terms, this would be like sticky rice.
Laika and Halkara didn’t seem to take to it very well. They were eating their dish with a strange look on their faces.
“This dish oddly sticks to your stomach, doesn’t it?”
“I believe I prefer bread. It does feel like this will fill you up, though.”
It must’ve been because of the spices, but it leaned more toward what I’d call “ethnic,” so you’d either love it or hate it. It tasted like something for especially sensitive eaters.
I always thought the girls spending nine hundred yen for lunch were being extravagant, but I was going to die from overwork anyway, so maybe I should’ve splurged a bit more on lunch.
Beans and sticky rice, huh? And there was wheat, too.
An idea suddenly came to me.
I could make some Japanese sweets, couldn’t I?
We had beans, so I could make something like sweet bean paste, and I bet I could make the wrappings of manju buns out of flour. Next was the mochi. I should be able to make that out of this sticky rice.
And my motive for making sweets would be to see the smiles on Falfa’s and Shalsha’s faces. The end.
Laika was better at cooking than I was, and Halkara wasn’t too bad at it (even though some weird things ended up in the mix). I hadn’t heard it enough: “Mommy, you’re a good cook!”
They still complimented me, but it was more out of gratitude for the person who made their food, not the sort of reaction you’d hear if something was truly delicious.
So if I made a ton of manju, my daughters might acknowledge me as a mother who was good at making sweets.
Not bad, not bad at all.
But it was possible manju already existed in this world. If I boldly declared it was my original creation and it turned out someone had thought of it first, that would be pretty embarrassing. So I should investigate.
“Hey, Laika, Halkara, do you know what kinds of sweets they have in this region?”
Laika tilted her head, but Halkara answered, “Crunchies.” It was a rather silly name. “It’s because they make a crunchy noise when you bite into them, so they call them crunchies. It sounds like something a child would call them, doesn’t it?”
“Huh. I’d want to try that.”
“It might be on the menu here. They serve the classics.”
Then I’ll order it right now. I asked the waiter for it.
What we got was very thin and round.
It was like a takoyaki senbei but even flatter and wider. I took a bite, and it was sweet. And crunchy.
“Wow. It has a simple taste, but it’s better than I thought.”
“It would be lovely with a beer.”
“Halkara, you sure have a thing for alcohol despite how you pass out almost right away.”
As Halkara and I chatted, Laika ate silently.
I completely understood, since it was the texture of a light snack. It made you want to just eat them all.
But it wasn’t the kind of sweet I was imagining.
Afterward, I asked the restaurant staff if there were any steamed sweets in the region, but nothing immediately came to their minds. I was probably in the clear. Manju shouldn’t be a thing here!
Wait, I thought it was in the Muromachi period or so in Japan that the mantou came from China, and since it first came to a Zen temple—they couldn’t eat the meat, so they settled on filling the wrapper with something sweet.
Nowadays, manju and sweet bean Anman and meaty Nikuman all looked different, but their ancestors were practically the same thing.
And while I was at it, if you squinted at Anpan, you could call it a relative of the manju. They both had an outer shell made of flour and a filling inside.
On the other hand, the mochi line of sweets all used sticky rice. Something along those lines might already exist, but there wasn’t any copyright on this stuff, so I could sell a bunch. If I didn’t call them an original, then there would be no problem.
“You two go find a shop that sells beans later.”
“Oh, there are plenty of beans that are good for one’s health, aren’t there?!”
Sorry, Halkara, I think my motives might be impure this time around.
Afterward, I searched for red sweet beans that were as close to sweet adzuki beans as I could find. Then, I purchased a large amount of sticky rice while I was at it.
The other two seemed to think we were going to re-create these southern dishes at home, but they were wrong.
When I got home, I went straight to trying to re-create the sweet bean paste and manju shell through trial and error.
I wasn’t an artisan or anything in my past life, so I would just have to learn through failure.
I didn’t have any work, luckily, so I had plenty of time.
“Madam Teacher is trying to make something. She looks so serious!” is what Halkara said, saddling me with meaningless guilt, but there were no problems besides that.
Additionally, I had Flatorte eat all my failed attempts when she was hungry and just wanted to munch on something.
“I believe they’re getting tastier, Mistress.”
“That’s a relief. I’ll bring you some if I manage to complete it.”
Making the anko went comparatively quicker. I sweetened it with sugar and honey and such, boiled the beans, and made something close enough. Man, sweeteners were the best.
But the shell was proving troublesome. It wasn’t really getting very big with just flour.
Would I need to use baking soda? In short, I probably would. I wanted some if it existed, but I didn’t really know where they’d sell it.
Or would I have to leaven it with malted rice? I didn’t even know where to look for malt.
It might work if I put yams in… I’d seen manju that had yams in it before. But I wasn’t really sure where yams grew around here.
Eventually, I ended up making a few gluey shells, and since they were basically edible, I brought them all to Flatorte.
“I think they need to be a little moister.”
“I know. I’ll think of something and bring ’em over.”
And then, just as I was getting sick of all my trial and error—
I found the perfect mixture!
I wasn’t going to share my trade secret.
It was witchlike to have secrets, so it was fine.
“I took a bite, and it is exactly like a manju! He-he-he, he-he-he-he! I did it; I did it! This is the work of a lifetime!”
I was at peak excitement!
“That’s fantastic, Mistress! You succeeded on your hundred and eighteenth try!”
“Thank you, too, Flatorte! And you just told me how many times I failed, didn’t you…?”
Rosalie appeared afterward and corrected her, since I’d failed five times before Flatorte started watching, so it was really a hundred and twenty-three times. Just as things changed after three hundred years killing slimes, perfection would come if I just kept at making manju.
Now then, it was time to have Falfa and Shalsha take a taste—or so I was tempted to do, but I should first give some to Flatorte, who had watched me this whole time.
“Here you go. It’s right out of the pot, so it’s a little hot.”
“I have a sensitive tongue, so I’ll be careful. I’m okay with cold food, though.”
She did breathe ice, after all.
Flatorte’s eyes widened in surprise. Her tail started twitching.
“Oh! This is delicious! This is new, something I’ve never had before!”
All right! Next, my daughters!
Falfa and Shalsha had been in their room reading books this entire time.
Falfa was reading Arithmetic and Logic, and Shalsha was reading What Is Time?
This was always the case, but they were abnormally difficult books. I didn’t understand them at all. I thought if they took the right steps, they could become professors with those minds.
“Hey, how about snack time? Don’t you get sleepy using your brain so much?”
“But we finished with dinner already. It’s not snack time.”
“It’s been a while since we finished eating, too, so it’s not really dessert, either.”
They calmly passed judgment on me.
“A-anyway, Mommy made a yummy sweet snack for you to eat!”
They were round and of a brownish color—just like manju should be.
I presented them a plate with a few sitting on it.
“Don’t you want something sweet after using your brain? You can make even more progress if you have some! Eat, eat!”
I might’ve been a little too pushy, but they each reached out to take one.
First, Falfa popped it into her mouth.
And immediately, her expression brightened! My victory was certain!
“It’s so yummy! It’s really yummy! You’re incredible, Mommy! I’ve never had anything like this before! You’re so good at making sweets, Mommy!”
“Thank you. I’ve been wanting to hear that for ages!”
I savored the joy.
Next was Shalsha. Their tastes were very similar, so I wasn’t that worried anymore.
“Mm… How exquisite…”
Her eyes were closed, and she was shivering slightly. She then reached out to take a second one. Her expression hadn’t changed much, but she wouldn’t have responded like that if she didn’t like it.
“Mom, what’s this called?” Shalsha was the type who always wanted to know where things came from. This time was no different.
“It’s called manju.”
“Manjoo… I think there’s a place with the same name in the west,” Shalsha said, going to retrieve a geographical dictionary from her bookshelf. I didn’t think manju would be in there… It’s not a place name anyway.
“There it is: Manjoo. Earl Lugness of Manjoo is famous. There’s no account here of these sweets.”
“That’s because they’re unrelated… A total coincidence.”
But I didn’t really like the idea that people would think this was an original of the Manjoo region. I was the one who created it here in this world.
And on the flip side, if manju ended up getting popular and spreading, it was possible that the people of Manjoo would be perplexed as to why it was named after their land.
Shalsha flipped through the dictionary as Falfa munched on the treat. It probably wasn’t the healthiest thing to eat after dinner, but I’d allow it for today.
“They’re yummy, but it’d be better if they were cuter!”
And she asked for cuteness. Wait, did manju need to be cute?!
“See, Mommy, it doesn’t have a face or anything on it. Wouldn’t it be more adorable if it had a face?”
“That’s a new one… Wait, some manju were printed with companies’ names on them, so I guess not…”
That being said, it’d be creepy if we put a lifelike face on it, so we had to deal with that. Maybe an animal face? But what was an animal with an easy-to-recognize face?
“They’re sort of shaped like slimes,” Shalsha murmured, popping a whole one into her mouth. “O hourse, haim ahnt hweet hou.”
I think she was saying, Of course, slimes aren’t sweet, though.
What she said suddenly gave me inspiration.
I could make a slime face easily. It was super simple. I just had to heat something up and press it against them.
“Got it. Wait a sec!”
I had Flame magic to heat things up, so I just did that to the first metal object I found and pressed it against the manju to make the eyes.
“Okay, they look more like slimes now!”
And then, my daughters’ faces started to glow.
The manju sure were cute with slime faces. Children would probably like them, too.
“Slimes are yummy!”
“Slimes are delicious.”
Watching the two slime girls eat them looked a little like cannibalism, but they shared nothing in common with real slimes besides the shape, so it was fine.
And I got another Halkara-like spark of brilliance.
I could sell these.
I didn’t want to go as far as making a business out of them and getting rich, but if I brought them to Flatta, the people there would probably be happy for it.
As for the name, manju would only remind people of the place Manjoo, so I guess we’d go with “edible slimes.”
I used everyone I knew as my test group.
First up were my family members Laika and Halkara.
“It’s so soft, Lady Azusa!”
“This would be a great product!”
Their reactions were just as I expected, thank you. I would keep those comments in mind.
Next, figuring she probably didn’t have any work at this hour, I summoned Beelzebub using magic.
However, it seemed like she was doing overtime, since she appeared with a quill in hand. Oops…she’ll probably complain again…
“This is, like, another unbelievable situation, is it not? It’s not because you got your hands on a nice bottle of booze, yes? I do not mind either way. Speak up.”
That introductory remark made it hard to say. But I’m gonna say it. She said it was okay, so I’m gonna say it.
“I made sweets we’re calling ‘edible slimes,’ so have a taste. They’re a big hit right now!”
As I thought, Beelzebub still didn’t seem to buy it (which meant we were even after Beelzebub came and pushed things on me out of the blue), but she popped one into her mouth anyway.
“Mm! I believe you’re on the right track!”
“Right?! I did pretty well, don’t you think?”
“You might even be more suited to making these things than any medicine!”
“That’s a rude thing to say to a witch! You better take that back!”
The test group round seemed to be a success for the moment.
“All right, we’ll test it tomorrow and sell them in Flatta!” I said, and my daughters heard me.
“I wanna play shop!”
“There are things to be gained from honest work.”
We weren’t playing shop, but we had only one thing to sell, and the two of them could even do it on their own.
All right, I’ll let them help me!
Early the next morning.
My two daughters and I went to the mayor’s house and said we wanted to open up a shop.
“Excuse me. We made some sweets, so we would like to sell them if you have an open spot.”
“Set up a table in the market and sell them there. It’s sunny today, so you shouldn’t need an awning.”
It was decided right away.
I was thankful for the trust and good track record I’d built up over these three hundred years. We borrowed a table from the community center and made a simple setup.
And the reason we came so early was because it would take a while to get everything ready. The villagers were most active in the morning, so if we took our time, we’d miss the prime shopping hours.
And of course, we had what we needed.
“Shalsha, bring it out.”
“Understood.”
Shalsha spread out a sign advertising EDIBLE SLIMES.
There was an illustration of the delicious-looking merchandise on display in crates and an enlarged picture of one of them on top.
And then it said, MAGNIFICENT FLAVOR, REVITALIZING AND NOURISHING—CAREFULLY PRODUCED BY THE WITCH OF THE HIGHLANDS: EDIBLE SLIMES.
The expressions were a little stiff, but, well, this was for fun. And they had nutrients in them because they were food, so the line about being nourishing wasn’t a lie.
Shalsha was good at drawing, so I’d asked her to draw the picture.
“Yaaay, it’s a shop; it’s a shop! Gross profiiits! Break-even poooints! Sunk cooosts! ”
Falfa was fidgeting in excitement, but her choice of words was a little too vivid. Was it because she had been reading math books…?
Behind our price tags, we lined up the merchandise: one for seventy gold; a four pack for two hundred and fifty gold; an eight pack for five hundred gold; a sixteen pack for a thousand gold; a thirty-two pack for two thousand gold.
I thought the thirty-two pack was a lovely sight. It was like a gift box.
“All right! Let’s sell!” I mentally rolled up my sleeves.
“Mommy, Mommy! Why don’t we cut one into four quarters and place them on the side for people to try? No one’s seen this food before, so we should have them try it first.”
“I see, Falfa! That’s clever.”
“And maybe we should write down where we sourced our beans and wheat from! There might be some customers who want to know.”
“…You’re a little too serious about this, aren’t you, Falfa?”
It almost felt like I’d brought Halkara along. Was this what playing shop was like? Did kids these days get serious about playing house? Was guidance about how to deal with litigious customers part of the norm now?
Come to think of it, they always did get pretty into it when they played house…
We hadn’t set any hours, so our opening time was when the villagers started coming out to shop.
Before I could even psyche myself up for it, the villagers immediately gathered in an endless stream.
“The great Witch of the Highlands has made something new.” “Oooh, it’s shaped like a slime.” “It’s sooo cuuute!”
Falfa held the plate of sample edible slimes and presented them to the customers. She was sharp when it came to this stuff…
“Everyone, please have a taste! If you like it, please buy!”
The crowd of villagers popped pieces of the edible slimes into their mouths, one after the other.
These people had never had the sweet bean paste called anko before, so I wondered if they would be okay, but there was no need to worry at all. I could tell this was a win just by looking at their faces.
“This black cream inside the fluffy bread is so good!” “What a tender sweet!” “My mouth is so happy right now!” “The great Witch of the Highlands really is amazing!”
The nonfans of the manju were few and far between, from what I could tell.
The villagers were captivated.
“I’ll take that big box there!” “One eight pack, please!” “Same, but two of ’em!”
They flew off the table. Yes, yes! This is the thrill of commerce!
And Falfa, by the way, was unusually courteous in dealing with our customers.
“Thank you very much! They will taste much better if you warm them up a little! Come back again!”
Why is she so good at dealing with customers?
“Big Sister does not cut corners when we play. When she was pretending to be a cricket, she wanted to observe how it jumped and what it ate,” Shalsha, who was still a little nervous, explained.
“I guess I started it…”
“There’s no doubt that since she’s playing with real money and real customers, she’s being especially serious.”
This wasn’t a game, though. It was just pure customer service.
I would’ve been expecting something a little fancier if I was playing shop. We could’ve created the ambiance of an old, long-standing Japanese sweets shop…
Either way, the edible slimes were super popular, and I was thankful for that. Times like these, we usually sold so much more than what was believable for the population of the village, and it looked like it was going to be the same thing again.
And then an unexpected customer appeared.
“You’ve been working hard, Madam Teacher.”
Halkara had come to the front of the line. It looked like she’d waited her turn.
“Don’t tell me you came to express your appreciation?”
“I was watching your sales from a little ways away. I believe you’ll be able to sell in other regions like this. Please let me sell them in Nascúte. I can guarantee employees as well!”
She came to turn this into a business…
“If you’re here for negotiations, please come this way!”
And Falfa was really into it…
After discussions with Halkara, we came to the following conclusions:
• Halkara would use her employees to sell in the villages of Flatta and Nascúte (but mainly Nascúte).
• The product would be called Flatta Cakes and would act as an advertisement for the village of Flatta.
• They would first be made when the family had free time, but in the instance that their popularity exploded, the recipe would be taught to employees of Halkara Pharmaceuticals.
I hadn’t really been planning on making a profitable business out of it, but it was probably fine to sell them in nearby places like Nascúte.
While the edible slimes were a huge hit, I started brainstorming my next product.
That would be mochi made with sticky rice. Well, there were many kinds of sweets that had mochi in them. If it was too sticky, then it came with the risk of getting stuck in someone’s throat, so I decided to make oak-leaf-wrapped mochi.
Flatorte devoured all my test runs this time, too, like staff eating leftovers. This was one of those times when it was great to have a hungry dragon around.
Compared to when I was making manju, I finished this one fairly quickly.
I added the slime eye marks this time, too.
And because I could, I placed the mochi on top of a leaf and called it finished.
“I call it: leaf slime!”
Flatorte was the first person to taste test.
“Mm, it feels weighty in my stomach. This could be good for breakfast. The bean paste inside isn’t so bad, either.”
“It is rice. So it’s probably heavy.”
“First, let me eat fifteen of them for now.”
Fifteen was a little much to start with for now.
Then, I had my daughters try them.
“It’s yummy! I love you, Mommy!” “You’re good at cooking, Mom.”
I wanted Shalsha to say I love you, Mommy! with that much enthusiasm one day, but her whole personality would have to change for that to happen, so I didn’t mind so much.
Of course, I knew very well that Shalsha loved her mommy. Very, very well. Better than Beelzebub, at least, and that was what really mattered.
“Mom, I’d enjoy this with some tea.”
Shalsha was the one who came up with the idea, so I poured her a cup.
I made it a little strong so that it would pair well with the leaf slime.
Shalsha took a bite of her treat and sipped her tea.
“Hoooo, mmmm. This is refreshing.”
Then, her eyelids immediately slipped downward, and a gentle smile crossed her face.
Shalsha’s precious smile! Yes, what a great thing to see!
I was suddenly seized by the impulse to hug her then and there, but I resisted. Her mother I may be, but it was still suspicious behavior. Such patience was necessary.
“If only I had a cat on my lap. That would be the best.”
I imagined her as an old grandma taking a rest on a porch outside. Cats are cute, so I get it.
“Your candy goes well with tea, Mommy! Yeah, I understand what Shalsha’s saying!”
As always, Falfa was completely agreeing with her.
I’d even become a witch to preserve that smile (well, I was already a witch).
Okay then, I’d have to get selling these leaf slimes. I had to tell Halkara.
I appreciated Halkara’s offer to provide guaranteed employees. Selling something was a long-term commitment. Making these was just an extension of a hobby, so I couldn’t wake up every day at the same time to prepare for it.
The company system would cover all those problems for me.
The company would make up for my limitations as an individual and play a role in expansion. Companies did have their good points, of course, and I would make use of them.
I had Halkara taste a leaf slime (whose name was practically the same as leaf mochi), and she gave a big seal of approval.
“Yes, we will absolutely sell this, too! This and edible slimes will be our two main attractions. This will cover all our bases!”
“If you say they’ll be a hit, Halkara, then there’s no room for doubt.”
The next day, I got to watch them being sold in the town of Nascúte.
New Product: Leaf Slimes! Just In! A New Flavor! The Witch of the Highlands’s True Skill!
The words danced across the sign behind an employee getting ready to open shop.
“I feel embarrassed looking on from over here…”
“There’s nothing to be embarrassed about! Stand up proud!”
And then, it was opening time. The employee raised her voice: “We are now open for business! We have a new product! Come try it!” And the people came in droves.
The population here was higher than Flatta’s, not to mention all the visiting out-of-towners, so the area right in front of the shop was bustling.
“Ohhh, this is exhilarating… It is nice to see people buy what you’ve made…”
“Isn’t it? They’ll probably sell out before noon. Producing them en masse will bring us more money, but we would be getting our priorities backward if the taste went down in quality, so I believe we should continue as is.”
What pleased me most of all were the smiles on the faces of the customers who bought them.
At first, I just wanted to make my daughters happy, but now that I was bringing smiles to more people, there was nothing better.
I could hear people saying, “Wow, the great Witch of the Highlands is incredible.” That’s it—praise me more.
“The great Witch really is good with food and drink, isn’t she?” “The Witch’s House Café was great, too.”
Hmm…? Something about my reputation isn’t quite right…
“I guess this is the great Witch’s forte.” “She probably realized she’s more suited to this than medicine.” “It’s nice to discover your strengths.”
At that moment, I realized I’d made a mistake.
The reason I’d gone south in the first place was to make medicine, but now I was getting attention for my sweets. The medicine-making part of me was stepping back!
The employee was yelling, “We have a new product from the great Witch of the Pastries!”
Please don’t give me a nickname like that! I’m still the Witch of the Highlands!
“This is a wonderful new creation, from three hundred years of wisdom living in the highlands to make excellent sweets!”
I didn’t start living there to make desserts!
“A three-hundred-year-old tradition lives on in these sweets! The epitome of old meets new!”
Please don’t make this sound like my shop’s been around since the medieval era!
Maybe I should just give up on making a name for myself in medicine…
But that wouldn’t make me a witch anymore, would it…?
I nibbled on a leaf slime as I pondered my identity.
It was perfect—lightly sweet.
This could take over the world.
—Wait, I can’t forget about my slow life…
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