Dungeon? This Tree? Why Don't You Join Me for Lunch? (Dungeon Core)
Chapter 19: The toll road

Chapter 19: Chapter 19: The toll road

I knew that Robert did not like this, but this was the perfect opportunity for me! I had to prove myself to the soldiers, so they would eat my food!

And, as Robert and Nara were forced to play nice with the Lich, I took out the onions!

For I had no illusions that I would ever be able to feed an entire army, even one that numbered only 2,000 soldiers, with food I would have given to my humans.

So, finger food it was!

I cut the onions, but not all the way through. They ended up in the cauldron with water and salt.

Now, for the hard part!

I took the pot and then added the olive oil. Some of the soldiers grumbled. We were at war, and I was using a luxury item.

One imported from our enemy, at that.

"Cooking has nothing to do with politics," I said, for if the soldiers did not want to try my food only because of the olive oil, then I was going to bring a pan on each one of their heads!

I shook my head.

Not like that, Sylvan, I told myself. You are not like that!

"Is that so?" I blinked. The man had more medals on his robe than he had wrinkles! Was that a Boliarin, or a General?

"Yes!" I said, as I let the oil heat up. Doing my trick with the flying onions, this time with both halves landing on the board, and then began to cut up the onions. "Food is something everyone has to eat! If you were starving, would you have cared that you were eating something made from goblin meat?"

It was underhanded and about the worst example one could give, but that did not stop me!

It was time to boil a frog!

"Goblin meat? Is that what this is?" I could hear as if some of the soldiers shifted on their feet. Most looked green.

"No, beef," and it had taken a lot out of me to get the gnomes to part with it. I had to rent Robert out for repairs for an entire day!

If the army had passed the mountains during that time, I would not have dared to cross the borders.

Leaving them to their fate.

"Beef?" The general took some of it and ate it raw. I narrowed my eyes. The nerve!

"Wait for it to cook! Do you want to get sick, or something?" I snapped at him, hitting his hand with the ladle and then taking the meat out of his reach.

He looked at his hand, which now had grease on it, then back at the meat.

"You have guts," that sounded like he was going to let me off the hook. "Why are you not a part of the army?"

I gulped. Oh, marshmallows with chocolate in an air fryer rune...

"Well, I have a disability!" I did not. But the fact was that I could hide my mana. Had done so from the start.

As I washed the rice for the stuffed onions, I could feel as if the general scanned me. I did not kid myself. If I had a wound, the old war hound was going to sniff it out!

"A mental one?" He asked, a smirk on his lips.

I did not think. Was about one sneeze away from teleporting myself back to my old girl.

"Yes!" When in doubt, bullshit!

The general blinked, then looked at what was cooking in the pot.

"You should join us. Cook for the army," he said, sitting down. Almost as if ordered, the other soldiers began to settle down. Some of them even took out plates and forks.

"Me?" I squeaked out in such a matter that Methuselah would have dried up from laughter.

"Yes, you! When was the last time you paid your taxes?" The general asked.

I took a deep breath.

Taxes? I was a nymph! I did not pay taxes!

"Um..." now, that was not something one could lie about. After all, if you did, then someone was going to check your entire history as an adult.

They were going to find out where I was born, as what, and that I had never, not even once in my entire life, paid taxes.

"The way I see it," the general said, as I added the grated carrot to my mix. Preparing to get the mincemeat inside next. "You have not been doing your civic duty. And that means, you have to do so now."

"I have a better offer," my last line of defense. My last chance to not get my brain eaten by a zombie. "How about I supply the army with already cooked and warm food, and I stay home? Where the zombies can’t get me?"

Some of the soldiers looked at me so, as if they wanted to beat me to hell and back.

I could understand them. They probably did not want to invade the Necromantic Union... and probably return home with hungry eyes and no brain in their empty skulls.

"You are a coward," the general said, reaching out. Trying to get some of the mix I was preparing. I slapped his hand with my trusty ladle once more.

"No, I am not," the fact that I was here, in the middle of the war camp of a person who’d love nothing more than to steal my heart, and not in the good way, spoke of that. "You are."

He snorted. Then he snorted once more. His laughter was the laughter of someone who was sentenced to death.

He did not want to die alone. Or, at least, he did not want to die eating something not fit for compost worms.

"And how are you going to make the deliveries? Is that why the giant is here?" He asked.

"The toll road is going to open," I said, as I added some cumin and coriander to the mix. Soon, it would be ready to get inside the onions and charm the soldiers. The rice was nearly done. "The Main Road will bring you victory!"

The general snorted once more.

"Just know that if you don’t feed us, you will also die," he said, as he laid down on the grass. "Someone wake me up when the feast is ready."

"Yes, sir!" His soldiers chorused, as I was separating the onion skins.

Feast? I asked myself. This was no feast. This was a worker’s fare.

But... for these soldiers, anything that was warm was a feast.

I had to make it count! To make sure that this was not their last meal!

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