Taming the Beast World with a Frying Pan

The darkness of the Onyx Palace courtyard rushed up to swallow Ren the second her eyes rolled back in her head. She expected the cold, hard impact of the cobblestone. She expected Syris’s panicked shouting to echo in her ears until she completely faded into the void.

Instead, she smelled clarified butter.

Ren’s eyes snapped open. The freezing swamp air was gone, replaced by the heavenly, intoxicating aromas of roasted garlic, searing thyme, and caramelizing Wagyu beef.

Bzzzt. Bzzzt. Bzzzt.

The distinct mechanical whine of a kitchen ticket printer echoed in her ears.

Ren gasped, stumbling backward. She wasn’t in the Stone Age. She was standing in the center of a pristine, brilliantly lit, stainless-steel commercial kitchen. The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead. The massive exhaust hoods hummed like airplane engines.

"Behind you! Hot pan!" a voice barked.

Ren spun around, panicked, as a stressed-out line cook holding a smoking skillet barreled directly toward her.

"Wait, don’t—!" Ren shrieked, throwing her hands up to protect her face.

The cook didn’t stop. He walked straight through her.

Ren choked on a gasp, stumbling as the sensation of a human being passing through her body left behind a strange, chilling static. She looked down at her hands. They were slightly translucent, shimmering at the edges like a bad television hologram.

"I’m a ghost," Ren whispered, her jaw dropping. "Did I die?"

"Dave! I swear to God, if you break that emulsion, I will personally deep-fry your favorite pair of sneakers!"

Ren whipped her head toward the expo station. Standing there, bathed in the glow of the heat lamps, wielding a pair of stainless-steel plating tongs like weapons, was her.

It was her.

Ren stared at her past self in awe. She looked magnificent. Her crisp, white double-breasted chef’s coat was impeccably clean. Her red hair was tied back in a tight bun. She was aggressively wiping the rim of a large, bone-china plate, perfectly plating a pan-seared duck breast with a blackberry gastrique.

’Oh my god, I used to be so clean,’ Ren thought, a tear almost prickling her eye. ’No mud. No dirt. No blood. Just truffles and health code compliance.’

"Chef!" Dave, her eternally incompetent sous-chef, sprinted up to the pass, sweating profusely. "Table twelve’s tasting menu! Course number eight! We’re running out of plate real estate!"

"Then get a bigger plate, Dave! It’s a twenty-person VIP buyout, they are paying ten grand for this table, and they are going to eat every single calorie!" her past self barked, slapping a garnish of micro-greens onto a towering pile of butter-poached lobster. "Fire the A5 Wagyu! All twenty portions! Go, go, go!"

Ren crossed her arms; with a hum she racked her brain. She suddenly remembered this night. It was about a year ago, before she landed her television show. A mysterious VIP client had bought out the private dining room for a massive, twelve-course feast. She remembered that she had prepped enough food to feed a small army.

"Alright," her past self exhaled, wiping her brow with a towel. "The savory courses are out. Let me go do the Chef’s table touch."

Ren followed her past self, drifting through the swinging double doors and into the hushed, ambient luxury of the private dining room.

Ren remembered expecting to see a loud, boisterous party of twenty billionaires in tailored suits. But as Past-Ren approached the sprawling mahogany table, the reality of the memory hit her.

The table was empty, save for a single chair at the very end.

Sitting there was a small, frail-looking Japanese old woman. She couldn’t have been more than four-foot-ten. She was wearing an intricate silk kimono, patterned with strange, vibrant motifs: a roaring white tiger, a coiling black serpent, a soaring golden eagle, and a shimmering blue fish.

The tiny old woman was currently holding a steaming Tomahawk ribeye steak in her bare hands, tearing into the premium beef with the ferocious, unstoppable appetite of a starving timber wolf.

"Holy cholesterol," Ren whispered, watching the old woman polish off her fourth lobster tail with a loud slurp.

Past-Ren blinked, her professional, customer-service smile faltering for a fraction of a second before she plastered it firmly back on her face. She smoothed down her apron and approached the table.

"Good evening, madam," Past-Ren said politely, her hands clasped behind her back. "I am Chef Ren Reynolds. I trust the... uh... the twenty-course tasting menu is to your liking?"

The old woman paused. She dropped the bone onto a crystal platter with a loud clatter and wiped her greasy mouth with a linen napkin. When she looked up, her dark eyes seemed to pierce right through Past-Ren, staring directly into her soul.

"It is delicious," the old woman rasped. Her voice was raspy and dry. "The mortal flesh is weak, but your hands... your hands possess spirit."

Past-Ren’s smile tightened into the classic ’smile-and-nod’ expression reserved for rich lunatics. "Thank you so much. We strive for excellence."

"It is wasted here," the old woman stated bluntly, waving a dismissive, greasy hand at the luxurious, modern dining room. "You cook for men in gray suits who cannot taste the soul of the earth. They eat to fill their bellies. They do not eat to heal."

"We do offer a very healthy, gluten-free vegan menu if you prefer—"

"No," the old woman interrupted, leaning forward. The ambient candlelight caught the white tiger motif on her kimono, making it seem as though the beast was actually pacing across the silk. "Your cooking has the power to heal. It can cure the sick of heart and banish the darkness of the mind. There is another world that desperately needs your gifts."

Ren, standing invisibly next to the table, felt an icy chill race down her spine.

But Past-Ren just let out an amused, patronizing chuckle. "Another world, huh? Like... a franchise in Tokyo? Or are we talking Mars?"

"A world where handsome beasts dominate the earth, the skies, the swamp and the ocean," the old woman continued, ignoring her sarcasm. Her dark eyes clouded with ancient sorrow. "A beautiful realm that is currently bleeding. The evil in that world... it spreads like a black rot. It was caused by the greed of an evil fox yokai, twisting the natural order and bringing forth a horrible plague."

Ren gasped, her hands flying to her mouth. She was sure now, exactly where this was going. It all aligned. Why didn’t she remember?

"The beasts are succumbing to the feral madness," the old woman whispered, leaning so close to Past-Ren that their noses almost touched. "Their minds shatter. They become monsters. But you... you are the cure, little chef. Your fire, your spices, your spirit. You simply have to find the right ingredients."

Past-Ren clearly thought the woman had escaped from a psychiatric ward. She took a polite, cautious step backward, signaling discreetly to Dave through the kitchen window to get the check ready.

"Well, that sounds like a very intense culinary challenge," Past-Ren smiled tightly. "I’ll be sure to keep my frying pan handy if I ever run into any mad beasts."

"Do not mock the unseen, child," the old woman warned, though her wrinkled lips curled into a sly, cunning grin. "I have searched for a long time for a chef with the ability to cook food that touches the soul. If you promise to help them... if you swear to use your gift to save that world..."

The old woman paused, her dark eyes twinkling with mischief.

"...I will personally guide you there. And as payment for your services, I will gift you many handsome husbands. Strong, fiercely loyal beasts."

Past-Ren, convinced she was humoring a senile, romance-novel-obsessed grandmother, let out a loud, genuine laugh.

"You know what, granny?" Past-Ren grinned, crossing her arms and leaning against the mahogany chair. "It’s a deal. You point the way to this magical beast world, and I’ll go cook up a storm. Bring on the sexy, high-stamina husbands. Make them over six foot three, please."

"It is a binding promise," the old woman whispered, her smile widening until it looked entirely too large for her frail face.

"Sure, sure," Past-Ren chuckled, waving down a waiter. "I’ll just go pack my spatula. Enjoy the dessert course, madam."

Past-Ren turned on her heel and marched back toward the kitchen, shaking her head and laughing to herself.

But Ren didn’t follow her past self.

She remained in the private dining room, paralyzed with shock. She stared at the Japanese woman sitting at the table.

She had somehow forgotten this interaction. It had happened a year ago. It was just a weirdly busy night, a crazy customer, a funny anecdote she had told the staff over beers after their shift. She had dismissed the old woman as senile.

But it wasn’t a joke.

The old woman was a prophet. She had orchestrated the entire thing. She was talking about the Beast World.

This world.

The feral madness. The healing food. The impossibly handsome, tall, strong and loyal husbands. The only thing unfamiliar to her was the evil fox yokai.

Ren hadn’t just fallen off a cliff by accident. She had agreed to the terms and conditions of her fate being rewritten.