Chapter 301: Is that Cake?
———Karra———
<4: 27 pm>
“...What the hell is that?” Useph said while the chat exploded at a rapid pace. I thought someone bad would’ve happened with how vague Wiina was being, but I am still taken aback by it.
In actuality, it’s not something hard to describe. It’s just an eyeball with tiny bat wings and some flesh and bones protruding out. Kinda like those eye monsters, only kinda small and look like it can’t even do so much as float. It looks like it’s going to die within a few minutes of it existing, even.
“Yeesh. Good thing I brought extra materials.” Kenni said before walking to the pile of monster corpses. Meanwhile the rest still aren’t sure of what to do with this little thing. Wasn’t there a monster expert that I know of? Maybe she can tell me something? It’s been a while, what’s her name again… Terry? No, that’s not right… Wait, it is right?
“…So do we kill it?” Qyunda asked.
“I mean it is a monster, right?” Malk said while scratching his head.
{Crazy little thing!}
{Does it taste like cake tho}
{monster making program? What dis?}
{whose baby is this!?!?}
The chat is coming up with all sorts of comments, some certainly more unhinged than the others. With this kind of spectacle it’s hard for wild comments to not pop up.
“Pitiable weak little thing…” Kenni remarked as she brought out those monster materials and put them down on the table. “...So we kill it, right?”
{Seems like a waste?}
{looks like a baby monster is that a thing?}
“Hold on! This isn’t something we have seen before, let’s not try anything rash.” I called out before searching for Terry’s contact.
“Alright alright, what’s happening here.” Before I could actually call for her, a new yet familiar voice rang out in the lab. The tracksuit and sunglasses will make anyone able to recognize her in less than a second. “...Hm? Is that a mogall? Where did you smuggle this from?”
I thought Wiina would’ve come in to help, I didn’t expect her of all people to come here. Sometimes I seriously forgot how important of a person Coach Wana is, since she keeps a low profile with the exception of during official school events.
Coach Wana walked up to it and lowered her sunglasses to get a better look at the creature that looks kinda… terrified? There’s no expression but the constant struggle to move its body gives off that impression.
“We were doing an experiment and this thing popped out.” Kenni casually recalled the event before her hand was suddenly engulfed in what looked like flames made of darkness, causing her hand to look like a claw. “We’ll clean it up quickly.”
{Damn that looks kinda cool}
{this whole house mad af}
“Hold on. This thing is quite interesting.” Coach Wana said before Kenni’s crazy ass could’ve tried anything. “Usually even a weak little monster would’ve attacked immediately, and also know how to use its body since the moment of birth. This thing… We’ll talk about it later, it’s coming with me for now.”
She then grabbed one of the containers lying around in the lab before scooping the thing and put it inside.
{that thing look kinda nasty wouldn’t touch dat}
{who is that woman?}
{looks like someone trying to be hip or smth}
“...Welp. Back to our regularly scheduled fuckups. Let’s try that again.” Kenni said while shrugging her shoulders before she began portioning the materials for Orrel and the others to process. What even went wrong last time? I thought we memorized the formula a few times by now.
Everyone just wordlessly started up the process again and hoped it went fine this time around. Cleaning everything up first and going from there, can’t really afford any contamination. Going step-by-step like last time, and hopefully without another life being born so suddenly.
We’re doing two versions of this. First is turning it into a complete cake, second is the more practical one of just turning each material into ingredients we can use to make a cake. I’m not really sure why we’re doing the more difficult one first that resulted in THAT thing, but they are pretty insistent on going with the impractical route first. I guess that’s good for me since I can extend the stream, but I thought I would need to nudge them in that direction first.
I’m not really doing anything outside of recording the process. While this kind of thing probably should’ve been publicized since it can easily warp the perception of what those materials can be used for, the fact of the matter is that most people still don’t know how to use it.
…So that was quite a weird incident, huh. I wonder what’s gonna happen with that thing. Considering Coach Wana chose to personally intervene it must be something very important. We’re talking about someone who even Wiina is wary of, she’s not going to intervene with anything that won’t leave a huge impact.
“...I mean, at least texturally it’s a cake?” Qyunda said as she poked at the abomination that was made. At least it’s not a living being.
{this sum horror movie stuff}
{is this cake or real}
“Hmm…” Kenni then cut out a small amount, attempting to eat it first, at least it’s clearly not flesh and bones anymore.
“Cut it out. I’m the one who’s supposed to be eating it.” Qyunda quickly snatched the portion from Kenni before she could put it in her mouth, quickly eating it before Kenni could protest. “Hmph… It’s sweet but has a bad aftertaste. Also, it’s basically pure sugar.”
“Weird. Orrel, you didn’t synthesize any flavoring?” Kenni asked before she took a small crumb and ate it, taking a few seconds to show any emotion. “It’s like someone overdosed this thing with MSG, why the hell would a cake be savory?”
“What?” Orrel muttered before tasting it. “...We need a redo. Structurally sound but the flavor is off. This won’t do.”
{they fr eating that}
{icky cake}
{Didn’t expect them to not worry about poison or something}
They are starting up the process again and doing everything by the book once more, though with probably some adjustment on Orrel’s end. He’s the one who tries to memorize how to synthesize a cake out of this, and the only one nerdy enough to come up with the idea.
{why her friends seem crazy as hell}
{she’s crazy so they’re crazy obiv}
{well at least that is a cake?}
“Alright! Hopefully this time you didn’t forget to change the shape at least a little bit.” Kenni remarked before Orrel tried again. The fact that the previous version just looks like a bunch of monster parts stacked on top of each other certainly doesn’t help it make look appetizing, even if it’s edible.
The process went about as smoothly as the last time, and… I mean the shape is compressed to look like a cake compared to the last iteration, and the color is less… bloody. Still wouldn’t call it something appetizing though.
“...Well it still felt like mostly sugar, but no weird taste, so I’d consider that a win.” Qyunda remarked after tasting a sample of it.
{for real fr?}
{is she crazy or is that real}
{looking at that thing makes me wanna vomit}
It looks way more cohesive than the other one. What the hell is that last comment talking about!? Whatever, I should let the others make their reaction first just in case there’s anything weird happening.
“It’s fine, I guess.” Malk remarked. From the looks of it it goes from tasting a bit bad to simply mediocre. “Definitely could’ve been better, but I ain’t gonna complain more.”
“Guess we’re starting the boring version next?” I said after walking over to try the mediocre cake made up of monster corpses. They’re right that it doesn’t taste off, it’s just kinda fine.
“Why not? This way we can let the audience replicate it.” Orrel optimistically said. Even if I give out explanations to the masses I don’t think that’d be enough. When it comes to mastering magic first-hand experience is key, watching a video does very little to help. Even if my camera has been set to visualize almost every aspect of the supernatural so everyone could follow along, those are still just text on the screen.
“It’d be a miracle if someone could figure out how to do that…” I remarked while silently watching the chat moving at a rapid pace with predictable comments.
{too much faith in us innit???}
{oh yeah cause I can TOTALLY copy that}
{I think i need a better guide?}
{wtf do they tink we are????}
{omg are these guys serious?}
Yeah, none of them have faith in themselves to try something like this. It doesn’t help that you need to grasp a few concepts beforehand before you can even try replicating the easiest version of this.
Orrel quickly processes the next batch of materials into individual ingredients from the sugar to flour to flavorings.
“Easy there!” Useph said as he rushed over to catch Orrel who was clearly getting exhausted from all the process. He almost fell over before he could finish up the last few steps.
“What the hell dude? If you were that close to fatigue then step back and let a real professional do it.” Kenni said with a smirk before walking over to the other two plates and finishing the process with surprisingly no issue. With that tone I thought she was setting up for a joke.
“Ah right. The amount of mana needed for synthesizing even stuff like monster materials is extremely high, most of you probably don’t even have the mana pool for this, whoops.” I said to the audience while shrugging my shoulders.
{why I oughta!????}
{bitch}
{yeah yeah weakshame all you want you asshole}
{shut up you magicbred bullshit check your privilege}
Seems like they are still going on about magic being something you’re born with, despite the fact that the Eclipse fixed all of that in one fell swoop. No matter, it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy that doesn’t really affect me. I said it plenty of times and some people still don’t get it.
———Lerim———
<4: 36 pm>
“Hmmm…” I mumbled to myself while looking at the substance I made from synthesizing the materials.
*Sip*
...Eugh. Kinda tastes like fake milk. How did I end up making a milk substitute instead of the real thing? It would be neat to have those lab equipment the kids on stream have to verify its content. I’m not even a science kid but with the internet I could always look up the stuff inside a real milk.
I guess I have an open invite to go there, at least. I can sneak into the place later if I wanted to.
As for this thing, probably best to save it for now. I don’t think I even clear out the impure mana from the corpses.
“<Alright, for a test on ingredient number one… All correct! Good start.>” One of her friends said after checking one of them with a clearly cutting-edge technology. You could’ve easily mistaken this for an actual laboratory meant for serious research. The type that no one should have easy access to.
Certainly an interesting stream, but I already got a heads-up on this since she knows I might try to replicate it. I have been craving some sweet things ever since I began dungeon diving, way more than usual. This is probably one of the only ways I can get it out of monsters. So far my budget on food has mostly been for desserts, which isn’t a lot but I want to have an option that’s more frugal, at least.
It might take a while before I can fully master this. I know full well I can’t match the learning speed of those kids. Even right now they have been mostly successful with little incident outside of that eye monster.
Regardless, what they’ll do is none of my problem. Even problems that might’ve stemmed from some of them were by pure chance, not worth thinking over.
“<...Isn’t this fucking poisonious?>” One of them pointed out one of the ingredients having a major flaw.
…Perhaps ‘little’ is not the correct assessment. I made a judgement a bit too soon.