Chapter 171: What Is This Creature…?
One after another, the special tasting events came to an end.
Across the countless spaces scattered throughout the Land of Sweets, every participant had competed against beings they had never seen, or even heard of before.
When the final round concluded, the private spaces dissolved into countless specks of light, gently returning everyone to the rainbow cloud where the giant jellyfish patiently waited.
Paul was among the first to arrive.
He stepped onto the cloud with his hands behind his back, adjusting his glasses with a calm smile.
However, the expression on his face made it seem as though he had conquered the world three times over.
Caelum too arrived and looking at Paul's expression, he couldn't help but ask.
"You won?"
"It was inevitable," Paul replied confidently.
"My opponent underestimated me."
Caelum briefly wondered whether Paul's confidence had returned again.
Jojo arrived soon afterward.
Unlike before, he now carried himself with an unusual air of composure.
Resting casually on his shoulder was a simple green bamboo stick.
It looked ordinary, yet anyone with keen senses could immediately tell it was anything but.
Not long afterward, Anastasia too returned behind Caelum.
And her expression was impossible to ignore.
Anastasia looked as though her entire worldview had collapsed.
Her shoulders drooped, and the confidence she had displayed before the competition had completely disappeared.
She had lost.
Not by a narrow margin, but thoroughly.
Caelum, meanwhile, simply shrugged.
It wasn't that he had underestimated Anastasia.
It was just that Earth's desserts had been refined over thousands of years.
There had even been a period in Earth's history referred to as the Sweet Calamity.
How could Anastasia compete against centuries of culinary evolution from another world?
Feeling a sharp gaze on him, Caelum slowly turned his head.
Anastasia was staring directly at him.
"…"
He instinctively took half a step back.
After the competition, she had actually demanded that he hand over every dessert recipe he knew.
At the time, he genuinely hadn't known any recipes.
He had simply imagined desserts he remembered eating.
Now, however, that excuse no longer existed.
As the winner of his event, he had chosen a rather unusual reward.
A cookbook containing all recipes around the world.
The book was currently stored safely inside his school badge.
'Maybe, I should have picked something else.'
He had no idea that this single decision had quietly antagonized everyone behind the scenes.
To them, that cookbook was priceless.
Asta appeared beside him shortly afterward with an indifferent expression.
Whether he had won or lost, nobody could really tell.
Skyler returned next and soon the golden slime too as it appeared on his head.
The slime sparkled with excitement as if it had won.
Skyler, however, looked utterly exhausted.
"I lost." He admitted with a sigh.
The Golden Slime jiggled happily, making it painfully obvious that only one of them had actually enjoyed the event.
Nearby, Ryan's Heroic Thief Spirit also appeared.
The legendary thief looked completely dazed.
"I lost to a child."
The words seemed difficult even for him to say.
Unable to accept defeat gracefully, he had secretly stolen his young opponent's watch on which five tiny creatures circled endlessly.
He admired it proudly, completely unaware that the watch was an extraordinary treasure capable of changing its owner's race with a single touch.
Not far away, the Immortal Count noticed everything.
Without saying a word, Seth casually waved a finger.
Elsewhere in the Land of Sweets, a young child who had been frantically searching for the missing watch suddenly felt something appear in his hands.
"My watch!"
The child stared in disbelief before hugging it tightly, tears of relief streaming down his face.
Back on the rainbow cloud, the Heroic Thief Spirit instinctively reached for his newest trophy.
His hand found nothing.
"…"
Ryan returned with an enormous grin stretched across his face.
He proudly showed everyone a row of flawless white teeth.
After all, he hadn't been called Ryan the Toothless for nothing.
That nickname no longer suited him.
As his reward, Ryan had wished for teeth that would never break, never chip, never loosen, and never fall out.
He now had unbreakable and unshakable teeth!
Just then, another ripple spread across the rainbow cloud.
Voomie had returned.
And the moment Caelum saw her, he yelled as if seeing a horrifying thing.
"What is that creature?!"
Voomie was no longer walking.
She was rolling.
The dog had somehow expanded to nearly four times her original size.
Her legs had completely disappeared beneath the overwhelming amount of fat.
Even her eyes were nowhere to be seen, buried beneath layers of chubby cheeks.
From a distance, she resembled less of a dog and more of a perfectly round boulder.
Earlier, she had at least looked like an unusually plump Chihuchi.
Now, she looked like an entirely new species.
Even Seth stared for a brief moment.
The enormous sphere continued rolling across before finally slowing to a stop in front of everyone.
A deep, muffled voice echoed from somewhere inside it.
"I won against that cat! Woooooof!"
Nobody could determine where the sound had come from.
The creature didn't appear to possess a visible mouth anymore.
It was as though the voice had simply emerged from within the giant ball itself.
After several seconds of visible effort, two eyelids slowly parted.
A narrow slit finally opened.
Voomie had successfully opened her eyes.
The very first thing she saw was Caelum's expression.
He wasn't happy.
He looked as though he had suddenly inherited an enormous debt of seven generations.
The two stared at one another.
"…"
Then Caelum slowly rubbed his forehead.
"You will be on a water diet now."
Voomie gasped.
"How could you say such a thing, woof! I merely accepted the love the Land of Sweets had to offer!"
Caelum sighed.
Looking at the gigantic rolling ball before him, he genuinely had no idea what to do anymore.
'Should I sell her or something?'
The terrifying thought unconsciously surfaced in his mind.
Unfortunately, Voomie gasped his intention, though it was unknown how she did it.
Her eyes widened in horror.
"WOOOF! You can't sell me! I am family!"