Chapter 281
The blizzard showed no sign of stopping.
Haruto remained in the town for another seven days, and during that time, he cooked so much good food that Frieren, Fern, and Stark all began to suspect they had put on weight.
After asking around over the course of the week, Haruto also learned that the storm would not be ending anytime soon.
It would last for the entire winter.
Haruto knew there was no way he could spend a whole season trapped in this little town.
So on the seventh day, he told Frieren and the others that he intended to leave.
Although the three were reluctant to see him go, they understood.
After a simple farewell, Haruto left the inn and walked into the raging snowstorm.
Then, with a thought, the freezing wind and swirling snow vanished.
Warm sunlight streamed through floor-to-ceiling windows.
Haruto took a deep breath, and his entire body seemed to relax at once.
After that, his life settled back into its familiar rhythm.
Every morning, he ate breakfast and went to class. Occasionally, he attended meetings with the other Elite Ten members to handle Academy business.
Whenever he had no classes, he spent his time in the kitchen developing new dishes.
The days were quiet, peaceful, and comfortably ordinary.
Haruto enjoyed it.
After working so hard across other worlds, coming home and taking some time to unwind felt completely justified.
Unfortunately, that peace did not last.
One day, a gold-embossed invitation arrived in Haruto’s hands.
The envelope was made from thick card stock, its edges decorated with elegant dark patterns. At the bottom was Tsukasa Eishi’s handwritten signature.
The message itself was simple.
It invited Haruto to meet at a private French restaurant outside Totsuki Academy on Saturday evening to discuss an important matter.
Haruto studied the invitation, understanding immediately.
If Tsukasa simply wanted to meet him, there would be no reason to arrange it somewhere outside Totsuki.
Which meant the person who truly wanted to see him was probably the man standing behind Tsukasa.
Nakiri Azami.
Haruto had expected this day to come sooner or later.
The moment he defeated Eizan Etsuya and took his seat on the Elite Ten, he had disrupted Azami’s plans.
There was no chance Azami would simply ignore that.
It had only been a matter of time before he came looking for Haruto.
Haruto decided to go.
He was rather curious what Nakiri Erina’s biological father wanted from him.
On Saturday evening, Haruto arrived at the address listed on the invitation.
The restaurant was hidden within a grove of cedar trees. Its exterior was so understated that it bordered on plain, with only a single warm-yellow wall lamp glowing beside the entrance and blending softly into the surrounding darkness.
The attendant at the door had clearly been expecting him.
The moment Haruto arrived, the man greeted him respectfully and led him inside.
The restaurant was unnaturally quiet.
There were no ordinary customers, only the slow melody of a cello drifting through the air, accompanied by the rich aromas of truffle and cultured butter.
The attendant brought Haruto to a private room at the very back of the restaurant, bowed slightly, and pulled open the heavy wooden door.
Tsukasa looked up at the sound and gave Haruto a small nod without bothering with unnecessary pleasantries.
Seated beside him was exactly who Haruto had expected.
Nakiri Azami.
When Haruto entered, Azami rose with a practiced smile and extended a hand.
"A pleasure to finally meet you, Haruto-kun. I’m Nakiri Azami."
After a brief pause, he added calmly,
"Erina’s father."
Haruto studied Azami’s face for a couple of seconds, glanced once at Tsukasa beside him, then responded without much reaction.
"Haruto."
He pulled out a chair and sat down.
Then he looked directly at Azami.
"So, Azami-san, why did you go to all this trouble to invite me here?"
Haruto already had a fairly good idea.
From the moment he defeated Eizan, he had become an unpredictable variable in Azami’s plans.
Azami watched Haruto’s unruffled expression, a trace of surprise passing through his eyes.
Most people reacted somehow when they heard his name and learned who he was.
Haruto, however, did not seem surprised at all.
Azami sat back down.
Instead of immediately answering the question, he asked something that appeared completely unrelated.
"Haruto-kun, what do you believe cooking truly is?"
It was a question Azami had asked many people.
Tsukasa had given him the answer he most wanted to hear.
Eizan had given him the most pragmatic answer.
Now Azami wanted to know what Haruto would say.
Haruto looked at him and answered seriously.
"Cooking is something that brings people happiness."
At least, that was what it had always meant to Haruto.
That feeling of tasting something truly delicious and experiencing satisfaction spreading from the tongue throughout the entire body—
That was happiness in its purest form.
The answer clearly caught Azami off guard.
For a moment, he did not even seem to know how to judge it.
It was too ordinary.
Too gentle.
Too correct.
So correct that there was nothing to criticize, yet completely different from the answer he had expected from Haruto.
Still, Azami did not linger on it.
He gave a slight nod, then changed direction.
"To me, cuisine is the highest form of refined art."
Azami did not raise his voice, yet every word carried unmistakable force.
"Only chefs who have received the proper education and possess exceptional talent deserve to touch that art. Only they are capable of creating true cuisine."
"As for mediocre chefs without talent, what they produce should not even be called cooking. It is merely feed meant to fill the stomach."
Contempt entered Azami’s voice without the slightest attempt to conceal it.
"How can we allow such crude garbage to defile something as sacred and sophisticated as cuisine?"
Tsukasa sat quietly beside him, eyes lowered and expression unchanged.
Only the slight tightening of his fingers betrayed how strongly he agreed.
Tsukasa had always pursued absolute perfection in cooking.
He particularly disliked people who understood nothing about cuisine casually criticizing dishes into which he had poured everything he had.
Azami’s ideals aligned almost perfectly with his own.
Haruto leaned back in his chair and watched Azami without expression.
Internally, he felt nothing at all.
This level of inflammatory rhetoric was far too childish to affect him.
Besides, the reason Haruto had started learning to cook had always been completely different from everyone else’s.
He did not care about creating some noble form of art.
He had no grand ambition to reshape the culinary world.
He was not even particularly interested in earning recognition from other people.
He simply wanted to taste every delicious thing the worlds had to offer and make sure the precious ingredients he worked so hard to obtain were never wasted.
That was all.
Azami failed to notice Haruto’s complete lack of interest and continued, his voice growing increasingly persuasive.
"The same principle applies to those who consume cuisine."
"Only a select few are truly qualified to understand and appreciate great food."
"Every great art—painting, music, sculpture—has never had its value determined by the ignorant masses."
"Only elites with sufficient refinement, education, and taste are qualified to judge the worth of such things."
"True cuisine is no different."
Azami leaned forward slightly and fixed Haruto with an intense stare.
"Haruto-kun, you possess talent far beyond anyone your age. You’re capable of producing cuisine at the highest level."
"But look at the people who judge your work."
"People who cannot even identify where an ingredient came from. People who don’t understand the most basic principles of seasoning. Yet they casually criticize your dishes and dismiss the results of everything you poured into them."
"Do you truly believe people like that are qualified to understand your cuisine?"
"Are you really willing to let work you poured your heart into be trampled on by people who know nothing about food?"
Haruto said nothing.
Seeing his silence, Azami assumed his words were beginning to have an effect.
His tone became even more fervent.
"The culinary world as it exists today is rotten."
"Countless mediocrities occupy positions they do not deserve, polluting the public palate with crude imitations and preventing people from ever learning what true cuisine actually is."
"If the culinary world is ever going to progress—if cuisine is going to reclaim the refinement it was always meant to possess—then it requires a complete purge."
"Every piece of garbage must be removed."
Even Tsukasa’s breathing had quickened slightly.
Azami’s words had clearly stirred him.
Haruto, meanwhile, remained completely unmoved.
His only thought was that Azami had spent an impressive amount of time dressing up what was ultimately just another form of dictatorship.
He wanted the entire culinary world to operate according to his standards.
He wanted everyone to eat only the food he approved of.
Azami could dress it up as a noble mission to bring "true cuisine" to everyone, but forcing his personal ideals onto the entire world was still laughably foolish.
More importantly, Haruto simply did not care.
"I’m not particularly interested in any of that."
Haruto looked at Azami and spoke calmly.
"What happens to the culinary world, where it goes in the future—none of it has anything to do with me."
Central.
Reforming Totsuki.
The future of the culinary world.
What did any of that have to do with him?
Haruto had originally come to Totsuki simply to learn how to cook.
Unfortunately—or perhaps fortunately—he seemed to have improved a little too quickly. At this point, there was already less and less that ordinary classes at Totsuki could teach him.
Still, occasionally returning to enjoy a peaceful school life had its own value.
After spending time adventuring through dangerous other worlds, it gave him somewhere familiar to relax.
Of course, if Azami was already sitting here openly talking about these ideas, then he was clearly still planning to make his move against Totsuki.
Haruto had a feeling his peaceful routine was about to become a little less peaceful.
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