Chapter 77: Three-Color Rice Bowl

Chapter 77:
Three-Color Rice Bowl

Oniwaka, a samurai and high priest who served the Goddess of Darkness, rubbed his full belly contentedly.

“Yeah, this place is wonderful. If it weren’t so out of the way, I’d visit regularly.”

The empty white plate in front of him had once contained cooked pork. Oniwaka had seen a hunter boy with a dog eat a plate of the stuff earlier, so he’d ordered the same thing.

Oniwaka thought back on the “ginger pork,” made of hog’s meat basted in juice and grated ginger, and on the delicious roast chicken the ogre couple had eaten with their drinks.

He sipped his glass of cold, fruity ice water. It was the perfect end to his meal, cooling his hot body. Although it was the middle of summer, the room’s temperature was closer to that of fall. It was enough to make Oniwaka forget the heat of the mountains.

Coupled with his full stomach, the restaurant made him feel as though he was at peace in the underworld.

“My word. This is why life is so fascinating.”

Oniwaka reflected on his luck. Preparing to face off against wraiths, he had come across an oak door while exploring the surrounding area.

Lush, seemingly endless summer weeds had hidden the door. Although it looked suspicious, Oniwaka crossed to the other side only to find a restaurant.

The restaurant existed in a strange other world and was full of unknown foods. Some kind of higher being had made the dining room’s corner its realm, so to speak. Even a high priest like Oniwaka felt like a tiny bug compared to such a being.

Mmm… I really should’ve brought Shoujirou with me, Oniwaka thought.

Shoujirou, an old samurai who followed Oniwaka, had thrown away his earthly life to walk the path of God. He was probably still preparing for the aforementioned wraith extermination.

“No matter. I’ll bring him back something. Master!” Oniwaka called the master over. “I have a request.”

“What can I do for you?”

“Well, you see…”

Oniwaka asked the master for some help.

***

In a night camp just off a path deep in the mountains, Shoujirou readied himself. He placed seals containing the Goddess of Darkness’s blessings on his large spear, as well as on some arrows.

The goddess’s blessings included death and night. Thus, she was capable of overpowering and completely destroying undead monsters.

Shoujirou was tasked with guarding Oniwaka, who—despite his youth—had risen to the rank of high priest. The incredibly powerful seals he made strengthened Shoujirou’s already strong sword and arrows with lethal curses.

That’s about it.

Shoujirou brandished the heavy spear he’d used since he was young. He swung it around, making sure it felt right. His opponent, a wraith, was a particularly strong immortal monster.

Being ill-prepared would lead to death, so Shoujirou ensured that his weapons were in order.

***

About half a year ago, a story had spread from the Lord of Light’s shrine just off the road. A particularly lucky merchant, who’d managed to escape, had reported that a princess’s terrifying wraith lurked in the area. She only revealed herself during the full moon. Looking into old records revealed that the princess was related to the current lord of the land. She was an evil spirit many times more powerful than an average lich.

Priests and shrine maidens with Silver Sigils from the local Shrine of Light prepared and set off to take care of the wraith but met with failure. They barely managed to leave with their lives.

As far as the Lord of Light was concerned, the undead—beings of the darkness—were their mortal enemies. The shrine’s single elder high priest declared that the wraith could not be allowed to exist in this world and put out a hundred-coin bounty in hopes of exterminating it.

This was where Oniwaka and Shoujirou came in.

He’s late.

While Shoujirou prepared, Oniwaka had said he was going to look for food in the mountains and had left to explore the nearby area. He had yet to return.

No. I’m sure the young master is fine.

Shoujirou was a little concerned but collected himself. Having served as Oniwaka’s bodyguard for a while now, Shoujirou knew full well what sort of person Oniwaka was, and the strength inside him.

Oniwaka was a high priest who worshiped the Goddess of Darkness and a samurai who’d learned the ways of the sword from Shoujirou himself. He was a capable warrior who could wield both dark magic and a sword, but that wasn’t all. Oniwaka had ogre’s blood flowing within him.

Among the sentient creatures on the planet were demi-humans, monsters considered barbaric and hostile toward humans. The horned demi-humans known as ogres lived in the Mountain Nation.

Ogres boasted frames close to twice the size of an average human and typically preyed on mountain beasts. Their strength eclipsed humans. They were faster than horses, and their skin was so hard that one would be forgiven for believing they were covered in armor. With those powerful bodies, ogres stole food, ate humans, and ravaged fields.

Nowadays, swords could cut through ogres’ hard skin and bones, and heavy bows could pierce their stone-like skulls. Thanks to the talented samurai and martial artists who’d developed these weapons, humans could fight the ogres on equal footing. But just a few hundred years ago, the Mountain Nation’s citizens had lived in fear of ogres coming down from their homes and stealing the country’s rice, livestock, and even young women. It was commonplace for villagers to abandon their fields altogether in fear for their lives.

Ogre children had been spoken of since that era.

Ogres kidnapped and ate humans. However, if the human happened to be a young woman, there were times when the ogre would let her live as their plaything. That might lead to her becoming pregnant with the ogre’s child, eventually giving birth to babies that the ogres referred to as “hornless” and that humans called “ogre children.” They were horrific, unwanted offspring.

The strong bodies ogre children were born with rivaled those of full-blood ogres. It wasn’t uncommon in the Mountain Nation to hear stories of princesses, saved from ogres by samurai, who went on to birth ogre children. The children would eventually learn the way of the sword and become ogre hunters.

***

Oniwaka was an ogre child whose mother was the daughter of Shoujirou’s previous master. Thought to have died in a landslide, the princess had actually been saved by an ogre and survived.

Three years later, a samurai extermination squad had slain the ogre. They found a young lady holding a baby in the cave where the beast had lived.

For the first time in three years, the princess returned to her father. However, she was weak from her life in the mountains. Her heart could no longer handle losing Oniwaka’s father, and she succumbed to illness.

The young woman left Oniwaka behind, and he entered the Shrine of Darkness, along with the samurai who’d served as her bodyguard. After years of training, Oniwaka’s abilities were finally recognized, and he officially became a high priest at a young age.

***

Oniwaka himself brought up the wraith extermination job. Wanting to sharpen his skills and broaden his knowledge, he’d set off on a journey around the nation. He discovered the gig after hearing rumors while stopping by a town. Learning of the outrageous reward for the job, Oniwaka proposed that he and Shoujirou take it on. Like that, the pair found themselves beside the road on the day of the full moon.

Oniwaka really is late, though. If he doesn’t come back, I must search for him myself.

Just as Shoujirou was considering going out to look for the young master, he returned.

“My bad! I found something cool and lost track of time.”

Having spent much of his life away from the samurai household, Oniwaka lacked his peers’ formal tone.

“Huh. Something ‘cool’? What might that be?”

A wonderful aroma came from the object under Oniwaka’s arm. Shoujirou glanced at the white bag, which was neither cloth nor paper.

“I found an otherworldly restaurant!” Oniwaka replied, smiling.

“A-an otherworldly restaurant, you say?”

“Yup! It was crazy delish!”

Shoujirou widened his eyes in stunned silence. Oniwaka, on the other hand, took a box from the white bag and showed it to his companion.

The delicious scent coming from whatever food was inside the box made Shoujirou’s empty stomach growl. They’d left town before noon, so all he’d eaten was dried meat and rice and vegetable porridge.

“Well, I found a door that connects to this restaurant, right? I went through, but sadly, you can only use it once a week. The second I left, the door went ‘poof’!”

Oniwaka handed the paper box to his companion.

“What is this, Young Master?”

“I felt bad about being the only one who got to eat good food, so I asked the restaurant to put something together for you,” Oniwaka replied, without a care in the world. “It’s a little cold, but I can guarantee its flavor,” he added with a big smile. “I asked for something that’d taste great cold, after all!”

Rather than the face of an ogre child or a high priest, Oniwaka had the face of a young man who’d only just come of age.

Seeing this face, Shoujirou did his best to hold back tears. He decided to fill his stomach before the upcoming battle.

“I see. In that case, I’ll gladly accept this treat.”

Taking bamboo chopsticks from the small attached bag, he opened the box. The faint scent of rice and meat rose from within its still-warm interior.

“Wow. This is quite something.”

Shoujirou saw three colors inside the box—yellow egg, brown meat thinly sliced, and green beans boiled stalk and all.

“What is this dish called, Young Master?” Shoujirou asked Oniwaka. The delicious aroma and colorful food had piqued his interest.

Oniwaka repeated the name that the master had told him.

“Apparently, it’s called a ‘Three-Color Rice Bowl.’”

Shoujirou couldn’t hold back any longer. He lifted the heavy box to his face, plunging his chopsticks into the expanse of multicolored rice.

“Oh ho ho! This is top-quality rice, indeed.”

Shoujirou was something of a glutton. He was glad that there was nothing but pure white rice beneath the sea of colors. The grains were free of bran, clean, and carefully cooked—the sort of white rice that was popular among nobles.

“Right? Apparently, this rice is just normal over there,” Oniwaka said, almost proudly.

Shoujirou listened carefully. He picked up some rice and a piece of meat with his chopsticks, bringing them to his mouth.

“Ooh…!”

The old warrior couldn’t help letting out a gasp. The meat—fatty chicken to be precise—was seasoned with sugar and something like fish sauce.

What a sumptuous flavor.

The taste put a smile on Shoujirou’s face. Even the food at the banquets during his samurai days couldn’t have compared to this dish.

It was impossible to grow sugar in the Mountain Nation. The country’s only sugar came from the sandy kingdom to the south or from the contemptible bordering nation. Sadly, this sugar was tremendously expensive and was only ever sold in the capital and a handful of larger towns. When it came to desserts, the Mountain Nation’s options were seasonal fruit or sweet juice squeezed from grass that had absorbed the dew.

This meat had a succulent sweetness, but that wasn’t all. The sugary taste brought out the rich flavor of the fat in the savory chicken skin, the sweet rice, and the unique, salty fish sauce. It was tremendous.

Shoujirou straightened his back instinctively, beginning to eat slower. Simply shoveling the food into his mouth would be a waste.

Next is… Hrm. These are no ordinary scrambled eggs.

An artisan’s touch had even been applied to the yellow scrambled eggs.

It was a fact that eggs were delicious. Commoners far and wide considered any egg recipe a delight—boiled, fried, salted. But these were so much more.

Hmm… Have these been mixed with fish stock? There’s no muddy odor.

The scrambled eggs contained salt and, once again, sugar. Naturally, they tasted both sweet and salty. However, they included another savory flavor altogether different from the other two.

It was similar to the taste of a fish caught in a river, broiled, and marinated in alcohol. But in this case, there was no fishy smell. Instead, the flavor was simply savory.

This, too, paired well with the white rice. The eggs had a lighter flavor than the chicken—a refreshing taste for the tongue, once it had gotten used to the chicken’s sweet, greasy flavor.

Hrm. And these are just salted.

Last but not least, Shoujirou directed his chopsticks to the green beans, which had been boiled in their pods.

They mostly tasted like beans, although they had a slightly salty flavor.

But the mouthfeel is just right.

The boiled green beans had their own unique texture. Shoujirou enjoyed their crunchiness, and the sound the pods made in his teeth.

They were entirely different from the tender chicken and scrambled eggs. With each bite, salty bean juice oozed into his mouth.

It was extremely satisfying.

***

Eventually, Shoujirou fell silent, patiently enjoying each bite of the three colors in his bowl.

Rushing through the meal would be a waste, but he couldn’t help wanting to keep the food coming. So, with each bite, his chopsticks moved faster.

Oniwaka, watching his companion dig into the meal voraciously, could hold back no longer. He pouted like a child as he asked for some food.

“Hey… Let me have some.”

Shoujirou took his time to reply.

“Fine… But only a little.”

***

Oniwaka and Shoujirou conversed as they watched the sun slowly set, their battle preparations largely completed.

“How’d prep go? We looking good?”

“But of course.”

After finishing the delicious food, both men felt energized. All that was left was to defeat the wraith and claim their reward.

“Next time I drop by that place, I’ll take you with me.”

“You have my gratitude. I’d love to accompany you.”

The surrogate father and son would go together.

As the sun set behind the mountains, Oniwaka braced himself.

A cold breeze carrying the scent of death blew past, and the pair drew their swords.