Chapter 18: Hamburger
Chapter 18:
Hamburger
Hamburger
On the outskirts of a middle-of-nowhere town in a small nation, Jack ran along gleefully, his ears filled with the sounds of the coins rattling in his pouch.
“Heh heh, I finally got my hands on nine copper coins!”
He had earned this money bit by bit, helping out around the house, using a machete to take out the giant rats terrorizing the cattle and plants, and even guiding visitors to the local inn. It took him seven days to save up enough coins so that he could go out to eat that particular thing.
It was just before noon. Jack always made it a point to head out before lunch. As always, the usual pair were already there to meet him.
“Yo, Jack. Glad you made it,” said one of them.
Greeting him was Kento, the son of a sorcerer who lived in town.
The other added, “Thank goodness. If you were any later, we were gonna have to go without you!”
The second person to greet him was Terry, the third son of the mayor. He was one year older than the two boys. In this town in the middle of nowhere, these three troublemakers were the only ones who knew about “that place.”
Jack comically shrugged in response to Terry’s words. “Whoops! That would’ve sucked. Well then, let’s get goin’!”
“Yup.”
“All right.”
And so the three youngsters headed to their destination. It was an old well just outside of town that had long been out of use. When they were much younger, the three boys explored the well and stumbled upon that certain something.
“Kento, be careful,” Terry cautioned. “You know you can be an oaf sometimes.”
“I know, I know! Look, I only fell that one time. You don’t gotta keep bugging me about it every single time we go!”
The boys bantered back and forth while climbing down the rope and deep into the well. At the very bottom of it, they found…
“All right, I’m opening it!” Terry said.
“Got it.”
“Okay.”
Once every seven days, a door to another world appeared at the bottom of the well. Terry stepped ahead of his friends and turned the golden knob, opening the entrance to the world beyond.
“Welcome!” said the master. “Sit wherever you’d like.”
The master was already in the process of bringing some other regulars to their table: a tray full of small people that he carried by hand.
“Thank you!”
“All right.”
“Okay!”
The three boys were already used to the way things worked, so after quickly responding to the master, they found their way to one of the open tables and sat down.
“Sorry to keep you waiting. What’ll it be?” The master quickly returned to take their order, and the boys responded in tandem.
“The hamburger set with a cola!” the boys said in unison.
“Aye, coming right up.” The master did his best to try not to laugh at the synchronized boys and left for the kitchen.
“I can’t wait!” said Kento.
“Totally,” said Jack. “The food we normally eat ain’t got nothing on this.”
Terry nodded. “Yeah, even the food at my place doesn’t come close.”
The boys wiped their hands with the hot towels and looked around the restaurant after briefly discussing the deliciousness of the hamburger.
“You know what, there sure are a lot of other races that come here.”
“I mean, I get that they all come from that door, but from where?”
“It’s super weird. Does that mean our world is full of other kinds of people like the ones we see in here?”
This topic came up whenever they visited the restaurant. The boys couldn’t help but be astounded by how small the town they lived in was compared to the vast world, of which they knew little. The magic door to the Restaurant to Another World supposedly appeared all across Jack’s world. The people who used said door weren’t just humans. Nekoya was visited by all manner of beings.
There was an elf quietly but deliciously enjoying a plate of noodles topped with fermented bean sauce. They’d never seen anyone but that elf order it before.
Then there was the beautiful, silver-haired, half-elf sorcerer who was always eating a yellow food topped with beautifully arranged fruits and some kind of white stuff.
There was even a red-faced dwarf drowning himself in alcohol and all sorts of fish. He wore a giant axe on his back, much bigger than any of the ones the lumberjacks from the village used.
While they didn’t appear to be regulars, every now and then the boys saw barefooted halflings in the restaurant. The childlike people would always make a ruckus, excitedly filling their stomachs with all manner of foods.
These races weren’t all that surprising to Jack and the others. They’d heard of them before, and other than the elves that never left the forest, they’d even seen a few in person as adventures or travelers visiting their village. However, the Restaurant to Another World had plenty of stranger customers.
There was an expressionless lizard man digging his spoon into a plate of yellow omelet rice, topped with the same red sauce that hamburgers used.
Meanwhile, the legion of little people from before were digging into an absurdly large bread-like food topped with an array of sauces.
Next to them was another group of little people, though these were winged. They appeared to be obeying the orders of their haughty queen, taking bits and pieces off of some kind of sweet, creamy food.
Sitting close by was a beautiful woman with brown, tanned skin, hungrily eating a meat dish with boiled eggs in it. While this by itself wasn’t strange, one glance at everything below her waist was enough to understand. Where her legs would normally be was instead the bottom half of a red snake. The woman was a monster called a lamia.
These were the kinds of races that Jack and his friends had only ever heard about in fairy tales.
“Do you think the rumor about there being a dragon who comes here at night is true?” Jack asked.
“Oh, you mean the story that old diviner told us? Nah, he’s gotta be bluffing.”
“I wonder. I heard that sometimes even vampires show up here,” Terry said.
The three boys continued their casual chatter over the restaurant’s customers. Because the three were born in the same town and were around the same age, they acted much like siblings with one another. As they continued their light conversation, the master returned holding a tray with white plates on it.
“Sorry to keep you waiting. Here are your hamburger sets.”
The master was carrying the one meal that the boys just couldn’t get enough of.
“Heck yeah!” Kento cheered.
“It looks sooo good.”
“Well, we can’t eat it anywhere else, after all!”
The boys excitedly took the plates and placed them down on the table.
The first thing that drew their attention were the pale yellow french fries made from fried cobbler’s tubers. The seasoning on them was kept simple; just a dash of salt. They were hot to the touch and tasted great as is but were also delicious if topped with some of the red sauce from the corner of the plate.
Placed inconspicuously next to the plate was a glass cup filled with a black juice called cola. Sticking out of it was a mysterious tube made from neither wood nor metal. The iced cola drink initially had a layer of brown foam sitting above it, but much like ale, this eventually dissipated.
Finally came the main dish, seated neatly right next to the cobbler’s tubers; the hamburger. Sandwiching the meat, vegetables, and various sauces were two slices of lightly toasted white bread with some kind of delightfully scented seeds scattered over them. As far as the three boys were concerned, this was the best food at Nekoya.
“Whoaaaa! This looks so dang good!”
“All right! Then let’s get to grubbin’!”
“Terry, you’re drooling,” Jack pointed out.
The aroma coming from the french fries and freshly cooked hamburgers was enough to send the boys into a tizzy. The handy thing about hamburgers was that they didn’t require utensils to eat, so the boys simply grabbed them with their hands and took a bite.
“DELICIOUS!” cried the boys, their voices overlapping.
The aroma of the lightly toasted surface of the white bread was incredibly appetizing, and its seeds gave it a tantalizing mix of textures. The red vegetable cut into round slices had a mellow sweetness and sourness. The sweetness of the similarly sliced, fried oranie melted away in their mouths.
The thin, green vegetable beneath the meat was crunchy and felt great to bite into. Meanwhile, on top of the meat was some kind of pickled vegetable that really accented the whole dish. As for the colorful sauces, Jack and his friends tried out all three and found that the yellow sauce was spicy, the red sauce sour, and the white sauce a more gentle kind of sour. These three sauces combined with the melted cheese on top of the burger to bring out the flavor of the meat.
Indeed, hamburgers were simply a vessel by which to eat meat. Despite the use of multiple ingredients, the flavor of the meat was still the strongest of all. It was this overwhelming flavor that washed over the three boys. The finely minced meat was fried into something more solid, somehow remaining tender to the touch. One bite into it was enough to make it overflow with flavor.
All that had been used to flavor it was salt and some light seasoning so as to not hurt the taste of the tender, juicy meat. That was enough to bring out the inherent flavor of the burger. The bread, vegetables, and cheese were all there to help better draw out its amazing taste.
After initially yelling out in tandem, the other boys gave Jack a sidelong glance as he dug into his hamburger. They then reached for their set menus.
“Mm, this is super good. I wonder how he makes it?” Kento took a sip of his cola and tilted his head to one side. The black drink was foamy like ale, but it tasted nothing like alcohol. Apparently, it was filled with all kinds of ingredients, which eventually led it to its sweet and refreshing flavor.
According to Kento’s master, near a volcano somewhere was a lake by some hot springs that produced foamy water. Was that what the restaurant was using? While Kento was younger than the other two boys, his status as the son of a sorcerer meant he had the gift of knowledge. The foamy cola in front of him piqued his curiosity.
“Man, the fried stuff here must use some real good oil.”
Terry took a bite of one of his french fries after dipping it into the red sauce. The piping hot sticks melted away in his mouth. Terry had heard from his tutor that a long, long time ago, cobbler’s tubers were considered peasant food in the great Empire of the Eastern Continent. He had to believe that the reason these were so delicious was because the master used high-quality, clean oil.
As the third son of a noble family from the sticks, even he could tell that all manner of nobles in fine clothes frequented the restaurant. These were people who lived incredible lives. It only made sense that the master would use ingredients that outclassed even the finest of goods the capital city had to offer. This made it all the more puzzling that the prices were so affordable. Even commoner children like Kento and Jack could afford the food.
It wasn’t long until the three boys wiped their plates clean and quietly enjoyed their colas. After finishing their meals, they always made sure to order something else.
“I think I’m gonna get some more fries.” Terry announced his intentions while wiping some red sauce from his mouth.
“Then I’m gonna get another cola. I still want more.” Kento held up his now empty cup.
“I want another hamburger!” Jack licked the sauce off of his index finger.
“Aye, you got it.”
The master couldn’t help but chuckle at the three boys. They reminded him of a young couple, about the same age, who came to Nekoya to eat hot dogs.
I haven’t seen those two in years, he thought to himself. I hope they’re doing well.
The middle-aged man reminisced while he went into the kitchen to whip up the boys’ orders.
***
Jack moaned, “Phew, I’m full as all heck.”
“It was sooo good!”
“Yup. There isn’t anything like the food here.”
With their plates now completely empty, the boys stood up from their chairs, satisfied.
“Old man, we’re leaving the money right here!” They placed down enough copper coins to pay for everything, opened the front door, and exited out into the well.
“All right! Now that we’re nice and full, let’s head back!” said Terry.
“Mmhm. Special training waits for nobody!”
Jack nodded. “That’s right. The day’s almost here.”
The three boys had made a promise to one another. Once they all turned fifteen and were recognized as young men, they would leave town to become adventurers. After having spent so much time going to the tiny Restaurant to Another World, they found their curiosities piqued by the greater world outside of their village. They were resolute about doing this.
“Ah, but it kinda sucks we won’t be able to eat hamburgers anymore,” said Kento.
“Yeah, I guess that’s true,” Jack said. “But hey, the world is big and stuff, right? There might be even more delicious foods out there!”
“I guess you’re right…” Kento brightened. “Plus, we could always come back to town on occasion. We’ll be traveling together, after all!”
The boys climbed out of the well while chatting about their futures. Even if it didn’t seem like anything special, the time they spent together like this was irreplaceable. Eventually, that time would come to an end, the boys would become men, and the day of their journey would arrive.