Chapter 19
Oh, Lady Beth.
Not only do you bless me with this insanely delicious food, but also with such a useful buff…
Letting me swing a pickaxe eleven times for every ten? Compared to her, even the goddess Hagionia, who threw me into this trial, seemed less almighty and great.
Come to think of it, each dish had a different buff. Some were really handy, like this one.
The only problem was… I couldn’t remember them all.
At least there was one I often used: meatball spaghetti. It boosted a shooter’s combat power by 5%.
That was thanks to Sohyun. Of course, her character hadn’t cooked it herself—she’d bought it off the marketplace board.
Back then, we’d stack hundreds of meatball spaghetti items in our inventories and pop one before heading into dungeons…
“Yeah, can’t do that in real life.”
Eat the same thing every single day? No thanks.
In the inventory, the food stayed as fresh as the moment it was made. But if you ate the same meal every day, you’d go crazy.
“Fine dining is essential.”
Everyone values different things, but that semester, I learned something precious:
Eating three tasty meals a day was really important.
So, after finishing my meal, I stashed the lunchbox in my inventory and pulled out my notebook.
I had to jot down the food effects worth remembering.
I scribbled down dish names and their effects with my pencil.
“This one’s so good… guess I’ll just keep gathering for the next 12 hours straight?”
Gotta make the most of this buff.
No one could stop me. Kwahaha!
With that, I charged back into the mine and hacked away at the chalcopyrite like it owed me money.
Much later—
“Yes! Four more! Sixteen left to go!”
I got my daily bread, another rainbow stone. My mining proficiency rose to 5.
Now, I wouldn’t get that message anymore at iron ore spots saying, ‘You’re not skilled enough to mine this yet.’
I dumped the mountain of chalcopyrite I’d collected into my inventory.
In there, up to 100 pieces stacked into one icon, usually called a bundle. Short for “pile.”
But even bundle felt too long, so gamers just said bun.
I now had two buns of chalcopyrite. Nearly 200 pieces.
Wow. That was a lot for such a short time. I couldn’t help but feel impressed.
I’d keep them safe in my inventory, then later smelt them into copper ingots at the forge. That would raise my smelting proficiency and reward me with another precious rainbow stone.
That’s how gathering and crafting content was supposed to go—raise them together.
Now, for the next step…
“According to this morning’s plan, the logging site. Hmmm…”
But the sun was starting to set. Heading there now wouldn’t raise my logging skill much.
And soon, the breakfast buff (movement speed) would wear off. That’d slow me down getting back to town.
Better to travel while the speed buff lasted. There were plenty of things to gather near town anyway.
And if I wanted tomorrow’s meal buff, I had to take part in the cooking somehow—whether it was gathering ingredients or prepping them. I’d just beg until they let me help.
Resolved, I sprinted toward town.
Before long, I arrived and headed to the dorm building.
I hadn’t noticed before, but behind it were a garden and a livestock shed.
So that was where cooking ingredients were gathered.
“Chef Beth~! The lunchbox was amazing!”
I burst into the underground dining hall and shouted, full of emotion.
“Oh, our hero’s here. Was it really that good?”
“Yes! And how did you know sushi is my favorite?”
I chatted casually with Beth for a moment.
Then I got to the point.
“Um, is there anything I can help with for dinner prep? Gathering ingredients, chopping them—anything. I want to learn cooking too.”
“Oh, come on. A busy hero like you doesn’t need to… it’s fine, really.”
“No, I want to help. Please, give me something to do!”
I was dead serious. If I didn’t join in the cooking process, I wouldn’t get the food buff.
If she kept refusing, I was ready to cling to her pant leg.
So I batted my lashes and begged like a puppy.
At last, she sighed and reluctantly said:
“Hmm… then could you bring me some milk in this bottle?”
“Huh? M-Milk?”
Her request threw me off.
I’d expected something like pulling carrots from the garden or fetching eggs from the chicken coop.
“You mean… milk the cow and bring it back?”
I blinked wide-eyed, and Beth gave a sheepish laugh.
“Mmhm, that’s right. Haven’t tried something like that before? If it’s too hard, I can do it myself.”
“N-no! Please, let me do it!”
I wasn’t in a position to be picky. Besides, milking counted as general gathering, so it would raise proficiency.
General gathering included herb picking, hoeing, reaping, milking… that sort of thing.
It looked simple, but even that raised proficiency and gave rainbow stones.
And with higher skill, sometimes you could find super-rare herbs—Sohyun had mentioned that once.
So no, this wasn’t a trivial task.
“Then I’ll leave it to you.”
Beth chuckled warmly and handed me a big glass bottle.
Hugging it to my chest, I waddled toward the barn behind the dorm.
“I’m… really about to milk a cow?”
It still sounded absurd. I’d never done anything like it in my life.
I was born and raised in the city. The only time I’d seen cows was on long drives through the countryside as a kid, yelling, “Dad, look! A cow!”
It was about the same as spotting horses on Jeju Island.
This wasn’t about pride or being above such chores—it was just… unfamiliar.
Though, now that I thought about it, I’d had a chance before.
Back in elementary school, there’d been a field trip to a dairy farm.
I’d just happened to catch the flu that day and stayed home.
So here I was, trudging toward the cowshed.
A black-and-white cow blinked at me with big, clear eyes.
So that’s why novels always said “eyes like a cow.” The fluttering lashes were pretty, actually.
“Hi there, cow. Uh… oh, your name’s Spotty? You don’t mind if I take a little milk, right?”
Reading the tag on its neck, I gently reached out.
Spotty accepted my touch as I stroked her head.
Beside her stood a smaller calf.
Wait—was I stealing its dinner? A pang of guilt hit me.
But no, rainbow stones and food buffs were on the line. I couldn’t back down now.
Carefully moving to her side, I set the bottle beneath and started milking.
Warm, creamy milk began to fill the jar, carrying a nutty scent.
After a while—
My general gathering proficiency rose from 1 to 2. The glass bottle grew pleasantly heavy in my arms.
“Th-thanks, Spotty. See you later.”
I waved to Spotty and her calf before heading back to the kitchen.
“Here you go, fresh milk!”
“Oh, thank you, Hero.”
I set the bottle down with pride, and Beth chuckled softly, looking pleased.
“Anything else I can help with?”
I wasn’t satisfied yet. The 10% gathering buff still had plenty of time left.
Honestly, I could’ve just gone and raided the garden myself.
This land was blessed by the goddess—destroy the whole field today, and by tomorrow it’d all grow back.
But hey, might as well help the kitchen along the way.
I was an efficiency-obsessed gamer through and through.
“Oh my, this is already a big help. Well, could you fetch some onions from the garden then?”
“Of course! Just say the word.”
I pulled a hoe from my inventory with a shink and nodded eagerly.
She hadn’t said how many to bring.
Heh. I’ll harvest every last onion seed. I grinned wickedly as I headed for the garden.
And ran into another problem.
“…Which one’s an onion?”
Modern city folks know onions grow underground, but who knows what their leaves look like?
I vaguely remembered growing onions in school once, scribbling “thank you” and “I love you” on slips of paper and sticking them in the soil…
“Th-this one, maybe?”
I headed for something that looked like those sprouts.
Then it hit me. Oh, right—I had a status window.
It popped up with a sarcastic ding as if mocking my cluelessness.
Sadly, that was a green onion.
Sure, onions and scallions are both alliums, but Beth had asked for onions.
So I followed the status window’s directions to the onion patch and began hoeing like a pro.
I was in the middle of harvesting when—
“Hero~! That’s enough now!”
Beth’s voice rang out behind me.
“Ah, coming!”
Guess I’d overdone it.
I’d gone for onions for so long that dinner time was nearly upon us, and she’d come to fetch me.
Wiping sweat off my brow, I headed to the kitchen.
Then I dumped all the onions from my inventory onto the floor with a heavy thud-thud-thud.
“!?”
Beth’s eyes went wide at the mountain of onions.
