49 Start of A New Life

To be honest, only a place like the EU Military Academy, with generous amounts of funding from the Federation government, can something like a food sythesizer be in broad use within the student populace.

Although the function of the food synthesizer is the exact same as the so-called replicator from a certain famous sci-fi franchise, unlike the latter, which uses a fictional energy source to power said replicator, each gram produced by the academy's food synthesizer needs at least the equivalent amount of energy to be converted, in this case, a thoudsandth of the speed of light in a vacuum squared, calculated using Einsten's famous formula.

Although huge amounts of energy is being transported towards the Earth each second by the solar panels orbiting around the Sun, using such a huge amount of energy just to create a meagre amount of food can generally be said to be a waste of resources.

Only the military, including prospective military personnel like the academy's students, can afford such a luxury as it is subsidized by the federal government. Though, since the government itself is solely responsible for the allocation of energy use within the Federation, they can afford to do such a thing in order to retain the loyalty of the military in these dangerous times.

Fortunately, being friends with a rich second generation kid who had used a food synthesizer many times in his life, Daniel can simply did not need to use his head to specify what kind of food to synthesize and just directly use Jake's exhaustive menu of what the latter said to be the 'best food humans have ever produced, completely inputted into data and uploaded onto Minerva in order for people like him t oget the best cuisine anywhere at any time'.

However, since Daniel have never even came close to a food synthesizer before, he could only trust in Jake's judgement and hope that the dessert he directly have molecular chefs enter into Minerva's system is up to Daniel's palette, since he knew that the rich kid can have quite the weird tastes sometimes.

After the food materialized on top of the tray that Daniel placed within the microwave-looking device that is the food synthesizer, he stepped aside with his food and waited for the others to synthesize their own food.

"Military Menu C -- Dessert Selection. General Level Selection. D Set please."

General Eric is the second person in line. Since he was the only person within the group who actually had the experience with using a food synthesizer, he took even less time in choosing his own food than Daniel did, directly voicing out the stuff he wanted in one breath.

Unlike Daniel's selection, which can be accessed by anyone with a food synthesizer since Jake set his proprietary data that serves as his menu as available to public, the military have classified their menus to different levels so that the higher one's rank is within the military, the better the food they can get from the synthesizer. It is said that a lieutenant can only access the bare bones of the complete menu from the military, with the only thing available being some common foods that could be sold at any fast food restaurant outside.

Since Eric is a lieutenant general, he is able to access the second top level menu, with the only thing being unavailable to him being the VIP menu, reserved for higher ranks such as generals or the Chiefs of Staff within the Ministry of Defense.

Lastly, after Eric took his own portion of the food, it was finally 666's turn.

"666's Personal Menu. Nutrition Tablet A, E, D."

It seems that the somewhat dull and emotionless rommate of Daniel also has a much different palette than normal people as the only thing that he synthesized were three different-colored nutrition tablets -- a blue pentagonal shaped tablet, red spherical tablet and a yellow cubic tablet.

Seeing how unappetizing the nutrition tablet looks, Daniel could not help but ask, "Are you sure that this is all you want? You can ask for Minerva to show you Jake's Menu. My friend Jake, who made it, said that he has a great selection in there."

In response, 666 simply shook his head and said, "The tablets on my tray have enough nutritional value to last me the rest of the afternoon. Therefore, I do not require further sustenance other than these."

"That's not what I meant!" Daniel exclaimed, feeling slightly frustrated for not getting through to the other teenager. "I meant that you should get something more appetizing than nutrition tablets since Uncle Eric is treating the both of us."

"... That's not necessary. I've got all that I wanted." 666 replied after giving Daniel an emotionless look.

If Daniel were not holding the tray with both hands, he would have instantly facepalmed. Fortunately, Eric seemed more used to being around people like 666 as he simply gave a smile and stayed silent the entire time, as though 666's behavior is perfectly natural.

After the three of them found an empty table by the windows and sat down, Daniel started to take a closer look at the food that he himself ordered. "Jake said that this is his personal favorite, so I hope he's right." He muttered to himself softly.

Placing the tray on the desk before him, Daniel finally took a good close look at the dessert.

At first glance, what appeared before Daniel seemed to be a normal-looking cake that is cylindrical in shape. The cake itself looked to be a sponge cake with layers of whipped cream being etched in between each level. The cake is also topped with chocolate sauce, while each level of sponge is of a different color -- yellow, green, purple from top to bottom respectively.

General Eric's dessert looked much more normal and seemed to just be a standard Neo-York style cheesecake.

Daniel slowly scooped out a portion of his cake from top to bottom with his small spoon and took a bite.

"..."

Although it could not be said to taste disgusting, Daniel could only describe the taste of the cake as somewhat... odd. From what he could materialize, he found that the green part of the cake is apple-flavored while the purple is grape-flavored. The yellow part of the cake does not seem to taste like anything since it's been covered up by the grape and apple flavor, while the cream itself contains a slight tinge of saltiness for some reason.

Though Daniel would not call this the best dessert as Jake had told him previously, he could still stomach eating such a thing, which is already better than his original expectations.

Meanwhile, after taking the bite, Daniel looked towards 666, who sat next to him, and found the latter to be done eating already, as the only thing he needed to do is swallow the three tablets at the exact same time before drinking a glass of water.

He then turned to Eric, who sat opposite of him, and found the other thoroughly enjoying his food with a smile.

Feeling as though he was the only one loosing out at this time, Daniel simply gave a sigh and cursed Jake deeply within his heart, promising himself that he would find a way to punish his best friend when he sees the other person again, before finishing his food in a few large bites. Then, he cleansed his palette with the melon soda that he personally designed before finally feeling satisfied.

With everyone done with eating their food, Eric took the initiative and started a conversation with the two teenagers opposite him, "So what type of mech do you specialize in, 666?"

"I've been trained to use every single type of mech in existence. However, my physical and mental composition makes me best suited for Special Model 99." 666 spoke as though he is reporting to his superior.

"That's one of the most physically taxing mechs out there!" Eric widened his eyes and exclaimed. "With a fusion engine equipped, the model can go as fast as 30,000km/h, allowing for the mech itself to reach exit velocity and leave the Earth's orbit without any additional help. The mech also has a stealth function, which is optimal for use in spy missions. The only thing lacking about the mech is due to how light it needs to be in order to increase its speed, only two beam sabers are equipped within its body."

Eric immediately acted like a tech geek and spouted out the specifications of 666's mech without stopping. It was only when he realized that he went off on a tangent that he finally stopped and allowed for 666 to continue with answering his question.

"Although it might be taxing for a full biological body, it would be fine if one to be converted into a semi-mechanical one." 666 pointed out.

"So, you're saying..." Eric spoke with hesitation.

"Your assumption is correct, sir." 666 nodded and replied. "This body of mine is a bio-mechanical model."

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