Barbeque

The next morning after our successful hunt, I woke up to the usual smell of breakfast and gathered with the others in the kitchen when the princess asked me what we would be doing that day, her eyes sparkling with anticipation.

However, the fact was that we wouldn't be doing anything too special. I wanted to spend the first half of the day processing all of the terror bulls that we hunted, and I also wanted to make a few potion batches since now I had to export to the other cities too.

The princess told me that she actually was quite interested in learning how to process the monsters, but I honestly couldn't understand why. It wasn't something that I particularly enjoyed doing, but it was more or less something I had to do to survive.

When the adventurers guild first opened in End Town, I remember hearing that there were workers that specialized in butchering and processing monsters that adventurers brought to the guild. However, you obviously needed to be registered to be able to ask for their service, and most of the time they also asked for priority if the hunter wanted to sell any of the materials.

To be fair, it wasn't a bad deal considering how much I disliked butchering the monsters, and I was sure that if I went over there with dozens of bulls they would probably consider processing them in order to buy some of the materials, but I also didn't want any preferential treatment, so I simply did it on my own.

I explained to the princess that she would probably never need to butcher a monster. We were registering as adventurers in a year, so she could simply use the guild's services, but she insisted saying that it was still something she should learn.

It ended up taking me a bit longer than I had expected to butcher all of the monsters. Since I had to explain to the princess how not to damage the meat and materials, I had to work at a slower pace than usual. However, I can't deny that having the princess there trying her best made the somewhat repulsive activity much bearable.

Before we knew it, nighttime had fallen upon us, and I realized that we hadn't even had lunch. Thankfully, now we had hundreds of steaks and meat cuts that looked like the best quality beef I had ever seen.

One thing I noticed when butchering the golden bull was that its meat had a marble that looked exactly like wagyu beef, making me even more excited to cook it.

With all of the meat that we had and all of the hungry mouths I had to feed, I decided to do a barbeque under the stars. I had made a much bigger iron grill that worked with a gas tank that I refilled myself using air magic.

Before cooking the meat, I wanted to make barbeque sauce. I remembered that it was always made differently back in my old world since every company or restaurant had its own special ingredients they added. But, I knew the main ingredients for it, which made me quite confident I could make something similar.

First, I needed vinegar, although not the dark kind that I could make from fermented wine, but the clear kind, so I decided to make apple cider vinegar by placing apple peels and cores into a jar, then used nature magic to turn it into vinegar without having to wait for weeks. After that, I smashed some tomatoes and turned them into a paste with a very liquid consistency.

Next, I stirred the ingredients together with gravity magic while I poured brown sugar into the mix, tasting it every few seconds until I felt it was good. I had no way of measuring the ingredients' amounts, and I obviously didn't have the recipe memorized, so all I had was my intuition and sense of taste.

Once the mix was done, I made a small pot of clay with earth magic and placed a few chunks of wood at the bottom, then placed the sauce bowl on top suspended by two pieces of iron, and finally, I lit up the wood on fire, allowing it to get some of that smoky taste that was so emblematic for bbq sauce.

While the sauce got smoked, I seasoned the pieces of steak and began grilling them. I turned around to ask everyone how they wanted their meat cooked, but they didn't seem to understand exactly what I meant. I personally didn't like my steak well done, so I went ahead and cooked them all medium, except for Yoru's, which I left a bit rarer.

The princess and the maids watched me cooking attentively, almost as if they were taking mental notes of all my actions. I was so focused on cooking the entire time that I had completely forgotten to tell them what I was doing.

"This is called a barbeque, and that over there is the bbq sauce…" I said as I explained how the sauce was made and how cooking meat in portable grills while gathered with friends and family was also called a bbq. It took a moment for them to understand the concept, but once we were sitting eating, they didn't care and only exclaimed that they "loved bbq's now."

I felt pretty proud about the sauce, not really thinking it would taste so similar to the real thing. However, I did feel like we were lacking in side dishes. Veggies and bread were fine, but it would have been much better if we had some potatoes or rice.

After dinner, the ladies wanted to take a bath, so I went inside and used the shower while pondering if I should really make my own personal bathtub. Once I was done, I went to the second floor to work on the potions that I was supposed to be working on hours before.

I wanted to see what the horns of the bulls could be used for since the maids mentioned that they were used for crafting potions, but they didn't say what kind.

I grabbed one of the black horns from a terror bull and placed it on my desk for inspection.

<Terror Bull Horn

Can be grounded into powder for alchemy.

Possesses stamina boost and stamina restorative properties.>

<Golden Bull Horn

Can be grounded into powder for alchemy.

Stamina and MP restoration properties.>

("Stamina boost?) I pondered as I compared both types of horns. From what I could tell, the golden horns were an upgraded version of the terror ones and much more prominent in size.

For my first trial, I used the terror bull horns to search for the perfect potion base. I tried combining different ingredients that I had used before in my previous potions until I managed to get something that worked.

The potion had a light brown color that, frankly, made it look quite repulsive. Nevertheless, I inspected it, and it seemed to be complete.

<Stamina Potion

Creator: Ichiro

Restores fatigue and exhaustion or boosts stamina.>

The vile-looking potion actually seemed to be pretty useful, and the inspection showed me that there was nothing wrong with it. Naturally, I had to try it out first.

When I drank it, I felt a sudden and instant boost of energy. Almost as if I had just drunk a liter of coffee, making my senses a bit keener and alert.

The potion restored your stamina if you were suffering from fatigue. However, if your body wasn't tired, then it would instead give you a boost of energy. At that moment, I realized I had made a grave mistake by drinking the stamina potion when I was minutes away from going to bed.

With all the newfound energy I had, I began working with the golden horns using ingredients that I had already tried previously.

From that point on, the night was kind of a blur. I kept working on the new potions throughout the entire night. The princess and the maids came by the workshop to ask me if I was okay, but once I told them about the stamina potion I drank, they understood that there was no chance of me going to bed any time soon.

I woke up with my head laying on the desk and a small pond of drool under my cheek. Next to me was Vespera on one of the chairs, taking a nap, which was a very rare sight to see. I supposed that at some point during the night, she came in and watched me work until I passed out.

On the desk, not too far from where my head was lying, I noticed a small purple potion and quickly inspected it.

<Restoration Potion

Creator: Ichiro

Restores physical strength and MP.>

The new potion didn't boost my stamina, which I was quite satisfied with. But it also restored your MP, making me think that these potions could be extremely useful if I ever found myself in a tight situation.