***
Could… could it truly be?!
***
Hiro was standing in the kitchen with normal clothes and looked at Ryo and Ikumi, he said "Listen to me, this is how your 5 days here will go. Dinner service tonight, breakfast tomorrow and lunch tomorrow, I will be cooking everything."
Ryo and Ikumi nodded and Hiro nodded, continuing "After that, the entire kitchen will be all you two. Me, nor Zerotwo will interfere. It's up to you to keep the restaurant afloat. After every service, you will make the dishes that you saw me make. Prepare for minimal sleep as I will be teaching you how to make different dishes at all times."
Ryo and Ikumi were stunned and Hiro said seriously "Watch carefully to how I work, take inspiration from me, but do not copy me! If you copy someone else, you will lose yourself in the process. There are exceptions like Subaru, but for others it's a path to a dead end. Understand?"
Ikumi and Ryo nodded seriously and Hiro nodded before rolling up his sleeves and knocking on the cabinet over the wall by the door out of the kitchen. Ryo asked "Is that?" Hiro smiled and nodded "Every knife here has a story."
Ikumi asked "What about your knife?"
Hiro paused and smiled lightly, replying "I lost mine a long time ago." his words shocked the two kiddos senseless. Hiro just smiled lightly and pulled out Megumin's knife before swiping on the whetstone from the system twice.
Zerotwo walked in and took a random knife, doing the same, as she said "Full floor." before handing him a note pad. He took it and said "The kid?" she rolled her eyes and said "Unreliable as usual." Hiro just chuckled and shook his head.
A kid ran in, saying "Boss! 14 orders of...." he went on for a minute before gasping for breath, Hiro slapped his back and said "You need to relax, Fukuro." Fukuro just grinned and said "I can't sleep boss, I need to work." before grabbing a jar of wine and heading out.
Hiro shook his head and started, turning on all the stoves as he said "You two, stand back and keep your eyes open, I'll be quick."
Ryo and Ikumi watched as Hiro and Zerotwo cooked 20 dishes at the same time without effort, they were so shocked they couldn't close their mouths. Hiro suddenly said "Pay attention, you have 2 more chances to watch before you're on your own!"
They cam out of their shock and watched carefully, Ikumi took down notes and Ryo had his eye glue to Hiro's hands, not missing anything.
A while later
Hiro and Zerotwo finished the dinner service and smiled as they sent Fukuro off and closed the restaurant.
Hiro went back to the kitchen and started cooking again, saying "Did you get all that?" Ryo and Ikumi nodded and Hiro smiled, saying "Take your time, digest everything. I'm making dinner for everyone, go sit with Zerotwo outside, she'll test you again."
They nodded and walked outside, sitting at the table with Zerotwo, who smiled at them and said "So? How was it?" Ikumi said with a frown "Very hard." Ryo was staring into space, thinking about something.
Zerotwo chuckled and said "It's not too bad once you get used to it. The hard part is finding a waiter that can keep up." Ikumi deadpanned, that wasn't hard? Are you joking with me right now? You cooked 300 dishes in 2 hours...
Ryo suddenly asked "You said the menu will change every day?" Zerotwo nodded and smiled "Every night we will teach you the next day's menu." Ikumi asked "Isn't that bad for the restaurant?" Zerotwo looked at her and laughed "So?"
Ikumi and Ryo were stunned and Zerotwo added "This is only for you two. Hiro pulled a lot of strings to get all these people here. If there was no Stagiaire then we'd just run the restaurant as usual... Money isn't a big deal anymore, when you have so much, it's just a number."
The duo were stunned and pointed at themselves in shock.
The entire restaurant was used just for them to learn?
What was luxury?
This was!
Hiro came out of the kitchen and laid out dinner with a smile, saying "Eat up, afterwards we'll do testing to see how much to soaked in and I'll teach you tomorrow's dinner menu." Ikumi and Ryo looked at the dishes.
They were shocked, Ikumi got her A-5 Beef Roti and Ryo got his Autumn Pacific Saury Cartoccio.
Hiro grinned and said "Try and find where you went wrong during these two dishes." before turning to Zerotwo and cutting her Honey Garlic Pork, feeding it to her and saying "Come on, love~" she giggled and accepted his feeding, much to Hiro's happiness.
While they were flirting the two kids were absentminded, immersed in the flavor of their own dishes. They couldn't believe that their dishes could taste like this.
They cam back to reality and looked at Hiro feeding Zerotwo, they shivered in terror. Don't look at how cute he is now, this man is the top chef in the world!
A real monster!