The Loser's War

Once we polished off the dish, Candice brought out piping hot Fish soup out.

"Made them while you two were eating. I'll teach you next time. Come eat up! Since you are so interested in our cuisine, you can get Ken to show you around the outside of the AT center, as well as the shopping district."

She placed two big bowls of soup down on the table. The soup in the bowls shook with the force, but they did not spill. Ken gave a slight groan as he lifted the bowl and drank his sorrows away. It was slightly hilarious yet nostalgic.

Looking down at the soup, it's color was a very unappealing brown. Stirring it sent tiny little particles a slight shade darker up to the surface. Lifting it up like Ken, I took a small sip. Unlike the dishes before, the soup was incredibly rich, with no trace of sweetness. Instead it was more savory and had a slightly bitter aftertaste that seemed to make even saliva taste sweet.

"You should drink some water right after a mouthful of soup! It makes the water taste sweet, and it helps wash the rich taste down.""

Placing a cup of plain water in front of me, Ken took his own cup and took a big swallow of water. Alternating between water and soup, soon both of us were patting our bulging stomachs as we waddled to get ready to go out. Licking my lips, I had to admit. After a while, the taste of the soup became slightly addicting.

Shutting the door, I looked on as Sazzy immediately sat on the bed, rubbing her stomach. Letting out a giant burp, she laid on the bed like a starfish for a whole minute before jumping off and grabbing several items to shove in my arms.

Before when we were eating, I had seen Sazzy's eyes full of greed and sadness. Letting out a small sigh, I had distracted Ken by continuing the topic about food, as well as asking for more information on the animals here. Sazzy had caught on quickly and used these opportunities to 'taste' the food.

Placing the object she had given me into the sling bag she was holding out open, we both took this opportunity to have a small talk before setting off.

"Enjoy the meal?"

[Yep! The fish burger was so good! Everything was so soft! The crispy outside layer really enhanced the softness of the meat though.]

"How did you feel about the fish soup?"

[It was oily, but sweet. A nice addition to the meal!]

Smiling at Sazzy, I listened to her ramble on about the deliciousness of the food. But never once did I hear her mention anything that couldn't be gleaned from the conversation between me and Ken. Not even the chewy texture of the fish skin, which I could argue would be the most distinct feature of the dish, was even slightly mentioned.

Opening the door, Sazzy immediately shut as she saw Ken basically hopping from one foot to the next out of impatience waiting at the door.

"Done with your call?"

Smiling, I gave an affirmative hum as we all headed down the stairs and out the front door of the inn.

"First we need to go to the shopping street to get some ingredients for dinner. Then, after we have collected all of that, we are going to go fishing in the sea. You are going to enjoy fishing! Today's fish is usually caught by hand, and we are also going to check some traps to see if we can grab some side dishes as well!"

Going back to the crosswalk, we instead went into the third street from the right. We were immediately met with colorful storefronts, tasty smells and delicious looking ingredients and products locked behind display windows.

"The food here is more towards the international taste, so we won't find the needed ingredients here. We need to walk a bit further in, where we can find the wet market. Mother wants some star water, sun dust and fairy wings."

Pulling up his personal terminal, Ken flashed some pictures his mother sent him.

"Star water comes from these star shaped creatures that we can fish from the sea. The water that comes out when they deflate after coming into contact with air, or when we provoke them, is called star water. Usually they hang out in this really deep part of the sea, so most people would rather buy them from the store than catch some for themselves. "

"Sun dust is just golden dust that can be scraped off sun angels, which is a type of parasite. They're tree parasites so they are really easy to get, and really cheap! We can buy a whole jar with just 1 UC. Uncle Jeremy grows one right outside his house, and sometimes sends us a Jar in exchange for some free food."

"Fairy wings are really crispy! We can buy some extras to eat later! Mother always knows I buy some extras anyway so she gave me more money today! They come from these fuzzy looking sea caterpillars that like to crawl on the ocean floor. They are a pain to find so they're quite expensive to buy. We have to haggle down the price from Fern. He likes to hike up the price because of the back pain he gets from collecting the fairy wings."

Walking past all of the colorful shops, Ken stopped at several to slip some money to the shopkeepers and stowed the handful of snacks into his bag. "Energy rations'' was what he said. I looked at him with suspicion.

Now where have I heard that excuse before?

After walking for several more minutes, we left the pastel colors behind to enter a noisy market with shop owners busy behind windowless counters selling ingredients in jars. Walking up to one of the shops, Ken talks to the people for a couple of seconds in a foreign language before introducing me.

"This is Alex, a fellow chef!"

Ken pointed to the tall and burly man who was wearing a pink apron.

"This is Fern! He usually comes over to the inn in the evenings to drink and eat. In exchange, mother gets him to collect ingredients for our inn!"

Fern looked at me with a glint in his eye. His tough face then cracked into a very friendly smile as we leaned down to my height.

"A fellow chef? Then I take it that she also has a good taste in food?"

Pulling out a handmade lunch, he opened it to show a very colorful arrangement of food items.

"Try them and tell me what you think?"

Picking up some of the ... more tame food items, I put them into my mouth

"... very grainy" Like sand.

Looking at his face, I expected his smile to turn upside down but instead it became wider.

"Very grainy, I see. That's what I think so too! I guess it's back to the drawing board for me!"

Ken leaned towards me and said in a not so small voice.

"Fern's trying to cook something for his wife's birthday next week, but because he looks like that nobody dares to give him a criticism. And besides, he always adds international ingredients into his dishes so no one knows how to help him improve."

Fern glared at Ken's not so quiet whisper.

"I'm sorry I 'look like that'. Here, stinky boy. Take your things and go back and tell your mother she's going to have to add an extra side dish to compensate for the hurt her son has caused.

Rolling his eyes, Ken took the bag and waved goodbye to Fern.

Instead of going back where we came, we exited the protective barrier and headed right.

"Say, Ken. Why can nobody help Fern if he uses international ingredients?"

Ken looked my way and sighed as he placed his hands behind his head.

"You really must have amnesia since you don't even know about The Loser's War. Especially if you are from Mors."

"The Loser's War?"

"Yeah. To put it short, since you can easily research it yourself later. It's a war from 120 years ago. A massive war fought against the Colonizers. The Colonizers won, and the losers, the Alliance, had to sign a pact with the Colonizers to basically pin all the blame on Mors."

I looked at him in surprise.

"You must be wondering why Mors, right? Well, I heard it's because Mors was responsible for most of the deaths on the Colonizers side. There are many arguments about this though. Father disagrees. He says that it's because Mors was a double spy for the Colonizers and they were shipping out the poisons from Mors to be used as weapons."

Ken looked left and right as he said this, then lowered his voice to a whisper.

"The Colonizers mixed in the poisons to the food supplies for the Alliance. It was one of the main reasons that the Colonizers won. After all, 60% of the Alliance soldiers died. Ever since then, planets that used to be from the Alliance don't dare to touch international ingredients. Fern is one of the exceptions. Not many people dare to nowadays even if there is no war. Not after they see this."

Ken quickly pulled me off the path and into the woods, and we were running very quickly. As if afraid of being seen. After a while, the trees in front of us suddenly disappeared and gave way to a massive clearing.

In front of us were waves of gravestones. As far as the eye can see. Each gravestone had flowers on them, some gravestones had birthday cakes, some had normal food, and others had instruments, paints, dolls.

We walked up to one that had an old doll with a flower skirt. On the gravestone, 'Barbie' was engraved.

"When people first found out, they tried to burn the supplies. However, all that did was produce toxic fumes that killed everyone around them."

Ken bent down and squatted in front of the grave. Out of his pocket, he pulled out a carefully protected picture of a girl with a flower skirt who looked similar to him.

"Barbie was my sister. Some years ago, we both found a stash of ingredients stored in a cave nearby. Since it was a war more than a hundred years ago, we have heard of the stories but we never thought anything would be left from that time period. Barbie was more of a glutton than I was. She stole a bite from one of the crates and fell immediately. By the time I had noticed anything, it was too late. "

Standing up, Ken led us away from the mass grave and back onto the track.

After a few minutes of heavy silence, Ken smiled at me with a pained smile.

"I know this is very heavy, especially since we only met and properly talked today. You could say I just wanted to tell someone, to let out some stress! Most of the natives don't like to come to the AT center, much less the kids. Although war is over, we still have quite a bit of fear towards non native ingredients. Especially after the discovery of those caves."

Ken fell into silence once more before perking up again.

"Well we just have to make those unfamiliar ingredients familiar! Barbie has always wanted to travel the worlds and eat all of those dishes she had never seen before. Maybe she was why our family is still ok with international food!"

Swinging the bag in his hand, we finally arrived at the beach. Immediately Ken spread out his arms and breathed the scent in deeply. Then he turned around and smiled at me genuinely.

"Now it's time to fish for treasure!"