Death March kara Hajimaru Isekai Kyusoukyoku (WN)
chapter-9-28

9-28. Curry Festival

Satou's here. Do you like curry?　I think that the genuine specialty-made curry and pouch curry are both delicious in their own ways. However it was painful when my clothes smelled of curry after the lunch break that resulted in the women employees looking coldly at me.

◇

Now then, let's begin the preparation for the curry festival tonight.

I asked Lua-san in the morning to reserve one of the squares.

Large pots are lined up on the ground.

The large pot is big enough to fit a man inside, and it has eight feet on the bottom. They're not for walking of course, but for creating about 10 centimeters gap when the pot is put on the ground.

During our stay at the duchy capital, I made a lot of these pots in the underground labyrinth, they were made to be heated with the [Flame Field] magic.

"You two, please help me peel the vegetables."

"Yes."

"Understood."

"Liza, teach Nana how to do chamfering."

"Yes, please leave it to me."

I entrust Liza and Nana to peel the vegetables. I take out the chicken meat that I've left pickling since before the duchy capital out of the Item Box and pass it to Lulu.

I'd like to use chicken cutlets as the topping, but I guess the chicken meat isn't quite enough is it?

"Mia, is there anyone I can ask some chicken meat from?"

"Nn, Hiya."

Her word is few, but Hiya-shi is most likely a hunter. After Mia beat her thin breasts doing "Leave it to me" gesture, she ran accompanied by Pochi and Tama on her flanks.

Are you guys going to catch Roc bird?

The shortage of personnel for the vegetable peeling is immediately supplemented.

The researcher of hero's dishes, Nea-san leads some adult woman elves who like to cook to help. I entrust several people that Nea-san's brought, and Lulu to do the work that would take some time to finish.

Nea-san and me are going to fry the onions.

Fry it carefully.

Slowly and carefully.

Slowly and carefully.

Nea-san is cooking while frequently looking here.

It's complete when the onions have turned yellowish-brown.

I have Lulu to change place with me and mass produce it together with Nea-san. It's written in the memo that this onions give slight sweet taste to the curry, so it's quite important. I make the onions that are big enough, and some carrots to be shaped like stars and crescent moons, I just need to arrange them afterward.

I feel lonesome stares looking here from the shade of a tree. It's Arisa and Aialize-san.

This is troubling.

Letting Arisa to cook is seriously a flag for failure. In case of Aialize-san, I can't help but imagine her tripping the pot and gets splattered by the inside of the pot.

I beckon them, here here.

Arisa and Aialize-san points their finger toward themselves while having "Me?" faces.

When I nod to that, they smile like in full bloom, and rush here hurriedly.

When I think of this time, it hurts my heart.

"Ehehehe~"

"I-is there anything I can do?"

I say, "Yes", and pass baskets with candies from the duchy capital inside to them. I push thin stick candies to the mouth of the two who have received the baskets with blank faces.

Arisa seems to have noticed my intention as she crush the candy in her mouth while looking reluctant. Aialize-san doesn't seem to quite understand, she's eating the candy with slightly red face. Her expression is a bit erotic.

"Please distribute the candies to the pixies so they don't disturb us."

Ah, please don't put that "I've been betrayed!" face. With the basket hung on her arm, Arisa pulls the teary eyed Aialize-san to the square and gathers the pixies. I'm sorry Arisa. I'm leaving it to you to babysit the pixies and Aialize-san.

◇

The flame that's dancing wildly is heating the pots. When it has boiled, I relax the flame and remove the lye.

This work is really quite troublesome. I pass some ladles to Nana and Liza who were looking at it so interestedly. The two methodically scoop out the lye. Only the serious Liza and the hobbyist Nana can do such troublesome work so steadily. I'll reward the two later.

Halfway through it, some elf men who look like they're in military seemed to be attracted by Liza's serious expression, they began to take part removing the lye. You guys, why does the atmosphere becomes as if you're doing a serious match.... Since it feels like I've lost if I retort them, I leave them alone.

Now then, once the lye have been removed, and the vegetables have been cooked, I just need put the curry powder next.

I'll leave the state of the vegetables' to Nea-san.

I'm going to prepare the garnishes at once.

I prepare many fried food as the topping together with Lulu. Whale karages and cutlets, fried prawns, wild boar cutlets, and fried white fish meat. Halfway through, I appoint Lulu as the teacher to guide the elf women the way to help.

Now then, I'll prepare the deep-fried paprikas, and pumpkins for Mia.

I only preliminary arrange these, the frying is for later.

I fry the sweet potatoes that I've thinly sliced before. I put it in a small basket, and bring it to the place where Arisa is playing Sugoroku with the pixies.

"Arisa, I've come to bring more snack."

"Uwah! It's potato chips! Is it alright?　It's alright for me to eat it right?!"

"Share it with everyone."

Potato chips was among the item that I forbade during the diet back then, so I rarely ever cooked it. I've also told Lulu not to make it, so it might have already been one month I guess. I have some carbonated water that I got during the oak ores gathering, I'll try to make soda if I have some chance later.

"Okay! Popo, Lili, line up the pixies in a line!　I'll distribute the wonderful snack from the hero's country you know."

"Aye aye sir, ain't it!"

"Oh you, Arisa, you're exaggerating."

"But, it smells nice~"

Potato chips seem to be popular with the pixies too. I can hear relatively angry voice of Arisa from behind. Work hard, Arisa.

I prepare sweet drink for people who are bad with bitter ones while hearing such voice from behind me. I'm just putting some Ugi sugar into cooled cow milk. The drink outward appearance become like green tea because I put this sugar which has green tea color. After the pseudo green tea latte fill three large bottles, I cool it with magic. I need to operate the magic delicately since it must not freeze over, but it's not that difficult.

◇

I put curry powder into the pot little by little, and stir it while the powder is melting, but it's not getting thick. Was the original recipe wrong?　I put some wheat flour in order to easily thicken it. This time I feel that the body is lacking. It finally feels right after I've thrown some butter.

Next, I need to lower the flame, and wait for the flavor to sip into the vegetables. I'll fry the topping one by one in the meantime.

"Prey~"

"A big catch nanodesu!"

"Praise me."

Tama, Pochi, and Mia are running while being full of mud, so I stop them before they enter the square. Five elf men with nihilistic faces are following the three from behind. Although I said men, their outward appearances are that of junior high school students, so they look like nothing but some cheeky boys. Arisa would have drooled over them.

"Thank you for your hard work."

I use life magic to clean the people who have come back from hunting.

Pochi and Mia smelled strange since they were caught by some plant-type monster, so I use deodorant magic on them. It seemed to be quite hard.

There is no time to pickle the chicken meat I've obtained, so I'm going to use it for the topping instead. There are pheasants, and ducks, they look really delicious. I'd like to make the duck into kamonabe with dashi or udon, but I'll just put it on top of steamed salad this time.

The elf men who have come back from the hunt camp on a temp table at the square for the banquet, and begin to have liquor and appetizers ahead. Pochi and Tama are cunningly eating the grilled chicken at the place where the elf men are. Don't overeat okay?

"Nn."

Mia carries the potato chips basket near Arisa, and holds it out to me. Of course the inside is empty. Come to think of it, Mia and Arisa are often fighting over potato chips huh.

"It's dinner soon, so no. I promise that I'll make it as snacks tomorrow."

"Promise."

I join my little finger to Mia's little finger and do yubikiri. Aialize-san who's surrounded by the pixies seem to find yubikiri unusual as she's staring at it. Let's magnificently ignore it here.

◇

I distribute the completed curry rices. It feels like distribution center with all these people and camps.

I use the slightly long thin rice from Gururian city. It feels like rice from the specialty shop that I had eaten at before, so I'm imitating it.

"Huh? It's not yellow."

"Yes, it's too much for beginner so I changed the color. Don't worry, I've made our share to be yellow."

There are four kinds of red yellowish greeen bitter orange curry this time.

First, green curry with spinach-like vegetables. I made this one for people who like vegetables like Mia. It has normal spiciness.

Next is the red curry with quite a bit of pepper. I made it for people like the nihilistic men and Lua-san who likes something curious. Nea-san and Lulu who tasted it end up in tears, so its spiciness seems to be uncommon. I put a lot of wolf meat I have in stock.

The yellow one is keema curry. Of course I've arranged it in Japanese-style. I put the pickled chicken meat in this. It's quite hot, although not at the red curry degree. Its yellow color is close to the primary color one, so people who associate it with curry probably won't associate it with something disgusting.

The last one is orange curry. It's actually a normal curry. This color is made by coloring agent. Needless to say, the harmless one. They're something that I originally made to distinguish potion, arranged a bit. I've put cow meat that I got from the elves-san for this one. I've made two kind of flavors, the normal spicy one and the sweet one.

Maybe because there's no prejudice against it, the orange beef curry is popular among the women. I make it so people can freely choose the fried topping that I've mass produced.

As for the small palates, there are fresh salads, boiled cabbages, mashed potatoes, vegetables sticks, leeks, and etc. The soy-sauced pickles are limited so it's exclusive for my table. I'm currently making more myself, I'll share some when it's finished.

When everyone has spread through the place, the meal begins with [Itadakimasu] sign.

Ah, curry after a long time.

"Huh? The color of master's curry is strange nanodesu."

"The color is originally like this you know."

"The stars are hidden~?"

The stars-shaped carrots, and round-cut onions inside the curry seem to be popular. Now Pochi and Tama would probably eat it without avoiding it.

"It's hot, but delicious."

"Declaring that the curry here is cute."

Liza, you're free to put the topping and all. I think it's fine even if you pile the whale karage to the point that the curry can't be seen. She's chosen the keema curry. The chicken meat seem to be the decisive factor.

Nana is greatly delighted by the extremely hot red curry, and the rabbit-shaped cut of the apple-like fruit.

"Uu, it's delicious, but I can't eat it since it's too spicy."

"Aaze, do your best."

I've been admiring Aialize-san who's eating while drinking water with her mouth opening and closing with teary eyes, but I should help her soon.

"Aialize-sama, please try this."

"It's not spicy! I can eat this one."

"That's good to hear."

I changed her curry with the sweet one. The staff is going to enjoy her curry later. There are also other people who seem to be bad with spicy curry, so I inform them about the sweet curry.

"If your mouth is still tingling, please use the drink here. It will subside the hotness a bit."

"T, thank you. ...Tasty. It's sweet and delicious."

Since she still looked painful, I presented Aialize-san with the pseudo green tea latte I had made earlier. The way she's drinking it gulp by gulp by using both her hands is cute.

It's not like I'm charmed by that image, but the [Guilty] calls somehow come from Arisa, and Mia. I forgot to distribute it to everyone. I had planned to give it to everyone in the first place, but it seemed to be bad of me to give it to Aialize-san first. Why.

I put the remaining bottle of the pseudo green tea latte on the elves table since it's bad for us to monopolize it.

"Ah, bliss. It's as delicious as Coconi curry."

"Arisa, hamburg curry nano desu!"

"Karauma~"

Nea-san seemed to have grilled the leftover meat into hamburg steak. That person really likes hamburg steak huh.

I look at the curry feast while nibbling the soy-sauced pickles.

I'm glad that it suits their tastes.

However, Mia. You don't know.

There are beefs in the curry you're eating. It's turned into fiber since I've simmered it in different pot, so she probably won't notice it. It shouldn't have the texture of meat either.

While having such strange narration in my head, I fondly look at Mia who's doing all her might to put the curry into her mouth.

The curry, and the topping that have been prepared for 500 people are all consumed. There are many derivate dishes that have been born this time, like Liza's [Whale Cutlets among Curry].

There weren't any women who refuse the fruit jelly dessert even after they had eaten that much. No matter how they say that it's going to another stomach, it's bad for their healths, so I'll give them some digestive medicines later.

The curry festival is over like this.

The elves who couldn't participate seemed to voice their dissatisfactions, so it had been decided that we were going to have curry festival for a while. I didn't want to have curry everyday, so I gave the curry recipe to Nea-san who was fully motivated and pushed it to her.

I wanted to help Nea-san who had been dyed with the spices fragrances, but at that time, I was busy with another matter, so I couldn't spare some hand.