Chapter 31
The kitchen tent was quiet. Not empty—there were always people moving in and out, prepping, boiling, roasting, stirring—but quiet in the way a focused space should be. Knives clinked gently. Water hissed over coals. The air was warm with the smell of onions sweating in fat and flatbread baking over stone.
Ren stood at the farthest station, alone.
He hadn’t asked for help.
Not because he didn’t need it—but because he needed this more.
The stump of his right arm rested in a cloth sling tucked against his ribs, hidden beneath a fresh shirt. His left hand hovered over the table, fingertips twitching with concentration as strands of shimmering mana—the thinnest blue-white threads—unwound from his palm. They danced like hairs in water, weak and wavering, trembling with every breath.
Steady.
He didn’t need to move mountains. Just a few mushrooms.
They sat in a pile on the cutting board, squat and red-capped with little gold flecks around the stems. Firecap Buttons. Spicy when raw, but when roasted just right, they bled flavor—something between roasted pepper and cured meat, with a hint of woodsmoke.
He threaded his mana beneath one.
The strand slipped under the gilled cap, wobbled, then snagged. Ren grit his teeth, adjusting the pulse of energy through his palm. The thread jerked upward—clumsily—but the mushroom rose, hovering an inch above the board.
It wasn’t graceful.
But it worked.
Ren smiled, a tight line of pride, and gently pushed the thread sideways. The mushroom floated toward the skillet he’d oiled earlier and lowered in with a soft sizzle.
Immediately, the oil responded—bubbling gently as the firecap’s aroma began to bloom.
Savory. Smoky. Just a touch of sweetness at the edge.
Ren exhaled slowly, letting his mana threads drift apart. His left arm was already sore—like he’d held it above his head for too long. But he wasn’t done yet.
He reached for the rest of the ingredients by hand: a small basket of minced shallots, a few cloves of pale-blue garlic from the Order’s gardens, and a pat of churned goat butter infused with mana-rich herbs.
He moved quickly. Not fast—he didn’t have speed anymore—but efficiently, like someone who’d chopped and seared and sautéed long enough for the rhythm to return.
Shallots hit the skillet next, followed by the garlic. The scent changed instantly, going from woodsmoke to something warm and golden—like the inside of a fresh-baked pie crust. Ren let the firecap caramelize on one side, then nudged it with the edge of a wooden spoon.
Not everything had to be magic.
Some things just needed heat, patience, and a good hand.
Once the mushrooms had turned glossy and dark around the edges, he added a dash of salt and cracked pepper. Then came the broth—just a splash, enough to lift the fond from the skillet’s bottom. It hissed and steamed as he scraped gently, letting the liquid reduce.
His final touch: the butter.
He dropped it in whole. The pat melted instantly, streaking the pan with green and gold. Mana herbs. Not strong ones—he was still forbidden from using high-grade ingredients—but enough to tingle faintly against his fingertips as he stirred.
The scent became something unreal.
Rich. Earthy. With a sharp herbal brightness that made the nose tingle. People in the kitchen began to glance over. A few noses lifted. One of the younger apprentices near the dish station audibly sniffed and blinked like he’d just smelled springtime.
Ren didn’t say anything.
He plated the firecap mushrooms onto a small wooden tray, drizzled the buttery reduction over them, then reached for a final garnish: crisped wildroot slivers fried earlier in lard until golden-brown.
The first bite was his.
He used his fingers—couldn’t risk fumbling a fork—and took a piece of mushroom topped with root sliver.
Hot.
Soft.
A slow burn bloomed across his tongue, followed by the sweetness of the caramelized shallot and the herbaceous kiss of infused butter. The crunch of the root on top was perfect—just enough to break the texture.
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He closed his eyes.
It wasn’t his best dish. It wasn’t layered with multi-step reductions or mana-tuned glazes or experimental emulsions.
But it worked.
His hands—well, his hand—could still do this.
He opened his eyes to find two apprentices staring at him.
“Are you, uh… gonna eat all of that?” one of them asked.
Ren snorted softly and nudged the tray toward them.
“No,” he said. “Help yourselves.”
[LEVEL UP]
You are now Level 15.
+2 Intelligence
+2 Perception
+1 Dexterity
+2 Free Stat Points Available
The screen hovered in his vision for a moment before fading.
Ren blinked and sat down hard on the bench beside the station. His breath came in shallow gasps.
He felt it. Not just in the system prompt—but in his body. His thoughts were clearer. The scent and flavor profiles of the food lingered in his head like well-organized shelves. He could already think of three dishes to counterbalance the lingering bitterness of the broth. A dessert maybe. Or a spiced grain pudding with candied mushroom cap…
He felt… clearer. The tangled fog that had been clinging to his thoughts since the cave fight had thinned. His sense of the mana threads became sharper. Not easier—but more familiar. Like muscle memory learning a new shape.
He pulled up his status sheet.
Class : Arcane Sommelier
Strength: 11
Dexterity: 22
Constitution: 13
Perception: 30
Intelligence: 26
Charisma: 9
Skills:
? Culinary Knowledge
? Flavor Sense II
? Mana Pulse
? Flavor Control
? Mana Threading
“…Fifteen, huh?” he muttered. “Still not enough.”
The stat window hung in the corner of his vision. Perception had shot up again, and his mana control felt sharper, sure—but what did that matter when a wolf could just rip through him like paper? His pulse quickened as he remembered the cave, the blood, the fangs.
He hesitated. Then tapped his free points into Constitution.
+2 Constitution.
If he’d had a little more of that before, maybe things would’ve gone differently, though he really did need to put some into strength. It was falling behind a lot.
His gaze drifted toward the trees, thinking of Sinclair. That man was fast—absurdly so. Calm in a fight, terrifyingly skilled. What level was he? Thirty? Forty? Higher?
Ren exhaled slowly. He needed to know. Not to compare—just… to understand how far he still had to go.
"Next time I see him," Ren said aloud, "I’ll ask."
And next time… he would be stronger.
_________
The chamber was quiet, save for the clanging of weapons against wood as the Council settled down. Sinclair stood with arms folded, shoulder braced against the cold obsidian wall. In the center of the room, a magical projection shimmered to life—Ren Saito, unconscious, bloodied, one arm missing, lying on moss and pine needles.
“Level 14 when he wandered into a Class-Two mana anomaly,” someone murmured. “Unarmed, unsupervised. He should be dead.”
Sinclair didn’t speak. He didn’t need to. His eyes tracked the glowing image of the boy—no, the outsider—who’d become the center of a storm.
The other Writ-Bounds gathered around the circular council floor. Twelve in total, each in their ceremonial armor sets but with bodies ready for battle at all times. They weren’t the most powerful in the Order, but they were some of the most needed. They were responsible for the training of new Shadow-Initiates and the future of The Order.
A woman with crimson glyphs tattooed under her eyes sneered. “He refused to listen to orders, ignored the warnings about the forest and put our camp in danger.”
“He also survived a beast that could have torn through half our vanguard,” someone else muttered. “With only field-foraged supplies and second-tier spells.”
“That wasn’t skill. That was luck.”
Sinclair exhaled through his nose. This wasn’t about rules. It was about precedent.
Ren had stepped outside the bounds. Gotten lucky. Survived. And now the Order had to decide whether that made him dangerous—or useful.
A cold part of Sinclair—the part that had kept him alive in two rebellions, five wars and the collapse of a kingdom—whispered that Ren was a variable. A volatile one. The kind you either shackled tightly or removed.
But his heart—damn it—his heart had watched Ren bleed out in the dirt, eyes clouded with pain but still stubbornly clinging to life and… it reminded him of himself.
Sinclair looked across the room. Ethan stood silent, jaw set.
“Let me speak,” Sinclair said, stepping forward.
The murmurs faded.
“Ren Saito disobeyed orders,” he said. “He’s reckless. Untrained. A risk.”
The projection above the council flickered. A frozen moment—Ren surrounded by silver thread, hand outstretched, eyes locked with something unseen in the cave.
“But he didn’t run. He didn’t panic. He fought. He survived. And more importantly—he came back.”
A pause.
“I won’t vouch for him again. But I will say this: traitors destroy from within. Ren’s flaw isn’t betrayal. It’s inexperience. And that’s something we can fix.”
He stepped back, voice even. “He deserves the chance to learn from it.”
There was silence. Then the Grand Scribe nodded. She said,
“Summon him.”
