YOUR EYES SLOWLY FLUTTERED OPEN...
A throbbing pain hit your head as you let out a low groan, putting your arm on your forehead, you let your eyes adjust to the blinding line on top of the ceiling.
"Oh, finally you're awake!" Someone exclaimed from your right side, you glance at your right and saw a smiling nurse who gleamed at you softly.
"Who... are you?" You muttered, slightly coughing due to your dry throat. The nurse hurriedly went to her desk and took the glass of water and gave it to you. You slowly stood up from the bed as you drank the water.
"I'm Kana (little-small-jul), the school's nurse." The lady introduced herself smiling from ear to ear. Despite it being a smile, it was sad and slightly worried for your well being.
"You should probably rest here for a while. The next task will be in 4 hours." Kana informed you, looking at her watch on her wrist.
"Oh I meant 3 hours because you slept for like, an hour."
"Mmm, okay. Thanks." You muttered, the girl gave you a small smile as she took the vacant chair beside her and sat on it. Her legs were crossed as she glance at you, giving you a playful look.
"So.. Who's that boy who brought you here? Your boyfriend~?" The school nurse started teasing you. Seriously? Waking up and now you're bombarded by questions? On the corner of your eyes, you saw the small anxiety meter still there, it's meter rising for a bit but only for a small percent.
"Huh? Who even brought me here?" You asked, propping yourself on your elbows to look at the nurse.
"Ya know, that spice boy, Jun Shiomi-san's assistant."
"Ohh, him. No he's not my boyfriend, just a close friend of mine." You told her.
"I think he likes you."
"Huh?"
"Never mind. Anyways, I'll leave you and let you rest for a couple of minutes or an hour. I wanted to tell the alumnis to just excuse you but, this training camp is very important." Kana said, her hands placed inside the pockets of her white coat.
"It's fine. Thank you, Kana-san."
"No need. It is my job after all." The lady said and left, leaving you all alone in the white clinic.
"Damn." You looked around the room with your eyes before laying back down. Your vision went blurry and you saw the options in front of you. A sigh left your lips while you pressed the ratings.
They've dropped, you thought while your hands hovered on the current ratings.
"System?"
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
System:
You called?
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
"Did I mess up here?" The anxiety meter went up the first bar as you begun to remember what happened.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
System:
Certainly not. You did great, Y/N.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
•❅─────✧❅✦❅✧─────❅•
3 hours of rest, you decided to leave the clinic to go to the lobby where they will announce the next task.
You entered the huge lobby and was greeted by students who were tired from practicing. You look around and saw your friends running towards you.
"Y/N! Are you okay?! I heard that someone brought you to the clinic?!"
"Why did you fainted?! Are you already okay?!" They bombarded you with questions, making you giggle softly.
"I'm fine, I'm fine." You reassured them, waving your hands as you gave them a closed-eye smile.
"It seems all of you are here." Dojima said, making them anxious even more.
"Not again!" Marui muttered, slightly shivering.
"Before I get into why you're here, I'd like to say a few things."
"At this point in time, 352 students have dropped out, and only 628 students remain. This may seem cruel, but this training camp is a microcosm of what it means to choose cooking as your career." Dojima said, looking around.
"Blah blah blah. Just get to the point and show the foods that you all made already." You muttered under your breathe, getting bored by listening to his statement. The others glance at you, scared for your possible future with Dojima.
"What do you mean foods that they made? How did you know, though?" They asked.
"Oh, Shinomiya-senpai told me!" You answered, giving them a small smile while tilting your head a bit.
"Eh? When did you and Shinomiya-senpai got close-"
"-This life is akin to wandering alone through a wind-torn barren wasteland. The more you climb, the more you will stumble, and the more your goal will become unclear. I wish all of you the best of luck from the bottom of my heart!" Dojima exclaimed louder to gain the attention of the others who were murmuring in the back.
"Now then, let us begin the final program of this camp."
"I knew it!" Whispers filled the lobby. The door flung opened, the others let out a squeal but was greeted by the staffs that were lined up.
"Welcome!" The staff shouted in unison.
"The final program consists of a modest banquet to celebrate the conclusion of the training camp. We will have all of you enjoy a full course meal prepared by the alumni." The alumnis were holding one of the dishes that they made.
"Let me now say to all 628 of you who survived: Congratulations for passing the training camp! Enjoy to your heart's content!" Dojima exclaimed, pointing at the long table filled with various of foods. The students started shouting because of joy, some of them sighing in relief knowing that they passed and they weren't dropped out.
"Congratulations to us." You told your friends and let out an eye-closed smile, delighted that all of you survived this hellish camp.
——————————
"Oh, so this is where your diner is! It's pretty cozy and nice." You mumbled softly, looking around Yukihira's place.
Yeah so here's the thing, You overheard that Yukihira will go to his house for a couple of hours- or days, you actually forgot honestly. Then, you started pestering him onto coming with him because you were curious what his house looks like— well, that was your excuse.
But honestly, you had nothing to do at the dorms and didn't feel like using any devices you had on so that's why you agreed to come with him.
"Mmm, We have a spare room upstairs, you could bring your stuff there. I'll just open this real quick," The red-haired male instructed.
"Okay!" You then went upstairs and attempted to find the room he had mentioned. Emphasize on the word 'attempted' because you really didn't know because your ass forgot to ask him where it was. Well, also his for not mentioning where it was.
"Whoa!"
"Yukihira's open!"
"What?!"
"It's true! Soma-chan, make me something!"
"Me, too!"
"For me, too!" You heard the shouts of plenty of people who were at the front of Yukihira's Diner, making you chuckle softly at how they seem to be excited to see the diner open.
"System?"
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
System:
Yes?
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
"Do you think he'll allow me to have free food because I'm good friends with him?"
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
System:
You have to unlock that route
to find out.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
"System you son of a bi-"
•❅─────✧❅✦❅✧─────❅•
After a few minutes of unpacking, you decided to go downstairs only to see the diner was packed with people that were eating, and some of them are waiting for their orders. You went towards Yukihira, who was serving the teens that you assumed to be around the same age as you based on their features.
"Soma, do you need any help?" You asked the boy who instantly turned his head to you. The red head laughed at your question for some reason.
"Oh, no need! Everything's under control." Yukihira replied as he placed their orders on the table. You nodded your head, slowly and averted your attention to the people who questioned why you were there.
"Then, you don't mind if I look around for a bit, right?" You asked again. Knowing Yukihira Soma, he would begin to freak out when he realized you were missing and out of his sight. Most likely, he would start to wail around town and cry because he thought you were probably kidnapped and shit. You were a valuable person, after all.
"Sure, there are plenty of stores outside, you should try them out!" The red-haired boy informed you. You gave him a closed-eye smile, showing a thumbs up to him.
"Okay, thank you!" You then jogged towards the door and went outside, the cold wind hitting your skin as you shiver slightly by the cold contact. You then look both sides and started walking towards the store that caught your eyes.
"Who's that? Your girlfriend?" The blonde girl asked Yukihira, who just let out a chuckle. Not wanting to answer the girl's question. Yukihira was about to open his mouth to change the topic when someone called him.
"Soma-chan, can I add sauteed snow pea sprouts to my order?" Someone asked, raising their hand up.
"Sure!"
"Damn, I was saved. Thank you, kind sir." Yukihira thought to himself as he started walking towards the place where the sauteed snow pea sprouts were.
"But yes, was that your girlfriend by chance?"
"WHO ORDERED TEMPURA?" Yukihira quickly changed the subject, laughing awkwardly.
•❅─────✧❅✦❅✧─────❅•
"Thanks for the food, Soma!" They thanked Yukihira before they left the diner to do whatever they want with their lives.
"Thanks for coming." The red-haired male waved them a goodbye even if they didn't see him.
"Soma~!" You shouted, running towards him while holding two paper bags filled with different types of foods and candies.
"Oh, Y/N!" He greeted you with a smile.
"Look, look! I found sooo many foods and sweets!" You excitedly said, opening the paper bags so he can peak inside. The male let out a chuckle and patted your head, trying to hide the red tint on his cheeks when he felt how soft and fluffy your hair was.
"She sounds like a child. Cute." Yukihira thought to himself, smiling softly at the girl. He then glance around and saw no one were shopping at the stores like before.
"Huh. Is it just me, or are there fewer people now? There should be more people around at this time of day." Yukihira muttered under his breathe.
"Yeah, there were like, two to four people in the other stores, and the other ones were dead empty." You exclaimed, as you also looked around. The male was surprised to see that you heard what he said. He took a note to himself not to mutter things out loud.
"Oh yeah! Soma, I found this shop from I forgot where, and they were selling those crispy thingy foods that looks like a chicken, but it isn't?" You raised your head up, eyes twinkling as you look at the boy while you were speaking. Yukihira who finds you cute at this exact scene— just gave you a confused look as you started explaining the food's texture and other stuff.
"Wait no, I think it is a chicken. 'Ya know those chicken nuggets but not like those?" You explained again, making Yukihira confused more.
"You know, that food called karaate..? Karugi..? Eh, it starts with the ka." You were having a hard time remembering the food's name, it took Yukihira a few seconds to understand it.
"Ah! Karaage!" He said and let out a loud laugh as he remember the names that you mentioned. I mean, Karugi and karaate is pretty far from "Karaage".
"Oh, Karaage!" You repeated, mentally nodding to remember that word again.
"Well, I ain't even japanese, how would I know that." You thought to yourself while pouting.
You slightly flinched after hearing someone sighing loudly. Like, who the hell sighs that loud? Both of you peaked inside the diner and saw someone who looks pale as hell. Super pale. He looks like a white statue that the Greek would have placed in a middle of a garden as design.
"What's wrong?" Yukihira asked.
"Are mega investors so great?!" The adult shouted.
"Eek!" You flinched by his shout.
"Tomi-chan, calm down." The person he was with was trying to calm down the man called Tomita.
"Did something happened, chairman?" Yukihira asked again, slightly worried.
"To tell you the truth, just about a month ago, the station's shopping complex reopened after renovations."
"Oh yeah. It's a lot nicer now." The red head mumbled.
"it's another one of those city in a station type of things. They have a bunch of stores selling clothes and books and stuff."
"One's really popular. It sells karaage. It's supposed to be really good." Tomita said, looking down at their hands.
"Huh.. Is that the Karaage store that you were saying, Y/N?" Yukihira said as they glance at your way. You went towards the empty chair and sat on it.
"Yeah, but I wouldn't say it's really good. It has a lot of flaws that you'll notice once you tried it. Well, if you're an expert that is." You told them, as you remembered that one of the karaage is too salty, while the other one was too bland. Or maybe it's just because of Y/N Kinoshita's skills.
"I remember, my parents brought some home the other day." The blonde reminisced.
"Mine, too. It was good, yeah."
"They showed it on TV, too!" The black haired male said.
As if on cue, they showed it on the television, seeing that the one who's tasting it gave out a 10 out of 10 for the dish.
"All the customers are going to Ekinaka for the karaage!" Tomita said while crying.
"Hmm.. That girl, I bet she's just a mere host and not really a professional who tastes food. If I was there, I would've gave it a 3 out of 10." You exclaimed as you leaned against the chair, your arms were folded together, dismissing the chairman's statement.
"Well, I'll figure something out." Yukihira mumbled, his eyes were closed while leaning against the wall.
"Figure what out?"
"Their man attraction is the karaage, right? Let's cook up a new karaage that can knock their socks off here." Yukihira proposed a plan.
"What? That's impossible, Soma-chan!" Tomita declined. You on the other hand felt a wave of excitement, your eyes almost glistening because of the sudden giddy feeling.
"Wah! That's a great idea!" You exclaimed.
"They top us on everything! Money, marketing, you name it. They're the wrong ones to pick a fight with." Tomita said.
"I think you forgot that you are looking down at Totsuki Academy's students right now." You spoke in a cold voice, making them shiver up their spines.
"Customers are greedy, you know? If you make something really good, they'll always find it. I'm one of you guys. I can't just watch this place become a ghost town! Let's steal our customer back with a new karaage recipe, and revive the shopping district!" Yukihira exclaimed, as the others started shouting.
"Well said, Soma-chan!"
"We can count on you!"
"All right, I'm gonna use my vacation to come up with a great dish!" Yukihira mumbled to himself, already planning the things that he would do.
"Oh yeah, Y/N. You can just go back to the school without me."
"Mmm? Who said I'll going? I'll join you guys." You told him as you look at your f/c painted nails. The red-haired male let out a small smile.
"First off, Who's this girl?" They then pointed at you.
"Ara~ I guess I'm not really well-known to oldies, huh? Maybe that's for my mother and father. Well then, I'd gladly introduce myself." You then stood up, chin high as you gave them a confident smile.
"I'm Y/N Kinoshita, it's nice to meet all of you."
[ special tag::
hallunii <3 ]
if you're a new reader of
this book please say hellooo !